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Romans 6:1-14
Congratulations, today's your day. You're off to great places. You're off and away. You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose." Those words of advice come from the delightful little book by Dr. Seuss titled Oh, the Places You'll Go! "You're on your own," he continues. "And you know what you know. And you are the one who'll decide where to go." It's up to us, says Dr. Seuss. The world is ours and we're free to choose what kind of life we'll have. He even provides a warning: "You'll look up and down streets. Look 'em over with care. About some you will say, 'I don't choose to go there.'" With your head full of brains and your shoes full of feet, you're too smart to go down a not-so-good street." I wish that were true, don't you? I wish we only went places our brains told us to go, that we always make rational choices.
In one of his books, A. Philip Parham wrote about a minister who asked a man he was counseling if he had any trouble making decisions. The man answered, "Well, yes and no. Parham went on to point out that the word intelligence comes from two words inter, meaning "between," and legere, meaning "to choose." An intelligent person is one who has learned to choose between good and evil, truth and falsehood, love and hate, gentleness and cruelty, humility and arrogance, and life and death. In other words, "You'll look up and down streets. Look 'em over with care. About some you will say, 'I don't choose to go there.'"
Life is about choices. As Professional speaker Phillip Wexler once noted, the human being is the only creature on earth that is not the prisoner of its programming but is the Master of It. Birds are programmed to fly south in the winter. They don't suddenly decide because of the bad economy they'd better stay home this year. Beavers build dams. Fish swim in schools. Only humans decide to build a dam or to go back to school. We have the power to decide. That doesn't mean, of course, that we always make good decisions.
Some may remember an episode of Seinfeld in which George Costanza is frustrated because every decision he makes turns out to be wrong. Jerry says, "Here's your chance to do the opposite. If every instinct you have is wrong, then the opposite would have to be right." George realizes that Jerry is on to something. If he would act and react completely opposite of his normal actions and reactions, he might have better results. George decides to alter his behavior. "Yes! I will do the opposite!" he declares. It turns out Jerry was right. Whenever George does the opposite of his normal reactions, the situation always turns out in his favor. You really must have a perverse view of the world to make such an approach to life work for you, but that's why the comedy on Seinfeld worked.
And yet, many of us will have to confess there's something within us that invariably draws us toward making bad choices. Why is it that we are drawn to that which is bad for us especially when we know that making bad choices can sometimes be disastrous? When Pompeii was being excavated, they found a woman's body that had been preserved by the ashes from Mount Vesuvius as it swept over the city. This woman's feet were turned toward the city gate, toward safety but her face was turned backward. She was looking back toward something that was just beyond her outstretched hands. The archeologists wondered what she was looking for. As they dug, they found a bag of pearls. Maybe she dropped this bag of pearls as she ran for her life. Maybe someone else dropped them, and this woman saw the chance for instant wealth. One way or another, with her life on the line, she thought it was worthwhile to stop and pick up some pearls. She turned to pick them up and the volcanic ash swept over her. What a terrible choice. It was a very human thing to do to reach out for the bag of pearls, but it cost her her life. There are many choices people make that end up costing them their lives, or their families, or their health, or their peace of mind. Anything that causes us to hurt ourselves or someone else is going to be a bad choice.
The Bible says we are drawn to bad choices because of our sinful nature. Paul writes in his letter to the Romans, "When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord" (20-23).
In Romans 6, Paul contrasts people who are enslaved to sin and those who are servants of God. To help us understand what this means Psychologist William Glasser wrote a very insightful book titled, Positive Addiction. Usually when we think of addiction we think in negative terms drugs, alcohol, online porn, violent video games anything we can become so obsessed with that it will be destructive to us mentally, physically, or spiritually. We know how many lives have been damaged by negative addictions.
Glasser, however, noted that there are some activities we can become addicted to that will result in positive benefits for ourselves and others. One of the most obvious is physical exercise. Glasser came to understand the power of positive addiction from his experience as a runner. Running or almost any physical exercise can become addictive. Not only can we get to the point where we look forward to slogging down the street in the wind and the cold, but we're irritable and disoriented when something interferes with our daily run. It becomes an addiction, a positive addiction. On the other hand, the benefits of a positive addiction can be amazing. Weight loss, decline in blood pressure, regulation of blood sugar, improvement in your cardio-vascular condition, the list of possible health benefits is amazing.
We can become addicted to all kinds of positive activities, such as gardening, juggling, swinging a bat, swimming, creative but non-critical writing, and knitting. Just about anything can become a positive addiction if it's something we do religiously, if it benefits us and those around us, and if it doesn't cause us to neglect other positive activities, God would be calling us to be involved in.
Positive addiction is like being a servant of God. It means daily making choices that are in keeping with God's will for wholeness and health. It means choosing daily, with God's help, attitudes and actions that bring Him glory. Life is filled with choices and our choices say a lot about who we are.
Consider a revealing encounter Pastor Tommy Barnett had with singer Elvis Presley many years ago. Elvis was in the congregation at a church where he was preaching. Elvis seemed moved by the sermon and wanted to talk to him afterwards. Elvis knew he needed to repent of his lifestyle and return to his Christian faith. But the allure of show business was so strong he felt like he had no choice but to keep going in the same direction. With tears rolling down his face, Elvis asked, ". . . what if I renounce show business and find that serving God won't bring joy to my heart?" Sounds like a sensible question, doesn't it? Of course, we all know what show business did to this talented man. Elvis had it all but became a poster child for, and ultimately a victim of, bad choices.
Choosing Christ invariably helps us make better choices. That's one reason the Christian faith has stood the test of time. When people give their lives to Christ they become better parents, better citizens, they live happier, more fulfilled lives. We all know it's true.
But it happens only if we make our faith the most important part of our lives. It works only if we take our faith seriously. Studies show that people who only show up at church occasionally, who have only a casual relationship with God, are as clueless as everyone else about what it takes to have a fulfilling life. They make the same bad choices; they have the same emptiness as the world outside. Only when Christ becomes a real presence in our lives do the benefits of faith show themselves. The words "servants of God" may rub us the wrong way, but they emphasize the completeness of the commitment that's required.
The choice is put squarely to us by Paul. He writes, "The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." The choice couldn't be any plainer than that. Or, as Dr. Seuss puts it, "Congratulations, today's your day. You're off to great places. You're off and away. You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose." With God's help, we can.
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Rev. Charles Eldredge is a member of Maitland Church of the Brethren. He has a Facebook page and can be contacted by email: ce1133 @verizon.net.