Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” (John 14:6 (NKJV))
Decisions, decisions, decisions. Apparently, an average person makes about 35,000 choices each day. 35,000. That equates to 2,000 decisions every hour you’re awake and one every two seconds.[1]
Of course, most of those decisions are minor. And you probably don’t think too much about them. Decisions like . . .
Do I really want to get out of bed now? Maybe just five more minutes.
Should I wear a purple shirt or a blue one?
What should I eat for breakfast? I don’t really feel like eating yogurt this morning.
Should I drive five miles per hour over the speed limit? Maybe I should use my cruise control.
You get the idea. But there’s one decision that is more important than any other. It’s the most significant one you’ll ever make. And that’s not an exaggeration. The decision will not only affect your current life but all of eternity.
Have you decided to follow Jesus?
I hope you’ve already chosen to follow Him. If you haven’t, don’t put off making that decision for another day.
Anyway, by waiting, you’ve already decided by default. Jesus said that you’re either with Him or against Him (Matthew 12:30). By choosing not to make the decision, you’ve chosen to not follow Jesus today. By putting it off, you’ve chosen to be against Jesus.
If you wait until tomorrow to decide, you might not get a tomorrow. We are not guaranteed another day. No one knows when their time is up. And if you die before choosing to follow Jesus, it will be too late. The Bible teaches us that “each person is destined to die once and after that comes the judgment” (Hebrews 9:27 (NLT)).
There is no purgatory. No penalty box where you wait until you’ve done your penance so you can enter into heaven. We don’t come back in another life as someone or something else. This life is your only opportunity to choose. As the saying goes, “You make your choices and then your choices make you.”
So, what’s keeping you from deciding? Maybe you think that you have plenty of time left and you’ll wait to take God seriously when you’re older. Or maybe you’re waiting for a sign – a lightning strike that will prove once and for all that God means what He says in the Bible.
But God has already given us a sign. As Jesus said,
“This evil generation keeps asking me to show them a miraculous sign. But the only sign I will give them is the sign of Jonah. What happened to him was a sign to the people of Nineveh that God had sent him. What happens to the Son of Man will be a sign to these people that He was sent by God.” (Luke 11:29-30 (NLT))
When God told Jonah to go and preach to the Ninevites, Jonah refused and got on a boat that was going to a place in the opposite direction from where the Ninevites lived (Jonah 1:1-3). God sent a storm that threatened the lives of all who were on that boat (Jonah 1:4). So they tossed Jonah overboard, and the storm ceased (Jonah 1:12, 15).
Jonah descended into the depths of the water where God had prepared a large fish to swallow him (Jonah 1:17). Still, it took three days for Jonah to repent (Jonah 1:17-2:9). When he did, God spoke to the fish, and it expelled him onto dry land (Jonah 2:10).
What happened to Jonah was miraculous. When he finally obeyed God, Jonah went to Nineveh and cried out, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” (Jonah 3:4 (NKJV)). That very short sermon was enough to get the people of Nineveh to believe in God and repent (Jonah 3:5).
Similarly, Jesus’ resurrection was a sign to that generation and every generation since then that Jesus is who He said He is. He is the Son of God. And Jesus is the only way to come to the Father and have eternal life. Jesus died on the cross for our sins, was buried in a tomb, and rose again on the third day – just as the scriptures had predicted.
In fact, all of the Old Testament’s prophecies about the coming suffering, servant Messiah were fulfilled in Jesus. Jesus is our sign. So stop looking for another one.
As Steven Curtis Chapman exhorts us in his song, Waiting for Lightning:
But the sign and the word have already been given,
And now it’s by faith, we must look and we must listen.
Instead of waiting for lightning.
A sign that it’s time for a change;
Listening for thunder,
As He quietly whispers your name.
If you haven’t chosen to follow Jesus, do so today. Stop waiting for lightning. Today is the day of salvation (2 Corinthians 6:2). Tomorrow never does come. By choosing Jesus, you can start walking by faith with Him today.
* Photo by Johannes Plenio on Unsplash
[1] Eva M. Krockow, Ph.D., “How Many Decisions Do We Make Each Day?,” Psychology Today, Sep. 27, 2018, https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/stretching-theory/201809/how-many-decisions-do-we-make-each-day.
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