Choices

Many things make it difficult to get out of bed.  These things are a mixture of things I can control and things I cannot control.  What caught my attention in the current chapter is how my assumptions about my ability to control my life result in judgement toward others.  The following quote really caused me to think:

“From what I could see, they had decided to be miserable or depressed or a failure or whatever. And I would think, “You know, if they just made better choices, if they were just disciplined and stopped making excuses, they wouldn’t have to suffer this way.”

You can walk around for a long time thinking nonsense like this–that most adults have it together and live safe, pleasant lives, and that the ones who don’t only have themselves to blame. It’s easy to think like Job’s friends.” —Alan Noble

Job was an innocent man who God permitted to experience suffering of a kind we cannot even imagine.  His friends consoled him by attempting to convince him that he is guilty and that by admitting his guilt everything will be okay.  When God enters the conversation, it is obvious that Job’s friends are wrong.  In the end Job is restored and his friends are required to apologize to him.

Apparently, Jesus’ disciples had not read Job.  When they met a blind man, they applied the same reasoning to his situation that Job’s friends applied to him:

1 As he went along, he saw a man blind from birth. 2 His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” 3 “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him. (John 9:1-3 NIV)

Jesus makes it clear that God, in His plan, permitted the blindness to happen.  It may have been a natural result of the fall, but neither the man nor his parents had the power to change the situation.  Only Jesus had that power, and He heals the man.

Choices do matter.  When Jesus makes mud and puts it on the man’s eyes and tells him to go wash in the pool of Siloam the man has several choices.  He could yell at Jesus for getting his face dirty.  He could strike out in anger blaming Jesus for causing the lifetime of blindness he has experienced.  Instead, he immediately obeys Jesus, goes to the pool, washes his eyes and is healed.  He comes back to his community displaying the works of God.

I want to follow the blind man’s example.  I don’t have to understand why God is doing what He is doing.  I want to know what He wants me to do and do it.  I want to get out of bed and let the works of God be displayed in me.

What about you?  How do you view people who are experiencing hard times?  What choices do you need to make?