Decisions I Never Thought About.

Sometimes in life I have a tendency to believe that there are some experiences, situations, decisions that are shoe-ins. As in I don’t even have to look for them, seek them out, try to make them happen, they just will come knocking. I tend to plan my life around them. Prepare myself for their arrival, tailor myself into whatever it is I think will make those situations, experiences, and decisions easier.
But then the years pass.
And those experiences, situations, decisions---all of the shoe-ins---don’t come knocking. I have no door to open. Then, because those experiences didn’t happen, I find myself having to make other decisions by myself---decisions that I never thought I would have to make.

Is all of this too obtuse?

Let me bring it into a more tangible thought.
Girls who grow up as Christians tend to think that they will be married by the time they are 23. Do we want to get married by 23? Do we fear getting married by 23? Are we ready when we are 23?
That doesn’t matter; the fact is that all of us will be married by 23. It is our lot. Christian girls get married early. Period. It’s what we do.
But what about those of us who (gasp!)—don’t’? What if 23 comes and goes without the set of rings?
Then what?

Or what about those people who are going to be doctors? Their grandfather was a doctor, their father was a doctor, their uncle was a doctor, they will be a doctor. But then they can’t get into medical school.

Then what?
Then what do they do with their life?

Or what if someone planned to spend the majority of their life being a mom? But your body doesn’t want you to be a mom?

On our drive to Utah last week we came upon a storm.

There were all of these mangy looking clouds. We were happy to see that a storm was rolling in because they needed water desperately in these areas.

It didn’t take too long, however, before we realized that not all of those clouds had rain in them: most of them were smoke.
Smoke from the forest fires.

And I couldn’t help but think, “What if I was the one losing my house to all of that? How would I feel having everything taken away…and there being nothing I can do about it?”

What if, like them, the place where all of my hopes and dreams and futures went up, literally, in flames? If all that is burnable in this life-eternal did just that---burn?

What happens when God changes your plans? And night and day you wrestle with how in the world you are going to reconcile yourself to the new normal?

It’s the classic issue of God’s ways not being our ways. His being higher than ours (Is. 55:8-9), and trying to figure out how in the world to be a man of God or a woman of God when what you thought the world was going to look like isn’t how it turns out to look.

I was talking to a friend about it; one who knows what life is like when you are in this stage, and suddenly I knew. Life in this stage is exactly the same as life when you ARE married by 23, going to be a doctor, going to be a mom, what-have-you:

To live is Christ.

Four really simple words.

To live, i.e. to be alive, whether in want or need, waiting or promise-fulfilled, riches and wealth, hunger, famine, or even if it’s just having to make decisions you never thought you would have to make, is Christ. All is Christ. Every experience, situation, decision, planned or unaccounted for, if it involves living, then be it unto Christ.

In Philippians, when Paul is in jail writing to a church, he says to them, “Now I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel.” (Phil 1:12)

Did Paul particularly enjoy being in jail?
I can imagine not.
Was that his goal as a small boy, to be an inmate?
Doubtful.
But he knew that to live, whether chained or free, is Christ.
And even more, he knew a lesson I hope to learn: If we are living in Christ, Jesus will conform all things to his will. He makes all of our circumstances his servants. They serve to advance the gospel, to do its bidding.
Now that is hope; that is something worth living for.

Acts 17:26-28 says “From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’

The gospel of Jesus, the life of the Christian is a simple one:

To live is Christ.
To seek him.
To reach out for him.
To find him.
To advance the gospel.
Because in no one else do we live and move and have our being.