Choose Life

Good morning. You could be seated. So glad to see you all here together. Lots of people coming in from out of town. Good to see many of you guests and people who've been part of our church returning back for a visit. Welcome, and Merry Christmas to you.

We are wrapping up a series today in the book of Deuteronomy, everybody's favorite thing to do at Christmas time. So if you would find Deuteronomy 30, it's in the worship folder you have, handed out on the way in, or on the screen behind me. Our practice is to read God's word aloud together. So if you find that, we're going to read verses 11 through 20. If you'll join your voices with mine.

This command that I give you today is certainly not too difficult or beyond your reach. It is not in heaven, so that you have to ask, "Who will go up to heaven and get it for us and proclaim it to us so that we may follow it?" And it is not across the sea so that you have to ask, "Who will cross the sea, get it for us and proclaim it to us so that we may follow it?" But the message is very near you, in your mouth and in your heart so that you may follow it.

See, today I have set before you life and prosperity, death and adversity. For I am commanding you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commands, statutes, and ordinances so that you may live and multiply, and the Lord your God may bless you in the land you are entering to possess. But if your heart turns away and you do not listen and you are led astray to bow in worship to other gods and serve them, I tell you today that you will certainly perish in the land you are entering and will not prolong your days in the land you are entering to possess across the Jordan.

I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Choose life so that you and your descendants may live. Love the Lord your God, obey him, and remain faithful to him, for he is your life, and he will prolong your days as long as you live in the land the Lord swore to give to your ancestors, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. — Deuteronomy 30:11-20

This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

It's been a regular thing throughout history that when God's people have rediscovered his law, beautiful things come out of that. People's hearts are changed. Revival happens.

The Dead Sea Scrolls

In 1947, on the northern shore of the Dead Sea in Israel, there was a shepherd who had a flock of sheep and was following them. One of the sheep ran off, and he ran to get it. He looks up this hillside and there's a hole in the side of the limestone. He picks up a rock and throws it up there. And to his surprise, he doesn't hear it fall on the floor of a cave—he hears it smack and break something. That shepherd that day discovered the Dead Sea Scrolls at Qumran, in the northern part of the Dead Sea. I was there this summer, and it was probably the biggest archaeological find of the last thousand years. That's not an exaggeration.

Inside that cave were giant clay jars, and inside the clay jars were scrolls rolled up and preserved for almost two thousand years. From around 300 BC to about the middle of the first century, when Jesus was alive, there was a little community out there by the Dead Sea, and they carefully copied down God's word over and over again.

Now, what's really amazing about it is the number one scroll that was found most frequently in the whole cave was the book we're reading—Deuteronomy. It tells us something. This was the book that people in the first century read more than any other book. It explained so much of their history. It explained the exile and explained why a Jewish carpenter from the area of Nazareth would quote that book more than any other book in the Old Testament.

This discovery in 1947 led to an absolute revolution in biblical studies. People went nuts over this. You can still go to Israel today to this museum. They have a whole wing built around the Dead Sea Scrolls. It's that big a deal. It moved back our understanding of how established the Old Testament was by a thousand years—how much it was codified really early.

Every time people of God have rediscovered his law, this is what happens. There's a story about a boy king in Israel, Josiah. As he comes to the throne, he orders for the temple to be cleaned out.

The temple had not been cleaned out in a long time. And they're cleaning out the temple, and they find the book of the law, Deuteronomy. And when they read it, they discover this is what God says. And Josiah declares a nationwide fast. People come to faith. It's a huge revival. This has happened throughout history. The Reformation, a rediscovery of God's law. The Puritans in our country, a rediscovery of God's law. And then, like I said, Qumran. When people have rediscovered God's law, good things happen.

And I hope, as we have walked through this book of Deuteronomy this fall, I hope it has helped you understand that there is not two stories of your Bible. There's not an angry Old Testament God and a nice New Testament God. There is one story that runs throughout from start to finish. The law of God is the gospel before the gospel. Deuteronomy is like the gospel before the gospel. I hope as we walked through this, it has been encouraging to you. It's been deeply encouraging to me.

And today, as we finish out our study on this, I'm going to take you through maybe the dumbest sermon I have to preach. Because it's all kind of a duh ending. This is the big climax, and it's funny because these are the points I'm going to take you through this morning: the insulting simplicity of God's way, the annoying scope of God's claim on us, and the invasive choices we have to make in response to that.

