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Sunday 26 July 2026 Trinity 8, Seventeenth in Ordinary Time, Proper 12
Choices, Choices, Decisions, Decisions
1 Kings 3:5-12; Romans 8:26-39; Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52
Context: A small, well-educated congregation in a prosperous area just outside London
Aim: To help people think about the choices God gives us and how to use them as God would want us to
For all of us humans, life is a series of choices – do we go up or down or left or right? Do we follow the instructions we have been given or ignore them? It is part of the human psyche that we can think our own thoughts – even if we are in a totalitarian environment where there can be huge penalties for some actions. Decisions, decisions. Sometimes we have a clear idea of what we want to do and other times not. Sometimes we don’t have a real choice or indeed care one way or another. Sometimes a decision, perhaps made without thinking or caring, can change the whole course of one’s life. Sometimes the decision you find yourself making is not an easy one or one that you would normally chose to take, and yet deep in your heart – as difficult and as inherently painful as it may be – it is the one you know that your God would want you to take and the one that should you take.
In our first reading, we have Solomon, considered to be one of the wisest men of his time, asking God for advice on how he should rule his people. Later on we have Christ trying to guide his followers to the way God would like them to lead their lives. Many of his teachings were in the form of the Beatitudes but they too could throw up problems or confuse people when they were trying to make a choice of what to do. (Making choices is not always an easy thing.) And we have Jesus, sent by his Father to spread his message; loving his Father, he did spread God’s message but he did it knowing what was in store for him later on the cross.
The problem for many of us Christians today – particularly for those of us in the Western world – is that compared to many peoples, on the whole, we are comfortable and safe in our lives. We have choices and we can use them in any number of ways. We don’t tend to ask God whether we should go on holiday to Greece or Bournemouth. (We shouldn’t bother him with such trivial matters, so the thinking goes.) We just get on with what we fancy – or can afford! God doesn’t seem to come into this at all.
We profess to believe in God and his son Jesus but how strong is that belief? What do we do with it? Many of us were born into Christian families and just assumed we were Christians even if not always understanding what was involved. Many profess to be Christians, but it can still be a hit or miss thing. If life is easy, one can be tempted to put God in the background. Do you really need to bother him when you have things under control? Do you really believe in what you are hearing or promising in church, or are you paying lip service to what you know is expected of you? If life becomes difficult, do you pray to him for guidance and comfort, or rail at him for making your life so difficult? Talking to God can be a hit or miss thing for many people. Do you only speak to him when you want something or need advice? None of us knows completely what God wants or expects of us, and if one’s faith is shaky, one could lose that faith or make decisions that are both harmful and not at all what God had planned for you.
For most of us Christians, God has given us multiple choices over the years and one suspects that there may have been neither only one right or only one wrong way to arrive where God wants us to be. God has a plan for all of us and we must hold tight to that belief and rise up to do what we perceive his will to be – even if it means pain and death. (Think of Dietrich Bonhoeffer returning to Nazi Germany and to certain death.) When things seem particularly difficult, I often think of that phrase from the hymn ‘Dear Lord and Father of Mankind’ that suggests we listen for ‘that still, small voice of calm’ that will truly show us the decision that, out of all the choices we have, God would like us to make. He will be there with us always – hold tight to that thought.
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