Not sure if you have a favorite gum or breath mint you religiously consume, but the church I have the privilege of leading here in Broomfield keeps the Life Savers “Wint O Green” flavored mints in a mass quantity of supply at all times! Seriously, I think that you can find a bowl in every room of the church. Well, some of the other pastors on staff have a three year old daughter who comes into my office each time she’s there to get one of these fantastically addictive mints. But there’s a little twist to the routine that she expects me to abide by each time:  it’s the which-hand-is-it-in game. Yes, every time…and we always have a blast doing it, too! Of course, it usually takes two or three guesses for her to win the beloved prize out of my closed fist each time.  

So yesterday, we went through the ritual flow. She won. She smiled, thanked me and left. But then she ran back into my office a few minutes later for her to lead the game with myself being the one to do the guessing. To the humor of a few of us watching, she held out her right fist (clearly holding the crackling packaged mint) and then proceeded to point to her fist with the other hand! Yes, she deliberately gave away which hand it was in so that I would win. I would get the prize. My first internal reaction was to think that she had played the game incorrectly, but then God dropped a little nugget into my heart that I knew I was supposed to share with you…

In the Old Testament, Moses records God speaking to the Israelites in the book of Deuteronomy in chapter 30 verse 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”

Did you catch that? God lays out the two choices in front of us and then points to the correct one for unarguable clarity.  Choose this one!  Choose life…choose the blessing.  This is the one that will bring the most fulfillment and success!  

An unexpected comment is thrown our way…an invitation into a new relationship presents itself…a new policy gets put in place at work…attitudes on a vacation trip with the family…an unexplainable spiritual experience in the mountains…

The list is endless of course, but every day we are presented with choices and decisions that lead us down a specific path toward positive or negative outcomes. And here the God of all creation gives us the answer to the quiz before we even take it!  Choose life!  Choose to speak life over ourselves…our kids…our marriage…our jobs. Choose to think LIFE over the negativity this culture of death is unleashing an onslaught of.  Choose to bless before you give into releasing the curse that sits too often at the tip of our tongues. Choose to embrace THE Giver of Life this week in as many moments that you possibly can.