Searching around for something, anything, all things, even abstaining from things in order to discover happiness.  Nothing, maybe nothing will fill me with a sense of calm, removing this desire for peace from my worried heart.  But in the nothing you meet old powers, fallen spirits and a quest for mastery of science, light, wind, water and fire.  You give up the quest for the material only to become obsessed with the immaterial.  Joy remains elusive and still you scream at the top of your lungs when anyone suggests the hope and joy found in Jesus.  It is as a starving man who refuses porridge because he craves steak and in so doing wastes his last strength seeking what he cannot have.  This of course is insanity because who has known a man dying of hunger or thirst that would not eat anything put before him?  Even worse, Jesus is the full buffet, overflowing, with happiness, joy, peace and strength flowing from endless cornucopia, yet you will not accept His Grace.

The real power behind joy is choice.  I may exercise this Sovereign Power of choice because God first chose me, exercising His own Authority to include me in His Divine Guidance and Opportunity.  God demonstrated the gravity that comes along with self-determination, discernment and decision making.  It is the true power of this life to be fully responsible, prepared and capable of making choices.

I choose to believe in Jesus Christ as the only way, door, avenue and sacrifice, available to save me, cleanse me, deliver me and justify me from the contagion of sin that infected humanity after Adam and Eve’s failure to choose appropriately.  I choose not to be an intimidator, a victim, an avoider or a finger pointer, accepting the full authority, impact and responsibility for the choices I have and will make.  I choose to understand God’s Word to the extent that when someone attempts to twist, adjudicate, manipulate or rewrite that Sovereign Word, I may not follow them down the road into conflict with the Almighty.  I choose to serve His Will for my life, putting aside my own minor perceived and often flawed perspective, relinquishing my own “understanding” when there is question between God’s view and my own.  I choose to accept that He Alone Is Sovereign in the universe and my life, whether or not those who live within His creation accept that Eternal Fact is irrelevant to my thinking.  I choose to accept the JOY available to me via the indwelling of His Spirit within my heart and mind, regardless of the impending pressure, opinion or appearance of circumstance.  I choose to do what God would have me do instead of following or placing any other philosophy, person or spirit in the driver’s seat of my life.  I choose God in the single greatest application of my Divinely Given authority granted by His grace.  I choose abundance and life in Jesus Christ the King.  I choose God and ask His forgiveness for my past and future sin, repenting of the learned or practiced influence of my own sin, knowing fully that He has redeemed from that power and, even now, is cleansing me of all unrighteousness in preparation for spending eternity with a Holy God.  I choose to love, even those who hate me and know that even when I may be incapable of such grace that He will overcome my own shortcomings, giving me the power to overcome even myself in loving kindness.  I choose to believe, come what may, against all odds and influences, knowing that at some point my faith will grow beyond the minor influences of doubt and indecision.  I choose Jesus.  All that comes after that choice is secondary.

How do you view the struggle between God and the fallen?  Isn’t it the same choice that was made when creation first challenged their own Sovereign God?  The power of choice is the truth of this seemingly eternal struggle between Good and evil.  Choose God and victory or choose anything else, whether satan, self or sin and lose, now and forever.  In Jesus Name, Amen.

https://youtu.be/ncNTKr_4J3c  If you hear this speech and turn away then chances are you have never been called of God.