“By faith Moses, when he came of age, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, preferring to endure tribulations with God’s people rather than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin, and esteeming the condemnation of Christ greater than the riches of Egypt, because he hoped for reward” (Hebrews 11:24-26).
To do what is right, sometimes our conscience and our will have to overcome the desires of the moment. According to the above text, this is what Moses experienced in deciding to give up his future as prince of Egypt. To serve the higher interest, he gave up the pleasures that were immediately available to him and accepted a difficult task that cost him the rest of his life. impulse would have said Stay in Egypt! – But Siddhant said Go! Moses chose to be a man of principle.
No matter how much we grow spiritually, we will still have some “hard moments”. Obviously, the less the better, and obedience will be easier for someone who is committed to a disciplined life than someone who does not make such a commitment. Indeed, when we have trained and exercised ourselves in godliness (1 Timothy 4:7,8), we will find that God’s commandments are “not a burden” (1 John 5:3). But there will still be times when the right thing and the easy thing are not the same thing. And devotion will choose the right thing, whether it is difficult or not.
No one could have been more prepared for Gethsemane than Jesus. Yet it would be insulting to suggest that the choice he made was an easy experience. This judgment was literally an “agony” (Luke 22:39-46). He “prayed and prayed with loud cries and tears,” and he “learned obedience through what he suffered” (Hebrews 5:7,8). Whatever the impulses of His flesh, He chose to base His actions on the principle of love and the will of the Father.
Doing the right thing based on principle and regardless of circumstance is the essence of character, integrity and honor. The ability to make such a choice is an important part of the image of God in which we are created. When we use this gift to make principled choices rather than impulsive ones, we honor the God whose image we bear and we also please Him.
“Free will is not the freedom to do what one likes, but the power to do what one sees ought to be done, even in spite of extreme impulse. That is where freedom lies” (George MacDonald).
Gary Henry – WordPoints.com AreYouaChristian.com
