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PROGRAM D-8168
What choices did you make in the past that you would do differently if you could? In looking at the topic of life at the crossroads, no doubt all of us could say that we’ve made choices in the past that we’d like to re-do. Since that’s not possible, our challenge is to avoid those mistakes in the future.
What guidance do we have from God’s Word when we’re facing life at the crossroads? Consider this passage:
This is what the Lord says: “Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls.” (Jeremiah 6:16)
In Robert Frost’s poem, “The Road Less Traveled,” as he is deciding which fork in the road to take, he writes, “long I stood and looked down one as far as I could. . .” He tried to see the end from the beginning. I understand that desire, don’t you? Every time we’re faced with a choice, if we could see the end from the beginning, we would make much better choices. Often, the reason we miss the right way is because we don’t stand at the crossroads and look.
Instead, we go with our emotions, with our feelings, with our gut, and with our momentary desires. How many Christians have stood at that marriage crossroads and made a choice to marry a person who was not God’s choice? Why would they make such a decision? Because they didn’t look. They didn’t ask what this marriage would be like down the road. They looked with their earthly eyes instead of “forever eyes,” and thought they could beat the odds.
I was talking recently with a young woman who married a Muslim man, even though she is a Christian. He is a good man and she is not abused in any way, but she knows it was not the right choice. I asked her why she made that choice, and she said, “I was blinded by being in love.” She didn’t stand at that crossroad and look for the ancient path, the good way.
I can tell stories from my own life of making poor choices, and I don’t want to repeat those mistakes. We must stand at the crossroads and look. We must ask God for an eternal perspective—What will this look like in eternity? All of us like instant gratification and that grass on the other side just looks so green sometimes. But standing at the crossroads and looking past the temporary and seeing the eternal consequences will prevent us from re-making some of those past poor choices that we now regretfully have to live with.