What Choices Will You Make?

Sirach 15:11-20

Today is the 6th Sunday after Epiphany.  The Old Testament reading for this Sunday is from the Apocryphal Book of Sirach, also sometimes called Ecclesiasticus.  The author, Sirach, was a philosopher who deeply loved God, His Word, and the Temple.  He wrote this book around 200 BC.  Even though it is from the Apocrypha, we can always glean some wisdom from followers of the Lord.

This reading deals with man’s free will.  Verses 15 - 17 clearly show that God has given us free will to choose what path we turn onto in our life.  These choices can, and do, affect  us for the rest of our life, and frequently for all eternity.

In verse 15 we see that we choose whether to obey God and His Word or not to.  Our choice in this definitely affects both our life here, and our final destination, our life in eternity.  God gave us His Word, but He has given us a free will whether or not to follow that Word.  It is our choice whether to obey Him.

Verse 16 says that we stretch out our hand to choose between fire or water, and take one.  We can choose between something that can possibly hurt us, or something that can help us.  We can’t blame God for our bad choices.  We can’t blame anyone else for our choices.  Our free will can lead us to things that harm us, or things that help us.

Then in verse 17 we have the choice between life and death.  Will what we choose from day to day bring life or bring death?  This not only has to do with any violence we can bring to others or our own life, but also the whole spirit of our life.  Does our choice bring a positive spirit to ourself and others, or a negative one?  Then, also, there is the free will choice between life and death for the unborn.  They aren’t allowed to make the choice to life, but we choose one or the other for them.

We have the free will to choose spiritual life for ourselves, or spiritual death.  God does not force us to accept Him.  We must choose for ourselves whether to accept the Lord Jesus as our personal Savior and thus have eternal life, or to reject Him and have eternal death.

What is our choice?