The Insulting Simplicity of God's Way

If you were paying attention, and you've been here all this fall, I hope that as we read, there were some eyebrows that went up. Like, really? As we read some of this. Did you hear what he said?

This command I'm giving you today, it's not too hard for you.

What command? We've come full circle to right where we began in the book of Deuteronomy. The Shema says, "Hear, O Israel, you are to love God." That's the very beginning. And that's where we are at the end. The command is all one thing, repeated over and over in the section we read.

Love God with all your heart and your soul and your oomph.

That's what we're being called to in this passage. And yet, did you hear what he said? This isn't too hard for you. Really? I mean, really? Not too hard? I mean, if you've been around churches that preach the gospel regularly, preach God's word, don't we believe we can't do this? Anybody with me this morning? We can't merit our own salvation. We can't do all the stuff. What do you mean it's not too hard? Moses, what are you talking about?

Here's the key: the problem was never the law. The problem was never the law itself. Moses says it's obvious. It's accessible. It's right here for you. And the law wasn't things like, "All right, see the temple over there? On Saturday, you're going to jump over the temple. Or on Sabbath days, I want you to not breathe for that day. Or you're not going to drink liquids every seven years." God's law was not things that were physically impossible. That's what he's saying.

And Jesus affirms this. When Jesus comes along and teaches—some of you are very familiar with the Sermon on the Mount—He said things like this:

You've heard it said, here's the law, but I say to you...

He's not saying, "Oh, the law back then, it was so confusing. That was crazy." Now Jesus, if anything, takes the law and ups the bar. "This is what it was before. This is what you heard it say in Deuteronomy. But I'm going to tell you this: not just what you do, but what's on the inside of your heart." Jesus raises the bar.

God isn't like, "I gave them something they can't keep." Tricksy God, sneaky, giving them a wall they can't take. Sometimes I think I hear Christians talk about the Old Testament, and it sounds like God was kind of dumb back then and he had to learn his lesson. "I gave them something they couldn't do it, so I'm going to have to start over. Or I gave them this. Let's see what they do with it. There's no way they can keep this one." That's not at all what's being pictured here.

The problem was not the law. It was the hearts of the people. This was our sermon from last week—that we need a new heart. The law was always meant to show us that we need a new heart. It wasn't that Israel failed because the law is superhuman, or Israel failed because they actually really tried hard and they just fell short a little bit. No. The law and the history of the Old Testament shows this is a people who didn't want to obey God's law, who were hard-hearted, who God calls them stiff-necked.

Now we don't use that phrase much. It doesn't make sense to us. But I want you to picture a horse or a mule or a donkey or a cow that's pulling a wagon that doesn't want to go the way you want it to go. That's what he's saying here.

This is a people who need a new heart. That's what we talked about last week. The problem wasn't the law. It was the heart. And it's insulting, therefore, that the way that this whole book ends is right here before you. Love God.

I think that humans, we like epic stories, and we like a quest. We want to be told, "Hey, this is what you need to do. If you're gonna be the hero, take the hero's journey. You need to go get the golden fleece." I know that's going around right now. Or Percy Jackson, right? Or you gotta go get the holy grail. You gotta go get the wicked witch's broom, the broom of the wicked witch of the West, from Wicked. You have to do all these things. You need to do the things. Take the ring of power and lose it in Mount Doom. Do the quest, and therefore, you are gonna get in. You're the hero, right? This is what we hear.

But this is what Moses said. You don't need a quest. You don't need to go up to heaven to go get it. You don't need to go down into the abyss. You don't need to cross the sea. It's already right here in your mouth and in your heart.

It's not in heaven, so you have to ask, who will go up in heaven and get it for us and proclaim it to us so we may follow it? And it's not across the sea, so you have to ask, who will cross the sea and get it for us to proclaim it to us that we may follow it? But the message is very near to you. It's in your mouth and in your heart so you may follow it. — Deuteronomy 30:12-14

This is the hardest part of the gospel. There's no epic journey. The hardest thing for people is to be told, you can't do anything. Just receive it. There's nothing that you contribute to this except for the sin that makes the cross of Jesus Christ necessary. There's nothing that you can do except sit still and do nothing and receive. And it is an absolute affront to human pride.

