So, Moses is giving his farewell speech today. He has led this wild, complaining, endearing, loving, rough group of people for 40 years. It has, indeed, been an adventure. Escape from slavery. Miraculous interventions. Meeting God, hearing God, listening to God. Getting on the wrong side of God. Getting back in God's good graces. All while driving a car with thousands of unruly kids in the backseat.
And now, for Moses, the journey is coming to an end. And he wants to leave God's chosen people with one last bit of advice. Now Deuteronomy is a long book. And in Chapter 30, part of which we heard today, Moses starts summing up. Reminding us to love God, love our neighbor. Care for the widows and orphans. Care for the alien in our midst. Care for those who need caring for. Don't wall yourself off from them, because they are special to God.
Choose life, he says. “I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life. . .
Simple, right? So, we make the right choices and life is good.
Moses is telling us that our choices do matter. They shape our every day, day after day. But on the other hand, I know that so very much has already been chosen for me.
By virtue of my place of birth and opportunity, some choices were never really mine to make in the first place. Even more than that? When it comes to the largest questions of my existence, in this life and in the next, God made the choice for me in baptism. I belong to God. Nothing I choose or do not choose will ever change that.
And yet I also know that every moment of every day I have choices to make. Will I go to the gym, or will my couch tempt me over for a much needed nap? Will I stick with this weird diet I'm on, or will I binge on gluten? Will I spend an extra ten minutes hearing the story of the man who is sitting in my office, or will I send him on his way? Will I pause to pray before I jump headlong into my day, or will I move ahead as though it all rests on me? Will I put away my smart phone long enough to see the person standing in front of me — or behind me in line at the grocery store — or serving me at the cash register? And these are just some of the easy choices we all face!
Now, a sidebar. We all heard this Gospel reading, and I’d be an irresponsible preacher if I didn’t say something about what Jesus said. It’s an awful thing, divorce, and it doesn’t go away once the papers are filed. It echoes on in every major and many minor moments, and it just plain stinks. I'm the product of divorce as many of you may be. But also, it is, as often as not, a necessity. In my case my parents' divorce probably saved my life.
And later, Jesus will say Moses made space for divorce because “their hearts were hard.” And Jesus wasn't criticizing Moses. Marriage isn’t meant for divorce, it’s meant for love and for life. That is the expectation we set because that is the expectation God sets. But sometimes, frankly, people are awful to each other, or one person is awful, or social expectations and customs force people to live lives that are not true to each other or to God.
And we come to face the hardness of one person, or two, or an entire society that refuses to recognize the fullness of what love could be, that hardness of heart makes it so that divorce just has to be an option, those aren't God's fault. That is us trying to BE God with each other...and failing. And sometimes choosing life means that some things need to come to an end so that other things can live.
I’m actually kinda glad that shows up this morning. Because whether we’re talking about how to be in relationship or how to care for our neighbors or where to sit in church, it’s so important to choose life, choose love, and choose to keep our hearts soft.
Most of the choices we are called upon to make in the day-to-day really do not seem like they are so much about ‘choosing life' at all, instead just choosing the least painful option. But if you think about it, every one of them is. And perhaps they give us the practice we need. Maybe they prepare us for the day when the choice each of us is offered will be monumental and life-altering:
That day when you'll have to choose between staying in a relationship or a job that is not about life, but about pain and suffering. And you choose, venturing out not knowing what this new life will hold but knowing that the old one was killing you.
That day when you look out at the world around you and realize that you need to dig deep down to find the courage to speak the truth, even if the result may be that everyone you know turns on you.
That day when you sit at the bedside of a loved one and know that it rests with you to decide what life will look like for her and for you both – and whether you really do trust Jesus and the promised life yet to come.
The day when you are called to choose between the comfort we have been afforded and the unknowable future of working for justice for others. Not knowing what forces will be brought to bear on you when you speak up for others in a land where speaking up in love – and owning it – has taken a back seat to spewing anonymous and easy, habit-forming hatred.
These are all hard choices then. And so it is helpful that Moses’s sermon in Deuteronomy frames it in such away that he reminds us that all of our choices really do come down this: Will I love God or won’t I? Will I love the poor and oppressed? Those living in need and in fear? Will my choices in how I live reflect that love or won’t it?
We are told the stakes are high both for the Children of God then and us now. We also know that Moses’s listeners so long ago did not heed his urging. In fact, we understand that this speech of Moses was heard over and over by a people in exile who understood themselves as being punished for having failed to listen to these very words.
We also know that, in spite of themselves, later God made a way for them to come home.
And just as with them, we hear these words today, knowing that our choices matter. We know that as people who follow the Living God, who believe in the Resurrected Christ, that we are those who are called to choose life. Sometimes we'll get it right. Often we won’t. Either way, every day the gift and the privilege and the challenge is to sort out what life looks like and to try to choose it. And then to entrust it all back to God whom we love and who chose to love us first.
So choose life. Choose love and peace, justice and equity, light and life. Choose God.
Really, when you think about it, what other choice do you have?