Who Gets To Make Decisions In Your Life?

There are a number of perspectives and attitudes that we accept as normal but which have no part in our Christian walk. Those of you who are students right now are facing it. Some of you who are considering changing jobs are facing it. Some of you who are simply deciding what to do after work are facing it. Who gets to make the decision in our lives?

The obvious choice is us, but we have to ask ourselves how influenced we are by this age of the individual. Everyone assumes that we get to decide the direction of our life and that Yahweh will use whatever we make available to him. There are tons of books on the subject of decision making and most come to the same conclusion: "Do whatever makes you happy". But that is the fundamental problem with this thinking; we are not here to be happy.

There is only one book I consider to have the authority to set the foundation of my life and that is the Bible, the Word of God. And there is only one who has shown us the way and has set the example for us and his name is Jesus. He stated that he said nothing and did nothing in his own authority but only that which they Father had given him to say and do. There are also Scriptures such as this:

O Lord, I know the way of man is not in himself;
It is not in man who walks to direct his own steps. (Jeremiah 10:23)

This is why we need Jesus. We were born in rebellion to Yahweh. It is natural to us and no matter how hard we try to live up to his standards, we can't do it without help. That help came in the form of Jesus who sacrificed himself to remove the barrier between us and Father. He also sent to us the Holy Spirit for plenty of reasons but one of the big ones is so that he could remain with us, in us. He gives us direction, strength, power, and energy to do Father's will. But a rebellious attitude can be hard to shake off, even when we are singing songs of love.

To do what we want, when we want, how we want is part of our natural rebellious attitude, and as long as we think we are the "captains of our own destiny" we will find it impossible to get rid of. It is only in a daily humble attitude, recognizing we no longer belong to ourselves and that our entire desire is to do the Father's will, that this rebellion will die as the Spirit expunges it from us. But it requires an attitude of cooperation and a desire for the one who is above us. Not always easy in our culture but we belong to a more ancient, powerful and superior culture; for we are citizens of the Kingdom. Our ways are no longer our own as we learn to walk like Jesus, as he directs, for the Father's purpose.