Those who are far from you will perish; you destroy all who are unfaithful to you. Psalm 73:27

From reading this verse alone, you would think that God is very impatient with us and willing to drop us quickly. After all, even the “best” of us are unfaithful to God, right? As the hymn writer wrote: prone to wander, Lord I feel it; prone to leave the God I love. So then what’s happening here?

Most of life is about the choices we make. Certainly “life happens” to us and we are faced with other choices. For some the chaotic and sometimes evil things that happen to us could destroy us. As an extreme example, let’s say that you tossed in prison because of your outspoken faith. That was done to you; it wasn’t your choice. What are your options at this point?

You can shake a fist at God.

You can pray.

You can have people on the outside lobby for your release.

You can worry and fret about your situation.

More than likely, what you do will be a combination of all four of the previous options.

Some, however, will just bemoan their plight and think they can do nothing about their dire situation. All of these are choices in bad situations. Of course this is oversimplifying what is often complex. But the point remains: we make choices in life.

If and when we get off God’s straight and narrow path set for us, it is easy to get back on, even if we’ve strayed far. There’s no denying that the path is straight and narrow. He has not moved; he has not stopped wooing us. He is as steady as ever. The choice is ours to get back on the path.