Fear No Fear

“I made a covenant with my eyes; why then should I look upon a young woman?” (Job 31:1, MEV). Job so loved God’s moral character that he CHOSE to make a covenant with himself not to put before his eyes things that would lead to iniquity. Iniquity are the internal sins. The ones other people can’t see. Envy, lust, jealousy, deceit, etc. Those things we harbour inside. Not the things that pop into our minds, but the things we dwell on. Hour after hour, day after day. The things that motivate us to manifest them in behaviour. But instead of putting things in front of his eyes that he could then dwell on, Job made a covenant with himself to NOT give himself the opportunity to choose to dwell on things that weren’t right and good. Not from HIS point of view, but from GOD’s point of view. Just like how we don’t choose people because we love them, but love them because we chose them; Job chooses God and then does what he needs to do to maintain his love for God – to keep from straying. God chose us. God loves us. We have the opportunity to love Him because He loves us. To CHOOSE Him because He CHOSE us. To reciprocate choice. To reciprocate love. That’s why Jesus came. Not to judge us, but to provide the circumstances so that we could choose to love God. Not just the chosen people meant to teach us and guide us as we sought Him, but everyone. Jew AND Gentile. The whole world. We can choose to make a covenant with ourselves to cherish His love. To choose to put before us only those things that SUPPORT our love for Him. Only those things that STRENGTHEN our love for Him. Not because other things are bad or poor necessarily, but that they don’t help to deepen our relationship with God so they are not OUR things. To choose to make ours ONLY those things that deepen our relationship with God. Because He LOVES us. That is SPECIAL and should be cherished AS special. Love is a choice. Let’s make sure that we make THE good choice.