A Living Choice

 

“I have issued an edict that throughout all the dominion of my kingdom people are to revere and fear the God of Daniel. “For he is the living God; he endures forever. His kingdom will not be destroyed; his authority is forever. He rescues and delivers and performs signs and wonders in the heavens and on the earth. He has rescued Daniel from the power of the lions!”  Daniel 6:26-27

Being faithful to God isn’t something you do in a big moment in your life. It isn’t a one-time decision. The reality is that when faced with a major life choice, when you’re under the gun so to speak, especially if it’s a moment of stress and pressure, you’re not likely to make an admirable choice that is different from the types of choices you’ve been making in your life up to this point. We all wonder if when faced with a terrible choice we would make the noble one. Would we sacrifice ourself for others? Would we stand up for what we believe in even if it would cost us everything? The reality is, you can probably answer that question today.

Daniel was abducted from his homeland as a young man and taken to a foreign place. By God’s grace, he stood out among the captives and was chosen to serve in the king’s court. From the very beginning Daniel set himself apart by not partaking in the fancy meat and wine of the court. He wasn’t being snobby, the meat and wine had been sacrificed to a false god and Daniel knew that it would be a form of worshipping that god to eat it. Even though he risked getting in trouble, he asked if he and his close friends could skip the meat and wine parts of the meals, having them subsist on vegetables and water alone. That probably didn’t sound particularly fun to a young man living in a foreign court, but again, his priorities were in honoring God, not pleasure. As time went on, Daniel continued to distinguish himself as a person of wisdom and integrity. By the time King Darius came into power, Daniel could easily have been cast aside with all the previous empire’s trappings, but something was seen in him that made him worth keeping around. In fact, he was one of the three highest rulers and was in line to be made ruler over all the other rulers. The other rulers didn’t appreciate this and wanted to be rid of him, but they couldn’t find any fault in anything he did. He lived his life above board, following the rules to a T. He wasn’t selfish or money-grabbing, he didn’t keep a little aside or cut corners. So the only way they could find to catch him was in the one thing he was consistent in, worshipping his God. That’s what he was absolutely known for. Unfortunately, the king was also known for being vain and not too smart so he was easily tricked into signing an edict to have everyone worship him, only to realize too late that this would sentence his favorite satrap, or ruler, to the lions’ den. But even the king knew that Daniel, faithful in worshipping his God, might be saved by that same God. And he was! But even after witnessing Daniel being saved by his God, the other satraps couldn’t make a last-minute profession of faith to save themselves and their families. They were doomed to the fate they had tried to force on Daniel.

I remember, as a kid, hearing others say they wanted to live their lives as they’d like and then, at the last minute, accept Christ and go to heaven. I wonder about that now. If you live your whole life centered on yourself, in that pivotal moment would you really be able to lay your life down for Christ. In fact, it seems like the more you live for yourself, the more you push God away, and the less likely you’d be to even consider Him in the moments before your death.

You hear about big life moments people have, times when they choose to stand up for others or stand up for God. What you don’t see is the 10,000 times they chose God leading up to those moments. Dozens of times a day I talk to Him, asking for wisdom, praising Him for His goodness and beauty, seeking His provision for loved ones. I take time to study His word and reflect on it, like this. I choose to surround myself with music that honors God and points me to Him.

Here's the Thing: I fill my day with choices for God so that when the big, hard moments come, those choices are easy. Those choices have already been made.