Making Godly Choices

Making Godly Choices

Pastor Jamie Wright * April 27, 2005

Deut 30:19 “…therefore, choose life that both you and your descendants may live…”

Joshua 24:15 “…choose for yourselves this day who you will serve; but as for me and my house we will serve the Lord.”

Adam and eve had a choice. Noah had a choice, Jonah had a choice, Zaccheaus had a choice and Paul had a choice.

Don’t let the devil convince you that you don’t have the power to choose.

“DAMNED IF I DO DAMNED IF I DON’T

God gave you the power to choose.

ANYONE EVER MADE A BAD CHOICE!

I did a little research and came across some bad decisions of History:

a: Sam Philips sold a small recording company to RCA in 1955 for $35,000. It included an exclusive contract with a young man called Elvis Presley. Unknowingly he forfeited millions of dollars in royalties.

b: Tom Sellick turned down the lead role for Indiana Jones.

c: A thief in America tried to steal 2 live lobsters and he decided to stick them down his pants.

d: In Germany a bank robber pulls out a gun and demands money. The teller says she needs to se his ID So he gets it out, takes the cash and leaves the Id behind.

e: A south African hang gliding instructor saw a beautiful woman sun bathing on a roof below his flight pattern. He decided to make an obscene gesture at her. The woman’s husband appeared with a rifle and blasted him out of the sky.

f: The girl who told Bill Gates (Microsoft) it’s the computer or me.

g: The Leyland P76.

h: Pausing for a moment when your wife asks, “ Do I look fat in this?”

All bad decisions.

What is the key to making wise decisions? Listen to God.

Proverbs2:5 & 9 “If you want better insight and discernment, learn the importance for reverence for the Lord and of trusting Him. He shows how to distinguish right from wrong and how to find the right decision every time.”

If you want to make good decisions listen to God. Today I want to give 6 very practical ways to test a decision.

1: The Ideal Test: Is it in harmony with the word of God?

Is what I am about to do ok with what God says in the Bible? This is always test number 1. In life you have to decide what’s going to be the thing you base your life on - what is going to be your ultimate authority for what you do. There are 2 choices: You base you decisions on Gods word or on what society values. What God says or what people say.

If you base your life around what the popular opinion of the day is your always going to be out of date. Things are constantly changing. What was in vogue 10 years ago is not today. Society’s opinions are constantly changing. There is no solid foundation it is always on the move. If you base your life on opinions, popular culture, political correctness or opinion polls you don’t have a life foundation to build on. You don’t have principles to live by.

On the other hand if you base your life on Gods word, the truth never changes. Truth is always truth. If God says something was wrong 10,000 years ago it was wrong 5,000 years ago, 500 years ago and today. I don’t care hat the opinion polls says, I don’t care what political correctness says. I don’t really acre what is given to us on the media. If God says it’s wrong it’s wrong. We have a choice to build our life on a shaky constantly changing foundation or you can build your life on what God says which never changes which gives you a solid foundation while everything else is up in the air.

If you reject, disobey or ignore Gods principles you’re the one who gets hurt.

The first question in a decision is what does God say about it. If God says its ok then I go for it if he doesn’t then I don’t.

The oldest temptation know to mankind is to doubt gods word. Whenever we find something in the bible we don’t’ like, think is a little restrictive or outdated, old fashioned we start to doubt God and say does the bible really say you can’t do this. Did god really say, did god really mean. Any time you start thinking that question you’ve fallen for the oldest trap in the world. It was satans original temptation, the one he used on Adam.

So when making a decision the first test is, what does God say about it in His word?

2: The Integrity Test: Would I want everyone to know about this decision I am making?