Many Good Choices

At Crossroads we've been reading/studying the book of Acts on Sunday mornings before worship for several months. As we have entered the section focusing on the Apostle Paul and his journeys, we learn how many choices need to be made - where to travel, who to travel with, who to meet with in each town, what to do when the missionaries arrive, how to deal with success and opposition, when to move on to the next place.

For those of us who are more or less "fixed" in place, we still have many choices to make.  We have only so much time in every day, only so many people that we can relate to in significant ways, only so many groups we can join or participate in.  Being part of a local church is one of those choices.  So is the decision about which responsibilities to take on in that local church and in other groups and activities beyond the church.

God seems to be working on me to be deliberate in some of the choices I am making.  This doesn't mean I can't be led by the Holy Spirit, but it does mean I can't pretend that just "drifting" is the same thing as being led by God.  I will be studying Acts in more depth, but it seems to me that there was planning involved as the apostle(s) traveled.  Of course, the Holy Spirit can veto those plans (see Acts 16), but that doesn't mean we can't be strategic and have focus in what we do.

The place God is directing me to now is to the development of a spiritual leadership team for our local church.  If I am to follow God's lead in this I will need to "prune" some other groups and activities from my list of what I do on a weekly basis.  Because I'm already committed to, for example, involvement in youth on Wednesday evenings, and because I do need to have time on some evenings just to be at home, and to open our home to be a ministry center for others, I will need to say "no" to some very good opportunities that would involve me with other groups.

For example, there are two excellent choices that I could involve myself with on Monday evenings.  What I'm praying about right now is whether it's better for me to "prune" both of those choices so I can focus on building that spiritual leadership team I mentioned.  This is what I'm praying about now.  In Acts 16 God provided a vision to the apostle(s) about what they should be doing.  Sometimes we will receive that sort of direct guidance, at other times we will just need to trust that the Lord is speaking and take a leap of faith, believing that God is calling, and trusting that if it is a wrong choice that the Lord will indeed clarify and correct us.  He loves us so.

There are many good choices in life.  Here's praying that we will hear and obey the Lord's lead.

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