The clamor of the reasonable

Do any of you need wisdom? Ask God for it. He is generous and enjoys giving to everyone. So he will give you wisdom. But when you ask God, you must believe. Don’t doubt him. Whoever doubts is like a wave in the sea that is blown up and down by the wind. People like that are thinking two different things at the same time. They can never decide what to do. So they should not think they will receive anything from the Lord. (James 1:5-8)

"The absence of alternatives clears the mind marvelously." (Henry Kissinger) Wouldn't it be nice to have absolutely NO alternatives to obedience? In such a world, all our choices would be to submit to the will of God the Father without any argument, reluctance, or confusion. We'd just know the right thing to do, and we'd do it. Indeed, when there are no alternatives, the mind is already made up, isn't it? We don't live in a world without 'alternatives' to our choices, though. We live in a world riddled with not only one alternative to our decisions, but many! Learning to choose the right one in the chaos of all the others can sometimes make it harder than we'd like it to be, but we must learn to choose wisely.

Alternatives abound - ask God for wisdom. Alternatives entice - ask God for wisdom. Alternatives seem reasonable - ask God for wisdom. 'Reasonable' is not always the right choice. It may seem reasonable to take the express way home one night because it is the quickest way to get home, but when we hear of huge storms on the horizon, we may want to take the surface streets and go a little slower for both our safety and that of others on the road. Reasonable choices are not always the wisest choices, but are they wrong choices? Not always, but they may not be the 'best' choice for us to make. We need God's guidance to actually see the difference, don't we?

There have been times when all the chaos of conflicting choices has made it hard for all of us to 'sort out' the good from the bad. It gets hard to hear God's voice in the midst of such clamor, doesn't it? Perhaps this is why Jesus challenged us to get to know his voice when there is less clamor and the opportunity to pay closer attention to how he speaks, when he speaks, and where we find him in the midst of uncertainty. He wants us to be prepared for the 'clamor' of the 'reasonable' in order to hear the 'clarity' of the 'best'. Obedience is easiest when we can clearly recognize his voice in the midst of all the 'reasonable clamor'. Just sayin!