Choices

Sunday. 

I am sitting on my front porch, staring off into the distance a bit. Next to me, a bag sits with several books in it. Books that I will probably pick up and read at some point. I need to keep my brain entertained somehow. 

A few miles away, my church is having its first meeting in months. People are singing, praising, worshipping. Celebrating. 

I am not there. 

Just a couple of weeks ago, I would have told you that I would have been there with bells on. I had already purchased a new outfit for it. (Two, actually. I was trying to choose between two outfits.) 

Yet here I sit, wearing shorts, no makeup, my newly-cut hair tied back. Both outfits still hang in my closet. 

Over the last few days, I have been following the numbers. 225. 222. 450. 336. And just a few minutes ago, 478. Numbers of daily positive COVID-19 cases in Oklahoma. Many of them in Tulsa County. 

Where, incidentally, a rally was held just yesterday. An indoor rally with little social distancing and few masks. 

And though I have loosened my quarantine in recent weeks, I have family coming to visit in a few days. I can’t risk getting the virus, of passing it to them. 

So here I sit. Alone. Listening to Red Hot Chili Peppers instead of worship songs. Phone in my lap, with Facebook uninstalled because I can’t handle seeing my friends celebrating without being a bawling mess. (Real talk, y’all.) 

We all have to make choices in life. It’s part of having free will. I spent the better part of my life trying to discern God’s will for my life. It was a question asked of me many times by various youth pastors, friends, roommates. 

 For me, it was a way to escape agency. If God would just decide what I should do, I thought, everything would go well.  

Only it seldom worked that way. The path of least resistance is not always the correct one. God doesn’t always open a window every time He closes a door. (More real talk.) Sometimes, you have to decide for yourself how to proceed. And that decision isn’t always easy. You don’t always get a “peace” about it, no matter how you decide. 

And sometimes, you have to decide between two situations that are not great. 

Just because a choice is obvious, doesn’t mean that it is easy.

I spent days agonizing over returning to church. Many tears were shed. Even now, as I sit looking at my front yard, I am second-guessing myself. 

People may say, “Maybe you’ll get lucky.” Well, in my world, luck plus $5 will about buy you a coffee at Starbucks. I haven’t survived forty-plus years on this planet based on luck. I have had to make smart decisions. And God has protected me, thus far, from my not-so-smart ones. 

 

And a lot of times, the decisions that I make aren’t the “popular” ones. (As an example, I strongly suspect that my vote in the upcoming election will differ from most people I know.) That comes, I guess, from seeing things a bit differently from other people. A blessing and a curse. 

But, at the end of the day, I have to make the best choice for me. Even if it isn’t the easy, smoothest, or most popular one.