I’ve been thinking a lot about choice recently. A few members of my squad and I have entered into a fast for the month of April, and I’ve chosen to fast from social media. I so often choose to aimlessly scroll through my various feeds instead of completing school work, spending time in prayer, or doing a myriad of things that will actually help me accomplish goals.
Choosing to spend my time elsewhere the past ten days has been sometimes challenging. It has made me realize how much choice we actually do have in our lives– over almost everything, but especially over our emotions and attitudes.
For example, my sorority does several community service and fundraising projects throughout the semester. For community service, incidentally, we’ve ended up cleaning up trash off the side of highways for two of our projects. Not exactly the most glamorous, but I was able to keep a smile on my face and crack jokes about us being Sigma Alpha, the Trash Queens. I made the choice to serve with a joyful heart (and Tina and I look pretty good as Trash Queens, no?)
Then yesterday came and we completed our final fundraiser of the semester. We worked for Texas Motor Speedway during race weekend to scan tickets and greet guests into the event. It is usually a project that I look forward to… only yesterday it down poured on us twice, I stood on my feet for almost nine hours straight, and it randomly dropped twenty degrees, leaving me exhausted, wet, and freezing cold.
Yesterday, I had a moment where I wanted to turn away, leave my sisters behind, and go home because I was uncomfortable. I had to make the conscious choice to stay and serve, even though it wasn’t what I wanted to do. And not only did I make the choice to stay, but to stay joyfully.
I’m trying not to come into the Race with many expectations, but I think it’s safe to expect that there will be times when I must choose to serve, live, and treat others joyfully when it is the last thing in the world I want to do.
And moreover, I will have to make the choice to trust, obey, and love God above all else, as I already have had to do. We always talk about how love is a verb, not a noun; it is something you must work at to make happen. Friends, the same applies to us loving God. We must choose to love God even when we aren’t “feeling it”, and the rain is so cold, and you have to pick up a dead raccoon off the side of the road (true story), because we have made a commitment to serve him and his people. We must choose to love others because he first chose to love us (1 John 4:19).
I made this choice to embark on the World Race on faith, and now I must choose to allow faith to carry me the entire way. I must choose to lay down myself, my time, my finances, to God not begrudgingly, but joyfully. God’s already let me have lots of practice in this area, but yesterday was just another reminder of the importance of choice as October grows closer and anxieties threaten to rise.
I leave you with Psalm 13:5-6, where the Psalmist chose to have joy; “But I have trusted in your steadfast love; my heart shall rejoice in your salvation. I will sing to the Lord, because he has dealt bountifully with me.”
