Choose life!
The Lord calls us to obedience, to delight in his laws and to meditate on them day and night. Even when it is difficult, we are to put Christ above all else. (Ancient Christian Devotional Year C, p. 207)
Deuteronomy 30:15-20 NRSV
See, I have set before you today life and prosperity, death and adversity. If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I am commanding you today, by loving the Lord your God, walking in his ways, and observing his commandments, decrees, and ordinances, then you shall live and become numerous, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to possess. But if your heart turns away and you do not hear but are led astray to bow down to other gods and serve them, I declare to you today that you shall perish; you shall not live long in the land that you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess. I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life so that you and your descendants may live, loving the Lord your God, obeying him, and holding fast to him; for that means life to you and length of days, so that you may live in the land that the Lord swore to give to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.
Caesarius of Arles
Behold, man, you have before you “water and fire, life and death, good and evil,” heaven and hell, the legitimate king and the cruel tyrant, the false sweetness of the world and the true blessedness of paradise. Power is given to you through the grace of Christ: “Stretch forth your hand to whichever you choose.”
“Choose life, that you may life;” leave the broad way on the left which drags you to death and cling to the narrow path on the right which happily leads you to life. Do not allow the wideness of that road on the left to keep you or give you pleasure
(Ancient Christian Devotional Year C. p. 208)
Matthew Henry
Every man wishes to obtain life and good, and to escape death and evil; he desires happiness, and dreads misery. So great is the compassion of the Lord, that he has favoured men, by his word, with such a knowledge of good and evil as will make them forever happy, if it be not their own fault. Let us hear the sum of the whole matter. If they and theirs would love God, and serve him, they should live and be happy. If they or theirs should turn from God, desert his service, and worship other gods, that would certainly be their ruin. There never was, since the fall of man, more than one way to heaven, which is marked out in both Testaments, though not with equal clearness. Moses meant that same way of acceptance, which Paul more plainly described; and Paul’s words mean the same obedience, on which Moses more fully treated. In both Testaments the good and right way is brought near and plainly revealed to us. [1]
Grant thy servants, O God, to be set on fire with thy Spirit, strengthened by thy power, illuminated by thy splendor, filled with thy grace, and to go forward by thine aid. Give them, O Lord, a right faith, perfect love, true humility. Grant, O Lord, that there may be in us simple affection, brave patience, preserving obedience, perpetual peace, a pure mind, a right and honest heart, a good will, a holy conscience, spiritual strength, a life unspotted and unblameable; and after having manfully finished our course, may we be enabled happily to enter thy kingdom; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
(The Gallican Sacramentary)
Trust and Obey
If you have found this meditation helpful, take a moment and give thanks to God. Then share what you learned with a friend. This is how the grace of God spreads (2 Corinthians 4.15).
[1] Matthew Henry and Thomas Scott, Matthew Henry’s Concise Commentary (Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, 1997), Dt 30:15.
