So many times in life we make decisions without clearly weighing all that is associated with it. We fail to ask the question: Am I prepared to deal with this even if...??? You put in your "if’s". We can associate that assessment with every area of our lives.. our finances, our friends, our mates, having children, our careers, our major purchases, and the list goes on.
There is a wise admonition that challenges this very idea: “For which of you, intending to build a house, does not sit down first and count the cost, whether he or she has enough to finish it.” I love this final thought. For the one who doesn’t consider the cost he or she becomes a joke to the people watching. “So once he or she is not able to finish, all who see it begin to laugh at them.”
What is being plainly stated lines up with my opening statement, have you really weighed the whole matter…… whatever the “matter” may be? We tend to be entirely too hasty when we make decisions. To many times, those who identify with being a Christian, say that “God has told them to do something” when quite possibly we tie up what we want and take the predetermined answer and make it the proclamation or confirmation from God. What are you saying Angela? I am glad you asked. In life there are desires that we hide in our hearts. There are times when those desires come from within and not from God, but because we have decided that’s what we want we take that unction in our hearts to be the confirmation from God. Don’t get it twisted the great deceiver takes the mind, which is his battlefield, and plays havoc with many of us.
What is entailed with weighing the whole matter? I’m glad you asked. Let’s look at a couple of examples.
1. You say you want to have children. Which is an extremely admirable desire. Are you prepared for all that it takes to raise children? Have you really researched what it will mean and take to raise a child? Are you really prepared to live a selfless life? Are you prepared to do what it takes, legally, to provide for your child? Are you prepared to train up your child in the manner in which they should go? Are you prepared to lay down your life for your child(ren)? Are you ensuring that the right environment will be what your child is surrounded by? Woman, are you ensuring that the father of the child is just that… the father…. the daddy? Are you ensuring that the father of your child has the right qualities and characters necessary to help raise a healthy baby? This is not an exhausted list to say the least, hopefully there is food for thought, if this is you.
2. You want to buy a home. Have you weighed the whole matter? Do you clearly understand what it means to become a home owner? While you have enough for a mortgage, do you have enough for everything else, and then for those things that you never considered? Have you really looked into what it takes financially to own a home and ensure that all other financial issues are equally covered? Have you begun doing as Joseph showed Pharaoh, storing up money in an account for those potentially lean times so that when it comes you will never fill the strain? This is not meant to scare it is meant to encourage and equip so that you will be lacking nothing.
3. You’re looking for that mate. Are you looking for that perfect mate? Have you set up some standards and committed in your heart that you will not budge from those standard? Have you looked through the prism of the bible to clearly understand what those standards should be? And if you have are you prepared to remain single if those standards are not met or will you compromise? And if you compromise are you prepared to deal with the outcomes? Have you fully assessed what is you driving force for wanting a mate? I am not challenging having one, I am simply stating that there should healthy reasons for wanting one and it shouldn't be for reasons of feeling incomplete, especially when the bible tells us that we are complete in Christ. It shouldn't be because you are lonely. If it is dig deeper into your lonely state. This too seems to imply in order to fin happiness you need a mate to make that happen. Trust this, if you need someone to make you happy, you will always be searching for someone. You must find joy, happiness, and contentment within or you'll simply appear needy and I don't know of anyone who is looking for someone needy. Please weigh the whole matter.4. A job comes along that pays a lot more money than your current job. There’s an old saying, “all money ain’t good money”. Many times we make career decisions based on the pay and nothing else. It could be quite possible that the job that pays more does not afford you the other stuff that may be more important. Your current job allows you more time with your family. It allows you latitudes that a new position won’t. Let me cite on example of a friend of mine. She is a single mother of two boys and one of them is autistic. She has the ability to telecommute when necessary. Go on field trips with her boys when the school goes. When holiday’s come up generally given the option of telecommuting so that she can be home with her boys. Her current job location is only 20 minutes to each child if she needs to reach one in a hurry. Now if a new job isn’t going to be sensitive to those needs is more money really a better opportunity than the current? I am not saying that it is or isn’t. I am saying that the whole matter needs to be weighed before a decision is made.
I am sure you guys understand my point. I hope each of you are screaming “hey one of the most important considerations needed wasn’t mentioned!” and that is that we should never make any decision no matter how big or how small without the counsel of God. Some of us need to be sure that we are truly seeking out the will of God and not our will. The bible says there is a way that seems right to man and in the end it leads to destruction. Don’t get impatient. The answer may not come when you want it but in close I leave you with this - Elijah had just killed the false prophets and was exhausted and his guards were down when Jezebel came to him and stated that she was going to do to him what he had just done to her prophets so he became greatly afraid. He needed to hear from God so he sought Him in the thunder but He wasn’t there. He sought Him in the lightning, but He couldn’t be found there either. But then…….. in the still of quiet it was there that he heard from God!! So be still and know that He is God and that no good thing will He withhold from them that walk (live their lives) upright before Him.
Weigh the whole matter!!
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