Burning the ships
The Christian life begins when desire becomes decision.
“I have chosen the way of faithfulness.” — Psalm 119:30
“I want to be a better Christian.”
“I want to help people.”
“I want to love more.”
We all want things. But wanting alone rarely changes anything.
Proverbs 21:5 says, “The plans of the diligent lead to profit as surely as haste leads to poverty.” Wanting isn’t a plan. It’s just a wish.
“I want good grades.” “I want to lose ten pounds.” That’s just talk. Where’s the plan? Where’s the action?
Psalm 119:30 says, “I have chosen the way of faithfulness.” The word chosen here is important. Choosing isn’t the same as wanting; it’s far more powerful. Who is better off: the person who wants to be a Christian, or the person who has chosen to follow Christ?
When I was in high school, I remember sitting in P.E. class surrounded by guys lamenting how lonely they were. One goofy dude suddenly stood up, looked around the gym, and announced, “This week, I’m going to get me a girlfriend. I don’t know who it’s going to be, but I’m going to get one.”
I laughed. Surely that’s not how it works. But, believe it or not, that’s exactly what he did.
How? He moved from wanting to deciding.
Wanting is just a vague desire. There’s no plan, little purpose, and hardly any drive behind it. But when you decide something, everything changes.
Growing up, adults always asked what I “wanted” to be. My answers bounced from “I want to be a medical examiner” to “I want to be in the FBI.” But in my ninth-grade English class, the wanting stopped. My new answer was, “I’ve decided to become a teacher.” From then on, every academic and career choice aimed at that goal.
A similar thing happened when I was thirteen and confronted with the gospel. I knew I couldn’t halfway accept it. I was either in or out. I decided to follow Christ. With that decision, I never looked back.
That aligns with a verse I didn’t yet know, Luke 9:62: “Jesus said to him, ‘No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God.’” Wanting something is equivalent to thinking about plowing the field. Deciding is putting your hands on the plow and getting down to business.
Even the word decide reveals the difference. It comes from the Latin dēcīdere — “to cut off or cut away.” When you decide something, you subconsciously “cut away” the alternatives, leaving you with only one path. Hence, a true decision involves:
• cutting off distractions
• cutting off competing desires
• cutting off excuses
• cutting off the option of not acting
A decision creates a new reality. It slices away the possibility of remaining the same. It turns hope into direction and direction into identity.
In 711 AD, Berber general Tariq ibn Ziyad famously ordered his ships burned after landing in Spain, telling his soldiers, “Behind you is the sea; before you, the enemy.” With no way back, they had only one path — forward.
When we decide instead of merely wanting, we burn our ships, too. We remove the option of retreat and light the only way forward.
So stop wanting to be a better Christian. Stop wanting to help others. Stop wanting to love more. Decide who you will be and act — because that’s what Jesus did for us. He didn’t just want to save the world. He decided to, and He followed that decision all the way to the cross.
Your wants don’t matter at all. It’s your decisions that shape your destiny.
Graceful Contemplation
“Every time you make a choice you are turning the central part of you, the part of you that chooses, into something a little different from what it was before. And taking your life as a whole, with all your innumerable choices, all your life long you are slowly turning this central thing into a heavenly creature or into a hellish creature.”
—C.S. Lewis
Christmas idea!
Book 5 of my inspirational gothic romance series, Shadow Point Christmas, is now available! Share the hope and mystery of Shadow Point with a Christian reader in your life.
Thank you for reading!
November was a wonderful month to bask in family, faith, and God’s grace!
Inspirational. I can’t wait to share with my “ growing up” grands, but this was also for me! Doing instead of wanting! Thank you Jody!
Thank you for using your God-given gift of writing. It’s the message I needed to hear (once again). Thank for the encouragement and for spurring others on.