Decisions! Decisions!

            I’ve been a Christian a very long time, yet I remain amazed as God answers prayers and often the way he answers them. Sometimes it comes from reading His Word, other times from that still small voice.  It can come from a dream or a thought upon waking, or from conversation with a friend or a surprise email message or phone call.    Despite His answers, however, we can still harbor doubts, especially if the answer was not what we expected, how we expected and way beyond what we believe we are capable of handling.

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            As I think about this, I recall a devotion I read this last week about Abraham.  He was an ordinary man called to leave his family, his homeland and all that was familiar to go to a foreign country and start a new life.  To walk away from all he loved and which is familiar must have been frightening.  Have you ever asked yourself how he did it?  Do you think he received what he must have believed to have been God’s directive, and knew immediately he should go?  Or do you, like me, wonder if he didn’t wrestle with it a while?  Would he have instantly looked at his family and said, “God told me……and now we’re getting ready to leave.”  How do you suppose he worked through the inner struggle?

            I suggest even as he knew it was what he needed to do, he still prayed.  Perhaps he even felt certain of it one day; then wondered the next if it was indeed what he was supposed to do.  Maybe even as he made preparations he kept asking himself questions…. All the “what if’s.”  What if he was wrong?  What if his family refused to come with him?  What if he got there and didn’t like where he was going?  What if it wasn’t God at all, but Satan trying to thwart him from being obedient in other matters?

            Abraham was human, as are we.  Sometimes, given circumstances, our inner struggles threaten to overwhelm us with indecision.  How can we know for sure what is the right thing to do?  I suspect, like Abraham the best thing to do is call on the God from whom we believed we have heard.  Tell Him our fears, even while we make plans toward the new adventure He has for us.  Is this easy?  I suggest it is not only “not easy;” it’s downright difficult!

            We face decisions every day.  Not all of them earth shattering, maybe not even particularly difficult, but decisions none the less.  What is your process for making the decisions, even the small, seemingly insignificant ones?  Is it always instantaneous or do you find yourself asking for guidance?  I’d like to think I always ask for guidance.  But that wouldn’t be honest.  I believe most of us ‘handle’ the little decisions without a second thought to the Lord, but only seek His guidance when things get weird and difficult.  Am I alone here?  

I wonder about Abraham.  What were his habits?  Perhaps I’m wrong about his inner struggles.  Perhaps his fellowship with the Lord was such, that he really did immediately say, “Yes, Lord, I’ll go.”  I’d like to be there--in that mindset, and that solid spiritually!  Wouldn’t that make decision making much easier!?  What a thought!