choose life

In my life things come in waves - I get stuck on certain foods (currently stuck - ie: repeatedly having an appetite for the same food over and over again - olives, cheese-its, red wine, jalapenos...), one of my first favorite words was "again" - my poor mother had to read the same books over and over and have Annie constantly playing, and i learn things in themes. I am thankful for the perfect reality of having a Creator who knows me intimately and meets me in the unique ways in which He created me.

For those of you who have been with me on this blog journey for a while may remember my struckness in the area of falling this past spring - a perfect example of the Lord using a myriad of ways to teach me about myself and Himself. Well I have found myself smashed into another theme which I wanted to share with all of you - choose life.

This journey started over a year ago in a session with one of my clients. We were talking about the importance of being mindful of our thoughts during the day and being intentional to stop thoughts that are lies - replacing the thoughts with truth. She appropriately and extremely articulately said, "I have to tell myself to choose life - to recognize the areas where my thoughts are focused on things in the arena of death and stop those thoughts and to focus on things/thoughts that are true - i have to choose life." You have to love it when the Lord uses people in your life that you are serving to teach you incredible lessons. Well my clients words of choosing life have stayed with me.

Well, more recently in my reading of Deuteronomy I came across this passage in chapter 30:

(19) This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live (20) and that you may love the LORD your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. For the LORD is your life, and he will give you many years in the land he swore to give to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

What is choosing life: love the Lord, listen to His voice, hold fast to Him (just what i was struck by a week or so previous).

To hit the point out the park - I was at a meeting hearing about a friend's mission to the community of City Heights in San Diego and during her sharing she spoke the words, "I have to remind myself in my thoughts to choose life."

choose life, choose life, choose life. life and death are both out there in this world - fighting for our attention. i want to more fully, more completely, more regularly to choose life. choose life in my conversations, in my thoughts and in my behavior. i want to love the Lord in these things, listen to His voice in these things and hold fast to Him in these things - i want to choose life. and in this way i hope to honor Him who created me to be stuck, the One who gave me life.