Choices! Choices! Choices!!

Choices!  Choices! Choices!

June 7, NY

Prov. 19:21  Many are the plans in the mind of a man,

but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand. 

Prov. 16:9  The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps.

Galatians 6:7-8  Do  not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.

 Tuesday morning we decided to go to the vendors with Donna and Fred. Our other friends had gone on a guided tour ride for the day. We proceeded down there about 10. After a couple of hours we were hungry and decided to leave and get some lunch. We went to a diner in Lake George and had a great lunch!

Afterwards we talked about what we wanted to do next. Donna wanted to go to a thrift store in Warrensburg to look for a Dukes of Hazard red small match car. Off we went.  We were only in the store a very view minutes. When we came out, I asked them if they were interested in going on a short ride. They said yes. Off we headed up Highway 9.

We had ridden only a few miles when Norm mentioned looking off to the left. Coming our way were some heavy dark rain clouds. Did we turn back? No! We kept right on going. (First bad choice.)When we got to the intersection of Highways 8 and 9, what did Norm do?  Turned to the left and headed right for the rain clouds. What?! I am thinking to myself. This is not good.  

It didn’t take long before Norm decided to turn around and go back to the camp. That’s a good decision I thought. We had gone a few miles when we started feeling the rain drops. We quickly pulled off the road to put on our rain suits. For some strange reason, we only put on our rain jackets. It was a couple of miles before the down pour began. We were going to get soaked!!   What were we thinking? Why didn’t we put on our rain suit pants?  Second bad choice.

Nothing to do now but continue. A lady at the campground had told us about a short cut from Warrensburg to the Camp so we decided to try that way back because it was raining so hard.  We rode and rode and finally came to a stop sign. Now what? We wondered. Fred and Donna pulled up beside us to tell we should have turned right several miles back. Fred said he had been flashing his lights and honking his horn at us to stop. We did not hear the horn and I thought it was Fred’s headlight blinking on and off because he had had a problem earlier. Third bad choice  Now we had to turn around and go back about 8 miles the same way we had just come, all in the pouring rain!!

Finally, we arrived at the camp site. Our legs were pretty wet. What a ride! And a big laugh we had at our “choice” we had made.

Sometimes in life we make bad choices. We are walking in a certain direction thinking we are going to be alright with what we are doing. Like us on the road that day, we might they won’t catch up with us. We think we can beat it, like we did with the rain that day. We might even have a friend who is walking with us try to give us some warnings about the direction we are headed, but we don’t listen.

Our thinking during this time is usually skewed. We might think God will forgive us. Or, So and So is doing it so it must be okay. OR, this one time won’t hear me.  Or, we act like God doesn’t see what we are doing and where we are headed. We continue to make bad choices until everything comes crashing down. Then, we begin to take stock. We go to the Lord and ask “why did this happen”? OR, we try to run and hide from Him. None of this works. We must repent, ask the Lord to forgive us, and get back on the right tract. The problem is that sometimes there are consequences that come along with those bad choices. Those consequences don’t usually go away. They seem to stay around to remind us of those times we made those bad choices. Hopefully, they will help keep us on the straight and narrow. And, we begin to allow the Lord to be a part of our choices from that point on in our life.

Go to God. He is the Answer for all the bad choices we make!!