(Note: I enjoyed reading the introduction of Lee Huddleston's sermon here on Sermon Central; so I have borrowed his introduction, and used my own material for the body.)
Introduction
I’m not a big Country music fan…
but I did go through a country music phase in my teens...
whether you like country music or not...
one thing you gotta admit...
they have the best song titles of any musical genre…
Here are a few:
“You ain’t worth the salt in my tears”...
"May The Bird Of Paradise Fly Up Your Nose"
"You Can’t Roller Skate In A Buffalo Herd"
"Thank God And Greyhound She’s Gone "
"I’ve Got The Hungries For Your Love & I’m Waiting In Your Welfare Line"
"I Got Tears In My Ears While Lying On My Back Thinking About You"
"How Can I Miss You If You Won’t Go Away?"
"If Love Were Oil, I’d Be A Quart Low "
"If The Phone Don’t Ring, Baby, You’ll Know It’s Me "
"She Done Tore My Heart And Stomped That Sucker Flat"
"Drop Kick Me, Jesus, Through The Goal Posts Of Life"
"Her Teeth Was Stained, But Her Heart Was Pure"
"I Been Roped and Throwed by Jesus in the Holy Ghost Corral”
Wow...It makes you wonder what’s the story behind some of those songs...
-There’s another country song title with a story behind it...
that I want to use to illustrate our Scripture reading today...
It is by George Jones.
George Jones is widely considered to be the greatest living country music singer (at least according to wikipedia)...
A lot of his songs are the stereotypical "cheat’n & drink’n" songs that seem to be so prevalent in Country Music...
And it was no secret that George Jones had a drug/alcohol/woman problem ...
But on March 6, 1999 George Jones was critically injured when he crashed his Lexus into a bridge in Nashville....
The investigation showed that George had been drunk at the wheel. Thankfully he recovered, and two months later his new album called "Cold Hard Truth" came out...
and on it was a hit song titled "Choices"...
And the key phrase in the song that brings me to our Scripture reading...
George Jones sings, "I’m Living And Dying With The Choices I Made".
(Show video)
From my reading about George Jones...
he credits his 4th wife, whom he is currently married to...
to helping him get off the drugs and alcohol...
Think what you will about George Jones...
there certainly is a sober truth to that song...
not just for George Jones...but for all of us...
“I’m living and dying with the choices I made”
Read text: Deuteronomy 30:15-20
First of all, I want you to see that you do have a choice!!
This morning, I woke up and chose which tie I would wear...
I chose what I would eat for breakfast...
I chose whether to stop for gas at the Kangaroo...
or at Murphy’s...
And I chose whether to get a second mortgage on the house in order to pay for the gas...
When we go out to eat...
we choose McDonald’s or Burger King...
KFC or Arby’s...
Applebys or Panera Bread...
Stavro’s or Firehouse...
we choose whether we want water, sweet tea, or diet coke with our meal...
Some choices are what I would say are unimportant choices...
like where you will eat lunch...
but other choices are more important...
I have chosen to be faithful to my wife...
I have chosen to raise my kids in the church...
I have chosen to give 10% of my income to the Lord...
I have chosen to give my heart to Jesus and to be a Christian...
It’s been the same since the beginning...
people have always had a choice...
Adam and Eve, all the way back to Genesis 2:16...
they had a choice...
God told them that they were free to eat from any tree in the garden...
but that they shouldn’t eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil”...
And, we know the results of that choice...
they didn’t choose well!!
and sin entered our world...
and we’ve been battling with it ever since!
Here in our Scripture reading...
Moses has been leading the Israelites during the 40 years of wandering in the wilderness...
and he is preaching a final sermon before he dies...
He has been with them day and night for 40 years...
they have lived together...
camping out together...
he has seen them at their best ...and their worst...
he knows the things that they have struggled with...
And here...in some of his last words to his people...
before he dies...
and Joshua takes them into the Promise Land...
he is sharing some things that he considers to be very important...
he won’t be entering the Promise Land with them...
but he has a pretty good idea of the types of things that they will face...
he realizes that they will be faced the worship of other gods by the Canaanites...
and he tells them that they can choose...
they can choose between following God and His ways...
or they can reject God and go their own way...
Joshua, near the end of his life, he too explained to the people that they had a choice...
But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you,
then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve,
whether the gods your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates,
or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living.
But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.”
Joshua 24:14
In one of my favorite stories in the Bible...
Elijah was on Mount Carmel...
and he challenged the prophets of Baal to a contest to see who’s God was the One True God...
whether the gods of baal...
or the Lord God whom Elijah served...
And Elijah confronted the people, in 1 Kings 18:21...
Elijah went before the people and said,
“How long will you waver between two opinions?
If the Lord is God, follow him;
but if Baal is God, follow him.”
But the people said nothing.
But this isn’t just Old Testament theology...
we have the same choices today...
we can choose to follow God...
or we can choose to go our own way...
Secondly, I want you to see that you get to live with the consequences of your choice.
That’s the important message that I trust George Jones learned when he sang, “I’m living and dying by the choices I made”...
Our choices have a big impact on what happens to us...
George Jones chose to drink and drive and it almost killed him...
I try to get my kids to see the importance of choosing wisely...
If they choose to study hard and get good grades...
or if if they choose to not work as hard and get average or bad grades...
I’m amazed at the choices that are in sports...
my boys play basketball and Lora plays volleyball...
in basketball, Ethan or Jason might have a split second to decide whether to go for the steal...or go for the block...
and they get to live with the consequences of that split second decision...
if they go for the steal and miss...
the opposing player may make an easy basket...
and their coach might sit them on the bench, as a result...
but if they get the steal...
then they might get the easy basket...
and the coach will let them keep playing...
