The God of my choices

Against the backdrop of Paul's reasoning in Romans 1-6, where he repeatedly explains that we are saved by grace through faith, that we are set free so that we can choose to sin or not, he ends Chapter 6 with the following thought:

Romans 6:21-23

21 What fruit did you have then in the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. 22 But now having been set free from sin, and having become slaves of God, you have your fruit to holiness, and the end, everlasting life. 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Now this is quite a profound thought when we carefully think about it.  He explains that the wages of sin remains death - even for us who believe and put our faith in Christ for our salvation.  When we choose to sin we are still going to reap death as the fruit thereof.  Even though our souls are still saved by the grace of God from eternal death, the fruit of sin in this life still remains death.  In other words on a Monday morning it looks like this:  

If I choose to cheat on my wife or husband, the fruit of that will still be death to the trust and possibly the relationship.

If I steal from my employer, I may still loose my job.

If I commit fraud, I may still end up in jail.

If I cheat on my tax return, I may still end up with a criminal record,  fine, or a prison sentence.

And so I can carry on with examples, the wages of sin is death, we cannot continue to make sinful choices and think we are going to reap good fruit and blessings.

However the opposite is all the more true.  If we make good choices, the fruit of those choices will be holy and bring life to our relationships, our finances and every area of our life where we apply those principles.  Our good fruit will be rewarded by God and those choices lead to everlasting and eternal life, blessings and holiness - starting already in this life and culminating in our eternal life with Christ.

It really is such a simple principle - so why do we continue to make wrong choices?  I think this is the point to ponder this week.  Why do you and I still continue to make the wrong choices while God gave us the opportunity to make the right choices?  Can it be that we continue to give ourselves permission to sin with an attitude of 'it does not matter because we are saved?' Point is, it does matter because choices produce fruit - either for death or for life.  

Which choices do you and I have to revisit this week to perhaps change them for the better?  To change them into life-giving choices that bear holy fruit into eternity?

Perhaps we can ask the Holy Sprit to become the God of our choices?  

JJ Weeks - Choices