See, we wanna believe we're strong and we're bold and we're powerful and we're wise and we're smart. The gospel comes to us and says, this is really insultingly simple.

The Story of Naaman

There's a story in Second Kings about an arrogant king named Naaman. He was king of Syria, which is north of Israel. And he had in his household a young girl who was a slave girl captured from the Israelite people. And Naaman develops leprosy. Now this is the worst possible news a king could ever receive at that time. Because leprosy was a wasting disease—it still is in parts of the world—a wasting disease that causes, over time, the deterioration of your ability to feel. And therefore, people with leprosy would develop this whiteness on their skin and an inability—it's a neurological condition that prevented them from feeling things and would end up injuring themselves and not even feeling it. And so they'd begin to lose toes and fingers, the end of their nose from accidents, ears. It's ugly. It's disfiguring. And this king, this is a huge issue for the king because it means he can no longer be king.

So he goes into his palace, and the slave girl says, "If only you would go to Israel. There's a prophet there who can cure you." So he hears this news. Naaman hears this news, and he actually makes the pilgrimage. The king of Syria makes a pilgrimage into Israel to go visit the prophet. First, he goes to the palace, and the king's like, "What are you doing here? I can't heal you. Go find the prophet." So he goes to Elisha's hut. And as he comes up to Elisha's hut, Elisha doesn't even come out. He sends a servant out. And Naaman is completely insulted by this. The prophet won't even come out and talk to me. Doesn't he know who I am?

He will surely come out, stand, and call on the name of the Lord and wave his hands over the place of the cure of the skin disease. And aren't the rivers of Damascus better than all the waters of Israel? Couldn't I wash in them and be clean? — 2 Kings 5:11-12

So he left in a rage. You see, Elisha had said, "All you gotta do is go wash in the Jordan River, the muddy, filthy, shallow Jordan River." He's insulted because all proud people are insulted by the simplicity of the gospel. It is an assault on our pride.

Sally Wood Jones says of this in her Jesus Storybook Bible. She writes it this way—I like how she says it. "Of course, you and I both know that's not how God does things. All Naaman needed was nothing. It was the one thing he didn't have. But God knew that Naaman was even sicker on the inside than he was on the outside because Naaman was proud. He thought he didn't need God. His heart didn't work properly. He couldn't feel anything. You see, Naaman had leprosy of the heart. God was not only going to heal Naaman's skin, but he was going to heal his pride."

Here's the treasure in your pocket. God has made this insultingly simple.

It's like we think we ought to go on a quest and prove ourselves and get the wicked witch's broomstick or the golden fleece. It's like tearing apart your house and finding out that your keys were in your pocket the whole time. Right here.

You know what we celebrate at Advent? Advent is, if nothing else, the mystery of God come near. This passage tells us that God's word, God's law is near. It's in your heart, in your mouth, right here in front of you. Advent—we know that the mystery came even nearer and put on human flesh, became like one of us. Right under the nose of the people of Israel, right there among them.

This is what Paul does as he looks at the story of God. He riffs on this passage. He's maybe the first hip hop artist to mix this passage. And this is what he does with it in Romans 10:

For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness for all who believe. Since Moses writes about righteousness from the law, the one who does these things will live by them. But the righteousness that comes from faith speaks like this: Do not say in your heart, "Who will go up to heaven?" (that is, to bring Christ down) or "Who will go down to the abyss?" (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). On the contrary, what does it say? "The message is near to you, in your mouth and in your heart." This is the message of faith that we proclaim. If you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. — Romans 10

This is an Advent text. God comes near. That's the simplicity, the insulting simplicity of the gospel to us.

The Annoying Scope

But what about the scope? The annoying scope. If that wasn't bad enough, look at the annoying scope of God's claim. Everything. This is what God wants from you. God's command is simple: Love God. But it's massively comprehensive.

We looked at this at the very beginning of the series in Deuteronomy chapter six, the command in the Shema:

Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is one. You will love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might.

All of you. How much does God want of you? All of you.

And then it goes on to say:

These words I'm giving you today are to be in your heart. You're going to repeat them to your children. You're going to talk about them when you sit, when you walk, when you lie down, when you rise.

All your times. When does God want you to love him? All your times.

