The Moment To Decide

Wednesday of the Thirtieth Week in Course 2024

Today’s Gospel hits the lukewarm Christian right in the gut, if it first has an encounter with his head. Christ’s disciples have asked Him if there will be only a few humans saved. Jesus jumps right to the main point, telling them something more important than the question they asked about statistics. It’s “what about you guys? Do you know what YOU must focus on?” And he tells them: “Strive to enter by the narrow door; for many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able. When once the householder has risen up and shut the door, you will begin to stand outside and to knock at the door, saying, `Lord, open to us.' He will answer you, `I do not know where you come from.' Then you will begin to say, `We ate and drank in your presence, and you taught in our streets.' But he will say, `I tell you, I do not know where you come from; depart from me, all you evildoers!'” The critical question, then, is “will I be saved, and how?”

Our destination, then, is determined by our choices in life. In the 19th century, James Russell Lowell, a classically educated attorney, wrote a poem later set as a hymn. It was written as his protest against the war between the US and Mexico, because Lowell was a firm abolitionist, and the ultimate war question was “shall we have more states with slavery?” Remember the war started because of the annexation of Texas.

The hymn begins

Once to every man and nation

Comes the moment to decide,

In the strife of truth with falsehood,

For the good or evil side;

Some great cause, God's new Messiah,

Offering each the bloom or blight,

And the choice goes by forever

Twixt that darkness and that light.

Every generation has a defining moral question, often between life and death, but always between good and evil. In the nineteenth century, it was for the right to choose ownership of other humans, or against the exploitation of slaves. In the 1930s, German citizens had to choose between Nazi lies and Christian truths. Today people all over the world, especially in the West, must choose between allowing the murder of babies before birth or, perhaps, being dragged off to jail for protesting those murders.

I would hate to be a politician whose primary campaign issue might be pro-choice for slavery, like Stephen A. Douglass in 1858 Illinois, or pro-choice for abortion, like all nominees from a certain political party. I’d fear hearing those blood-chilling words from Our Lord: “I don’t know where you come from; depart from me, all you evildoers!” In every decade there is a moment of decision. Do we equip ourselves, by Scripture classes or other studies in moral theology, to make those decisions? Or do we just go along with the prevailing winds from our decadent culture? Decide today; don’t put it off.