Decisions, Decisions

Every day I make hundreds of decisions, most of them without any thought at all. Do I press the snooze button once or twice? Coffee or Nespresso? Bra or no bra? Curl my hair or put it up? Eye makeup or not? Pick up library books today? Throughout the day, the week, and the months, I am constantly making decisions, big and small, with very little thought as to the choices I make. Sadly I make these decisions often in a vacuum, not even bothering to get input from friends and family, and worse of all, not asking God for wisdom or discernment. This habit of counting on my own knowledge and experience to make decisions has resulted in me being inordinately cocky and sure of myself when making small decisions or even more important ones. 

For most decisions my husband and I consult each other, talk about the options, research it, and then discuss it again, eventually landing on either a mutually agreed upon outcome or, at least a compromise. Moving, buying an RV, investments, when to retire, and whether or not we should get two dogs have all been on the decision plate, and whether it is our decision-making prowess or sheer dumb luck, we have made some really great choices. But what about those decisions we regret? Life choices we keep buried in our closet, skeletons of our past rattling in the dark, whispering "What were you thinking?" Sure we learn from those ill-fated choices, but why did we make those mistakes to begin with?

Pride. Simple, sinful pride, the created pretending to be the creator, the reader presuming to be the author. Basing decisions on gut feelings or out of sanctimonious self-love without even a glimpse or a nod to the One who created us. Every single decision made in that vacuum of self without even so much as a glance at God's word or introspective look into the soul to ask the Holy Spirit within me what I should do has turned out poorly, some even disastrously; my past is riddled with the remnants of these poor choices. 

But I do not always just depend on myself for decision making; I go to others, to "experts." For financial decisions, I seek out CPAs and investment advisors, and lawyers assist me with legal advice. For medical concerns, I seek out doctors and nurses and online reputable sources. Parenting? Other parents, of course, and the myriad self-proclaimed parenting experts in print and online. Ah, online, the internet, where I can google anything and get a million recommendations and answers in a fraction of a second, without any assurance of the validity of these answers. I need to pay more attention to the fact that these so-called experts, the sources of information, are also part of the creation, and not the creator; putting such a heavy responsibility on the backs and minds of mere humans or the products they have written is foolhardy.

Why this tendency to ignore the Creator when searching for answers to my problems or help in making a choice? As a Christian and a believer in all that the Nicene Creed pronounces, I of all people should turn first to God for decision-making dilemmas. Only sometimes is that my initial tendency. Case in point: I have been struggling with a health issue for over a year; nothing is working out like the medical experts said it would. Now a bigger decision looms before me, and my first impulse is to ask Dr. Google or talk to friends and neighbors, to share my woes and thereby hope to receive wise advice.  The next stop is the medical community, and I beg the doctor to tell me what to do, to reassure me all is well and I am making the right decision. How can a mere man, created by the same God, have better advice than the one who made him?

So I pray. Sure I still talk to friends and family and experts, but first I talk to God about it. He already knows the outcome, and sure the outcome may not be one I desire, but it will be far better than if I go blindly down my own road without God's footsteps beside me.

Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers. The wicked are not so but are like chaff that the wind drives away. Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous; (Psalm 1:1-6 ESV)