And then it says:

You're going to bind them on your hands, which is what you work with. You're gonna put them on your door frame, on your house. You're gonna bind them on your forehead, your thoughts. You're gonna put them on the gate of your city.

What is that? That's your work life. That's your home life. That's your thought life. That's your public commercial life. All the parts. Love God in all the parts, every room of your house.

We're like people who say, "You know, I need a subcontractor to come to my house and give me a new bathroom. I want a new bathroom on the first floor. Just a powder room, something simple, something clean, clean lines, looks good." And the contractor shows up and says, "All right, we're gonna start with the kitchen, and then we'll go from there to the master bedroom. We'll do the garage after that, and then the den, and then the living room." You're like, "Woah, woah, woah. I didn't—that's not what I asked for."

But God is not a subcontractor. We invite him into our life. We're like, "God, would you help me with my anxiety? Would you help me get a job? Would you help me with this person I'm married to who has such a problem? Hypothetically. Would you help me with my kids? Would you help me with my extended family?" Right. Like, we want God to have just a little bit—a subcontractor, a powder room. That would be really nice. That would look really nice. That'd be a nice addition to us.

And God is like, "I got plans. We're gonna do the whole thing. I wanna do every room. I wanna redo every room." That's the annoying scope of God, isn't it? Haven't you found this out? You come to follow the Lord. You're like, "Hey, I just wanted a little bit." And God's like, "I got big plans for you. Maybe some we didn't want."

The Invasive and Personal Choice

This leads us to the devastating final point: the invasive and personal choices. Look at verse 19, the last part here: "Choose life."

But then I want you to notice something surprising that you can't tell in your Bibles. Every time Moses says "you" in this passage, it's all singular—singular nouns, singular pronouns. "You." Not "y'all." Not "you guys." You and you and you and you choose life. Every last one of this is an extremely personal decision.

It's an extremely personal question: what am I doing? Am I choosing life? Now earlier in this book, this is what's fascinating. Earlier in this book, God says things like this: if you obey, you will have life. Obedience leads to life. And now here in the last sermon that Moses gives right before he dies, the last thing that he says to them in this sermon is, God himself will be your life. Not your obedience, not what you do for him. God himself will be your life. That is a profound statement.

It is echoed in John 14 where Jesus says:

I am the way and the truth and the life. — John 14:14

God himself will be your life. Choose life.

This is what's wild to me. Deuteronomy, as we've been going through it, is the predestination book of the Old Testament. This is the book that says all about God's choosing. God's chosen people. God chooses people out of all the nations. God chooses. God chooses. God chooses. That's what's all throughout this book. God's electing love. God sets his love on his people. And now at the end, what does he say? You choose. I chose. Now you choose. There's a dynamic between those I want you to make sure that you get. Because this is what's being held out for us: God's choosing is what enables us to choose.

If you've grown up in a church that preaches reformed theology or Calvinism, and it comes out sounding like fate or karma, that is not biblical. God's choosing doesn't prevent our choosing. It animates it. The only reason that we can make choices, and we're called to make choices and to choose life, is because God sets his love on us. It awakens. It enlivens. It makes possible our choosing of God. This election doesn't eliminate it. It activates it.

This is the fork in the road that you face every day of your life. Every day of your life. God chooses the chooser, and the chooser must choose. This is what it means to know God daily, hourly, every decision. Am I choosing life or death? Am I choosing God or something else in this world? This is what it means to follow Jesus.

Some of you are married. Some of you have been around a lot of married people. And you know that the wedding is really not that big a deal. Because in the wedding, people make vows. But they make daily choices after that. And the daily choices are: am I keeping the vows or am I not keeping the vows? Am I continuing to lay down my life and follow and give up and sacrifice—you first before me—or am I not? This is what God's choosing is like. This is the call.

If anybody wants to come after me, they must deny themselves and take up the cross... Every day. — Luke 9:23

Choose life.

Five Applications for Choosing Life in 2026

How do I choose life? I'm going to give you five applications for your next year, and I want you to write these down. How am I going to choose life in 2026? This is my call to us as a church. You ready?

First, choose nearness over noise. Nearness over noise. The word is near to you. But there's lots of things that distract us. We are a distracted people. We're people who give our attention to all kinds of things. We're fueled by our fears. We're exhausted. No offense, CTK, but y'all are some tired people. Choose nearness over noise for next year. Listening to him, choosing him, choosing to hear him.

