Making Choices

It all started with me making the choice to love God. 1 Corinthians 13 says that no matter what we do, without love it is nothing. In my experience, choosing to love God makes all the other choices easier to make.

A few months ago I realized that I didn't *feel* like I loved God. I understand that our emotions don't necessarily tell us the truth, but it bothered me just the same. So the next time I prayed, I started with, "I choose to love you, God, because You first loved me." It seemed like an obvious place to start, because that's what the Bible says. I have to admit, though, that at the time I didn't *feel* like God loved me any more than I *felt* like I loved God! But I knew the Word is the truth, and I knew (at least intellectually) that therefore God loved me.

Once I started thinking of reasons to love God - reasons that are stated in the Bible - I noticed that they were all about what God DID for me. That frustrated me, too, in the sense that if my love for someone is based on what they do for me, then if they don't do what I want them to do, the love seems to dwindle.

From there I started to think about the people in my life that I KNEW loved me. What was it that caused me to believe that they loved me? The biggest reason was that they never left me alone...no matter how much I struggled. In that sense, the verse that says, "we love because He first loved us" began to come to life. So my *choice* was tweeked to include, "I choose to love You because You stick by me no matter what."

I remember being at church one morning and singing about God's love and how wonderful it is. I thought to myself, "How I wish I believed that!" At that point it seemed like I was miles away from where I wanted to be in my "love relationship" with God. It wasn't long after that, though, that I began my prayer one morning with my usual choice to love God and realized that I didn't have to CHOOSE any more! It had happened - I LOVED GOD!!! And even better, I KNEW, without a doubt, no matter what, that God loved me and was with me for the long haul!

Since that point, God has shown me different things about which I needed to make choices. I think the most amazing thing I've seen, is that every other choice has truly been easier. Things I have desired to know the truth about - to feel deep in my heart - are happening seemingly automatically. I heard a pastor once say that when your focus is in the right place - on God - things happen by the serendipity principle. I have seen that to be the truth.

All this being said, I do not want to give the impression that bad things don't ever happen. Rather, with a different perspective, they cease to hold me in the bondage of despair. Like Paul, I can find joy in every situation because God has become the Source of my joy.

It also doesn't mean that I don't have a bad day every once in a while. I have noticed, however, that those bad days are a result of me reverting back to old habits and looking for answers in my own mind, rather than going directly to God. A few years ago, a friend told me that I might as well tell God what I'm thinking since He knows already anyway. To be honest, it's not always pretty. But, again, because I KNOW that God will never leave me, I know I can express when I am to Him at any given moment without fear.

For so many years I have tried to walk in love - as stated in 1 Corinthians 13 - and in the fruit of the Spirit - as stated in Galatians 5. Through this experience, I have learned that those things are not what I do to impress God (or man), but rather they are a result of knowing God's love for me and returning that love back to Him. I admit that I do not walk perfectly in those traits. But I am finding that they are easier to walk in with this *love connection* than they were before.