We all live with the consequences of our choices...
If we abuse alcohol...like George Jones did...
we get to live with things like cirrhosis of the liver...
DWI’s...and car accidents...
If we choose to eat unhealthily...
then we get to live with the health consequences of being overweight...
(moving quickly on)...
And there are certainly consequences of our spiritual choices...
If we choose to follow God...
and live a Christian life...
the result of that choice...
is a life of joy...hope...abundant life...
and eventually, eternal life in heaven...
If we choose to go our own way...
and reject God’s way...
then the result of that choice is ultimately death and destruction...
Now...it certainly bears pointing out...
sometimes the consequences of our choices come right away...
like going for the steal in the basketball game...
leading to an immediate turnover...
sometimes the consequences come later...
just because someone chooses to reject God and go his/her own way...
that doesn’t mean that they will just keel over and die right on the spot...
(although that has happened...but I’ll save that for another sermon)...
more than likely, the consequences come later...
broken families...broken homes...
broken lives...and ultimately, as Moses pointed out...death and destruction...
So...the good news...you get to choose...
if you’ve chosen wisely...then there’s even better news...
you get to enjoy the consequences of that choice...
but if you’ve chosen UNwisely, then the BAD NEWS is...
you have to suffer the consequences of that choice...
So, what’s a person to do?...let me give you the advice that Moses gave to the people in verses 19 & 20
***Choose Life...vs. 19
Moses points out that our choices affect our children...
my choice to bring my kids to church affects them...
if I chose to NOT bring my kids to church...
that would certainly affect them too...
Following Jesus is not always the EASIEST path in the short term...
Jesus said, in Matthew 7:13-14...
“Enter through the narrow gate.
For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction,
and many enter through it.
But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life,
and only a few find it.”
Choosing Jesus is not always the most popular choice...in the world’s eyes...
The path is not always the easiest to travel...
sometimes it seems like you are swimming upstream in a world that just goes with the flow...
But ask any committed Christian...
and there are many here this morning...
and they will testify to the wonderful blessing of choosing Jesus...
Although the road isn’t always easy...
with Jesus...it is never harder than we can bear...
Moses told the people of Israel...
in Deut. 30:11-14...which are the verses leading up to our Scripture reading...
where he is placing the choices before us...
he says...
Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, “Who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?” Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, “Who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?” No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.
Jesus Christ is here today...
You can choose Him today...
it isn’t so hard that you can’t handle it...
***Love the Lord your God. vs 20
Giving your heart to Jesus isn’t a drudgery...
it isn’t something you do out of regret or fear...
it is something that we do out of love...
That’s the story of the alabaster offering...
expressing your deep love to the Lord in generous gifts...
we don’t serve the Lord out of a spirit of feeling that we HAVE to...
we serve the Lord because we WANT to...
we love the Lord because He has done so much for us...
***Listen to His voice. vs. 20
Jesus speaks to us...
we need to tune our ear to hear His voice...
I’ve never heard Jesus speak to me in a audible voice...
but I sense His voice in my heart...in my conscience...
and when Jesus is speaking to me...
it is very real and very meaningful...
He speaks to me when I read and study the Bible...
He speaks to me through songs that I sing in worship...
He speaks to me through my personal time spent in prayer and devotions...
I have sensed Him speaking to me about things that I have said or done...but shouldn’t have...
and I have sensed Him speaking about things that I should have said or done...but didn’t...
There are times ...glorious times when I sense the closeness and warmth of His love for me...
but we won’t HEAR His voice unless we LISTEN for HIS voice...
so, in the words of Moses...”Listen to His voice”
***Hold Fast to Him vs. 20
To me, this is the picture of a father and his young child walking through a freshly plowed field...
as long as the father is holding the child’s hand...
the child will be fine...
but if the child chooses to pull his hand free from his father’s grasp...
and run on ahead on his own...
likely, it won’t be long before the child falls on the uneven dirt of a plowed field...
but, if that child holds fast to his father’s hand...
he will be able to walk securely...
so it is with Jesus...
we can be assured that Jesus will not let us go...
but, if we decide on our own to pull free...
and go charging off on our own...
we will surely fall flat on our face...
so, in the words of Moses...”Hold Fast to Him”...
Conclusion
Well, life is full of choices...
If I give my kids a dollar to spend at the convenience store when I buy gas...
they might stand in the candy aisle for 10 minutes...
trying to decide what to get...
for those of you going out for lunch after the service...
you might spend awhile looking through the menu...
because there are many choices available to you...
But in our text...
the really important choice...
the most crucial choice you will ever make...
is only between 2 things...
“See, I set before you today: life and death”...
You would think this would be a real easy choice...
a slam dunk...
but many people in the world today...
and perhaps even some here today...
have chosen the way of death and destruction...
Jesus said, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life”...
there is no other way...
the lie of the world today is that there are many ways to salvation...
there are many roads to heaven...
even Christians have bought into this...
studies have been done among Christians...
and many of them believe that as long as you are a good person...
that is all that matters...
But the Bible tells us differently...
and the beauty of it all...
you get to choose...
maybe for some of you...
in the past, you chose to walk with God...
but you have pulled away from Him...
and you are running on ahead on your own...
and you are struggling...
and falling...
and your life isn’t where you know it should be...
and you know that if you don’t make a better choice...
you will eventually die...
The wonderful thing about Jesus...
if you are here today...
He is giving you another opportunity to make a choice...
Right now is a moment of decision...
you can choose Jesus...
or you can choose to continue to go your own way...
I encourage you to choose Jesus...
choose life...
love the Lord...
listen to His voice...
hold fast to Him...
#466 Yes, Lord, Yes
