The Chosen's Choices

Mark Dunagan
06/03/12 - Sunday Morning

The Chosen's Choices

“The modern world offers an endless range of choice and change, overwhelming traditional simplicities and cohesion…Life has become a smorgasbord with an endless array of dishes.  And more important still, choice is no longer just a state of mind.  Choice has become a value, a priority, a right.  To be modern is to be addicted to choice and change” (The Call, Os Guinness p. 165). 

Choices Have Always Existed

It might seem like we are overwhelmed with choices these days, yet the church was born and flourished in a culture that included many choices, especially when it came to what to believe in.  The First Century world was filled with all sorts of false religions—as was the Old Testament world (Joshua 24:15).

The Downside of Choices

• The Erosion of Commitment

“Stone, it is said, was the medium of the ancients and steel for the early moderns; ours is plastic and the name of the game is recycling.  ‘One-and-only’ and ‘forever’ are obsolete, and ‘needing more space’ is our most readily given excuse. In our fragmented lives the one thing necessary is to ‘keep our options open’….And since the rules of the game change as fast as the games themselves, we are taught to avoid, above all, being ‘stuck’ with commitments that might ‘mortgage’ the freedom of tomorrow” (The Call p. 166).

• The Unchallengeable Term

“Choice for modern people is a right that overwhelms both responsibility and rationality.  Witness how arguments against abortion on demand are shipwrecked on the rocks of choice.  The label ‘pro-choice’ attempts to settle the argument by seizing the unchallengeable term.  Arguments against choice need to recognize the special, godlike power of choice” (The Call, p. 167).

• The Danger of Dark Freedom

“Each choice sprouts with its own questions.  Might we?  Could we?  Should we?  Will we?  Won’t we?  What if we had?  What if we hadn’t?” (p. 166).   Therefore, we hear people talking about being “overloaded” or “overwhelmed”, because there is so much to do and so little time, and all the planning and juggling in the world cannot make up the difference.  I like the phrase dark freedom because our modern world of choice can seem like freedom, but it likewise can become a form of slavery, “They are choked with worries and riches and pleasures of this life” (Luke 8:18).

• Rootless Moments

When a culture is addicted to choice, there is a loss of unity and coherence in life.  “Each moment stands on its own, with neither roots in any yesterday nor consequences for any tomorrow.  Like a sound-bite or headline, each experience bursts into our attention and quickly fades from our memory.  So today’s rage is ridiculous tomorrow; today’s celebrity is tomorrow’s bore.  Not surprisingly, attention-deficit is a contemporary disorder” (p. 166).

• Too Busy for God?

I have seen people in this world of so many choices fall into the trap of being so busy with things that will not matter in eternity, but no time for the things that will last.  Yet, as I read Scripture, I find that other cultures in the past had many of the same problems.  In God's word we see the fleeting nature of celebrity (Ecclesiastes 4:15-16), people who were addicted to the latest fad (Acts 17:21), people who were incredibly busy with an array of things that did not matter (Acts 24:25 “When I find time”; Matthew 6:32 “For all these things the Gentiles eagerly seek”), and people overwhelmed with the choices that life presents to them (Matthew 6:31 “With what shall we clothe ourselves”).

The Answer

“Ultimately only one thing can conquer choice—being chosen” (The Call, p. 167).  I believe that the writer is correct.  Understanding that when I became a Christian, I accepted the gospel call (1 Thessalonians 2:13), and when I accepted the gospel call, I accepted God’s personal invitation to me to follow Him. Oh how this puts all the choices available to me in their right categories.  In becoming a Christian the following verses should automatically and beautifully limit the choices in my life:

• “You are the salt of the earth” (Matthew 5:13).
• “You are the light of the world” (Matthew 5:14).
• “Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 5:16).
• “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?  For you have been bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20).
• “Therefore also we have as our ambition, whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to Him” (2 Corinthians 5:9).
• “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me, and delivered Himself up for me” (Galatians 2:20).
• “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9).

What Clarity God Offers Us!

• With God, one's life, in fact,  has direction. Rather than being merely a jumble of experiences, of sound and fury signifying nothing, you are fulfilling a God given purpose (2 Timothy 4:6-8).
• There is a definite, and beautiful story-line from your and my conversion to the Judgment Day that culminate upon hearing the blessed words, "Well done, good and faithful servant."  Instead of getting off-track, God gives you and I the strength to stay focused on what is really important, and the ability to avoid the mistake of focusing our attention on all the inessentials (Proverbs 17:24).
• We can use our time wisely (Ephesians 5:16).  “Modern life assaults us with a infinite range of things we could do, we would love to do, or some people tell us we should do.  But we are not God and we are neither infinite nor eternal.  We are quite simply finite.  We have only so many years, so much energy, so many gray cells, and so many bank notes in our wallets” (p. 169).
• This is why Jesus said with simplicity, “Seek first His kingdom and His righteousness” (Matthew 6:33).  In every aspect of my life, the simple rule is “kingdom business first”, “seeking God’s level of living first”.  Certainly the, kingdom comes first in my marriage, the way I treat my parents, what I do with my free time, in my relationships, in how I work, and all these priorities are seen in my schedule.  Kingdom living predominates.  I am one of the chosen people, so everything I do and say needs to reflect that chosen status:  My dress, my speech, my priorities, how I entertain myself, and my dedication to serving others and helping others into the kingdom.
• On the night of His betrayal, Jesus prayed, “I glorified Thee on the earth, having accomplished the work which Thou hast given Me to do” (John 17:4).  May we all have this single-minded devotion toward bringing praise to God by accomplishing His purposes here without getting side-tracked.  As is true in our own lives, in order to finish the work, Jesus too had to reject all sorts of other distracting choices and options.  Someone has noted that the only single motive that is strong enough to endure over a person’s lifetime is the “yes” to God and the “no” to the chaos of modern demands. 

Mark Dunagan | mdunagan@frontier.com
Beaverton Church of Christ | 503-644-9017
www.beavertonchurchofchrist.net