Talking Donkeys

What is life but a road full of twists and turns, and various detours we do and do not take?

I've been thinking quite a lot lately about big decisions. It's sort of that time of life, if you know what I mean. In all my pondering of all the fascinating options, I keep coming back to one specific thought. Perhaps memory would be a better word. "Seek not the will of God, but the mind of Christ." 

I jotted this phrase down in my notebook last summer on a study abroad trip in England. Our professor, Dr. Alan Jacobs, was talking about how many Christians take the concept of "God's will" and twist it into something remarkably similar to the pagan notion of Fate. In effect, we sit around waiting to hear God's voice, or receive some sign, or in some way have our decisions "confirmed" by divine means. And we use the absence of these confirmations as excuses for our failure to act. 

Dr. Jacobs suggested that a more beneficial - not to mention holier - way of navigating life is to cultivate in ourselves the "mind of Christ." As in 1 Corinthians 2:14-16, which reads: "The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. 'For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?' But we have the mind of Christ." It is a powerful passage of Scripture. Essentially it says that if we are filled with the Spirit, we will be able to judge "all things" from a Christ-like perspective. 

So what impact does this have on the road we take through life? I think back to a talk author Donald Miller (Blue Like Jazz) gave at Wheaton last year. He challenged the audience - majority college students - to consider the idea that sometimes when making decisions, perhaps even more often than not, God just might want us to choose. Yes, he could send an angel or a prophet or a talking donkey to tell us what to do. He could speak to us audibly or do the whole wet fleece/dry fleece thing to make his will clear. But maybe, except in those fairly rare situations, he lets us decide for ourselves... as any good parent does, he gives us leeway to make our own choices, at least some of the time. 

To be clear, I'm not really talking about free will here. Yes, I believe God allows us to choose whether or not we will give our lives to him. But the choices I'm talking about are ones he gives to Christians specifically. Choices that do not affect our salvation. Some examples might be: where should I go to college? What should I major in? Who should I date/marry? What kind of career should I go into? Which church should I join? Sweet potato fries, or regular? Ok, that last one was a joke. Haha. Anyway. My point in all this is to say that we Christians need to stop crippling ourselves by waiting for some special "sign" or "call." 

If we actually receive one of these clear indications, of course we should act on it. As Don joked, "Here's how you know, based on Scripture, whether God has a specific plan for your life: If you are a virgin and you get pregnant anyway." He was kidding of course, but he has a point. In the Bible, if God wants someone to do something, he doesn't beat around the bush (literally... he seems to prefer lighting the bush on fire). But when he's not thundering from the heavens, his followers in Scripture don't just sit around waiting for the next talking donkey. Where did we get the idea we have to sit around waiting for God to send some sort of message in a bottle with instructions for our lives? 

Don't get me wrong. Decisions are important. Some (though perhaps not quite as many as we would like to believe) are incredibly important. But when choices are between two clearly good and beneficial alternatives, there really isn't as much hanging in the balance as we often think. In one of the best-known poems of the 20th Century, Robert Frost writes:

 
   I shall be telling this with a sigh
   Somewhere ages and ages hence:

   Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-

   I took the one less traveled by,
     And that has made all the difference. 

People quote this passage at graduation ceremonies and the like as a profound statement of truth. But in fact, "The Road Not Taken" is one of the most misinterpreted poems in existence. Frost is being ironic here. For earlier in the poem he makes perfectly clear that the two paths before him were "really just the same," one "just as fair" as the other. His point is that, looking back, we often over-romanticize the importance of life decisions and the impact they have ultimately had on our stories. His insinuated message is that he probably could have taken the other path and ended up more or less the same person. Which, I think, is far more profound than the alternative (and wrong) interpretation.


Does God have a specific will for our lives? Yes. That we love Him, and love our neighbor. And love is an active choice, not a passive emotion. So maybe, when we are faced with difficult decisions, instead of asking God to "reveal His will" to us, we should instead pray for discernment - the "mind of Christ" - and then... choose.