Second, choose comprehensive discipleship over compartmentalized religion. Compartmentalized religion is like, "God, I want a powder room." Comprehensive is, "God, come into the house. Here's the key to every door. Let me go unlock them all for you." Because I want you to have access to my thought life, to my work life, to my online life, to my sexual life, to my money life, to our relationship life, to my extended family life. I have all of it. Comprehensive discipleship over compartmentalized religion.

Number three, choose daily faith over passive distortion of Calvinism. Daily faith over passivity. Our theology doesn't create spectators. Grace energizes effort. It's not anesthesia. It's adrenaline. It doesn't sideline our efforts. It energizes them. It awakens obedience. Daily faith over passivity. Passivity is an easy one.

Four, choose life together over isolation. Life together over isolation. Moses' call is singular. You and you and you and you all choose life, but his call is always to the community together. No one casually drifts into the spiritual life. Christianity is not a solo exercise. It's not a solo sport. We grow when we're in relationship with God and with one another. You don't have all you need in your house, even if you have the best of families. You need other people. You need people who aren't related to you or married to you, people who are different from you. People are gonna provoke you. Choose life together over isolation.

And finally, choose a few things over everything.

Jesus says in Matthew 16:

For what will it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his soul?

Folks, we are some of the most over-scheduled, overextended, overbooked people. Our kids are exhausted because they're doing 15 things. 2026, choose life. Say no to lots of things. Say no to good things. That's the problem where we live—too many good things. Choose a few things over everything.

The gospel is the simplest, easiest calling: love God. Love him. Choose life with him. And it's the most annoying, gigantic in scope call on you. All of you, not just parts.

The Story of Dan and Nora

Let me finish with this. In 2016, there was a CBS correspondent who did a CBS Good Morning segment with a guy named Dan Peterson in Augusta, Georgia. Dan Peterson was 82 years old at the time. He had lost his wife and was plunged into depression. His son said of him, "He's been ready to die for years now." He spent a lot of time sitting in his house, looking out the window watching squirrels. His least favorite activity was going to the grocery store because it reminded him he was shopping for one all the time.

One day, Dan Peterson was in the grocery store near the canned vegetables, and he heard a little tiny voice say, "Hello, old person." It was a girl named Nora Wood, four years old, in a cart with her mom. Peterson had a scowl on his face, and she said it again: "Hello, old person. It's my birthday today." And she made him give her a hug.

You may think that's cute—an adorable little girl being an adorable little girl. That's awesome. But they swapped information, and from that point on, Nora started going to see Mr. Peterson once a week, sometimes multiple times a week. She would hug him when she came in. She would hug him multiple times during. She would hug him when she left.

Nora had a framed picture of Mr. Peterson by her bed. Her mother took a photo of her asleep hugging the photo. Her mother says that day was senior day at the Publix—lots of discounts for lots of older people. But Nora sort of hyper-zoomed in on Dan Peterson. Kids go through faces, but she went and saw him every week until he died. She went to the funeral.

Before he died, he told the CBS guy on this interview, "She opened up to me a love I didn't know existed." In Publix, she chose him, and it changed his life. It pulled him out of depression. It changed the trajectory. It gave him a reason to get up in the morning every day.

Chosen by God

Now look, if you are a Christian, you are not Nora in this story. You are Dan Peterson. And the God of the universe has said, "You. I want you. I have a picture of you by my bed. I love to hug you. I'm all about you. You're the one I'm crazy about."

Why? There's no reason to this, y'all. There's nothing in us. But will you allow the gospel story to change you? Will you choose the chooser? Will you choose life with him? Will you allow that to transform you like it has Dan Peterson? Would you remember the incredible electing love of God on your life that hones in, that zeros in like Nora on to Mr. Peterson?

Choose life. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Let's pray together. Father, we thank you for your word. There is nothing like your word. Lord, you call us to love you because you have so first loved us. Lord, would you melt our hard hearts? Would you thaw out the frozen places in us? Lord, would you help us to give up control of our lives, give you access to all the parts? Father, we long to be more and more transformed by the love of God and to reflect that in this world. Father, make us like Dan Peterson. We pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen.

Let's respond to God's word in song together. Would you stand with me and sing?