Choices we make

Some years ago there was a most upsetting, but also challenging story on ESPN, the American sports network.  It was about Robert Knight, a boy who played Little League in Michigan, Detroit.  On June 24, 2001 (before many of you were born!) he pitched a perfect game.  He struck out every single batter that came up for the six innings (Little League has six innings).  He was on fire!  Even when it came down to the very last batter, and the count was 3 balls and no strikes, and it seemed like that batter had every opportunity to hit him, he struck out.  When the game was over, everyone rushed to him:  his coach gave him a hug, members of the other team shook his hand, and people came out of the stands.  It was incredible!  There had never been a no-hitter in the Little League in Michigan up to that point – ever!
   
There was only one problem:  His parents weren’t there to see it.  When people found out they weren’t there, they wanted to know why they had missed this most historic occasion in the League and in their son’s life.  Evidently, they made a decision to go shopping that day with their daughter – to buy a gift for a family member for a party that was coming up.  The lesson from this, according to the reporter from ESPN is that the choices and decisions we make in life can have huge consequences.  They did nothing wrong – let’s just be clear - this is not a guilt trip on the parents!  It is just that they had made a choice, and in making that choice they missed out on one of the biggest moments in their child’s life.  Choices matter!  Choices can change the whole direction of our lives.

I don’t mean the little choices that you make; like do I listen to Twenty One Pilots, The Weekend, Drake or Bruno Mars.  I would choose Bruno Mars, just so you know.  Those are little things!  But there are big choices.  There are choices like: Who am I going to follow in my life? Am I going to try whenever possible to do the right thing? Am I going to do things that are going to make other people’s live better? And most especially, am I going to have someone in my life to guide and strengthen me every day?  In a few moments time, you are going to recite a promise, and when you do, it is like making a choice in public, for everyone to hear and see.  But, as we’ve already heard in our incredible text this morning from the Book of Joshua, sometimes choices must be made.  

Joshua was one of the great leaders of the people of Israel, and he was at one of the defining moments in the life of the people of God.  It was one of the central moments in The Old Testament, the people of Israel had been brought out of Egypt, and many of you will have read the story of Moses and the people crossing the sea and coming to freedom.  Well, Joshua is looking for the land that God had promised the people of Israel: the Promised Land, the land of Canaan, eventually to lead them to Israel.  The problem is the people were living in the land of a group of people called the Amorites, and they were comfortable living there.  They had food, clothing, and family life. Why would they disturb that to go and do something that God wants them to do?
 
Joshua challenges them, and says:  “I want you to decide today who you are going to serve.”  In other words, “Are you going to take the easy road or are you going to take God’s road?  Are you going to stay where you are, or are you going to do what God has decided is in your best interest?”  Then he says something remarkable and it so much like what you and your families are saying today, “As for me and my family, we are going to serve the Lord.”  In other words:  we are not going to take the easy road; we are going to go where God wants us to go and do what God wants us to do.  In a sense, as one of the great Old Testament theologians, Walter Brueggemann says, “This was a heavy moment for them!  It was a tough decision!”  But had they not taken it, there would have been no Israel.  There would have been no Jerusalem.  There would have been no King David.  There would have been no Jesus of Nazareth!  Everything hung in the balance.  Are they going to go, or are they going to stay? Are they going to follow God, or are they going to take the easy road?  They followed God, and Joshua led them.

You see, the choices that we make can make a huge difference.  Some of you will have seen on television, the Internet and Facebook the last few days that there are people in our country and elsewhere that are painting swastikas on buildings, and I really want you to think about this.  Do you know what swastikas stand for?  They stand for the Nazi ideology about the Aryan identity. Horrible thing!  This got me reading about Viktor Frankl, a man who ended up in a concentration camp during the Second World War.  He wrote a book – you won’t know it – but some time later on in your life you might read it.  It is called Man’s Search for Meaning.  You have got to find meaning in the world!  He tells a really simple story about two boys.  They are twins living in the concentration camp.  These twins were brought up in the same way but lived completely different lives.  One of them grew up to hate people, to discriminate, to be rude and nasty.  All he saw around him was hatred and violence, so he decided that the best way to survive was to be as nasty as they were.  The other twin made a different choice.  To do what he thought was the right thing:  to care for people, to share his food with the hungry, to give clothes to them when they were cold, to be kind, to love his parents, and to embrace faith and prayer.  He decided to do the exact opposite to the environment in which he found himself.  Two brothers, identical, but as Frankl said, “They made different choices.”

Life is a series of choices.  Today, you have a big one to make:  To follow in the path of God, or simply follow another path. There is one thing you need to know: while we make a choice, and those choices affect our lives, God made a choice about us first.  What did Joshua say at the end?  “I was in Egypt, but God brought us out.  We were slaves, but God set us free.  We had no land, and now we have land.”  God had chosen them!  And if this Advent time, and if the Communion that we are going to have in a few moments time means anything, it is that the sign that God has chosen us in the coming of his Son, Jesus Christ, and our ultimate choice is to say, along with Joshua, “We will serve God.  We will follow God.  We will be faithful to God.”  When you do that, you will find your best decision.  As I look at you and with you for the next few years, I am excited to see how your destiny will unfold! Amen.