It's On Us To Choose. God Takes Care Of The Rest

For if God did not spare the angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to pits of nether gloom to be kept until the judgment; if he did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a herald of righteousness, with seven other persons, when he brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly; if by turning the cities of Sodom and Gomor′rah to ashes he condemned them to extinction and made them an example to those who were to be ungodly; and if he rescued righteous Lot, greatly distressed by the licentiousness of the wicked (for by what that righteous man saw and heard as he lived among them, he was vexed in his righteous soul day after day with their lawless deeds), then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trial, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment, and especially those who indulge in the lust of defiling passion and despise authority.

2 Peter 2:4-10

All of us are free.

We are free to choose. We are free to act.

Yet none of us can ever be free from consequence. Whenever we choose, whenever we act, we are sure to face consequences for our choice and our action.

From our choices come our actions. From our actions come results which invariably produce consequences. From choice to consequences, the first begets the next as surely as night follows day.

We need no marvelous wisdom or even Bible verse to tell us that this is the order of things.

That consequence is the direct lineal result of choice is self-evident and intuitively obvious. As we make our choices, and thus we choose our actions, we may fairly say we also choose our consequences.

We should be clear, however, that while we choose a consequence by choosing an action, we do not choose which consequences arise from which actions.

If we choose to steal from our place of employment, we undoubtedly choose the consequence of being fired.

If we choose to be unfaithful in our relationships, we undoubtedly choose the consequence of losing those relationships, of being separated from those whom we love.

Yet we do not choose—we cannot choose—that the consequence for stealing from an employer will be the loss of employment.

We do not choose—we cannot choose—that the consequence for infidelity will be the lost of a relationship.

Perhaps it will be that the employer will choose not to fire us. Or perhaps our partner will choose to forgive us our infidelity.

The one consequence is just as plausible as the other.

Indeed, we might reasonably anticipate one consequence only to be surprised (pleasantly or unpleasantly) with another.

We might not expect to be fired as a consequence for a deed done at work—but we can be.

We might not expect our partner to leave us after a betrayal or some other infidelity—but they can.

At the same time, we might expect to be fired for an infraction our employer determines is minor, and so are not fired.

We might expect a friend or significant other to break off a relationship over something we see as misbehavior, but which our friend or significant other sees as not a serious betrayal of trust.

We choose our actions, and so we choose our consequences, yet we do not choose which consequence arises from which action. What consequence attaches to which action is not something over which we have any control.

It might even seem that we experience negative consequences as a result of doing that which is right.

We may choose to act with integrity and honor at work, only to be fired.

We may choose to tell a loved one a hard truth, only to have that person turn on us.

That is its own challenge. While it is easy to understand that we experience good consequences for good deeds and bad consequences for bad deeds, how do we comprehend those moments where it seems that bad consequences result from good deeds?

What do we make of moments when we receive seemingly bad fruit from our presumably good deeds. Are we not promised in the Gospel that good trees—good deeds—bear only good fruit, and that only bad trees—bad deeds—bear bad fruit?

Indeed we are. Yet as we are promised in the Gospel we must consider the possibility that what we are experiencing as a negative consequence—as bad fruit—is in some fashion actually a positive.

Perhaps if we act with integrity at work and are dismissed we are removed from a situation where worse things happen to those who remain.

Perhaps having the loved one unjustly turning on us removes us from a toxic situation and thus saves us from an even worse experience.

Perhaps in learning to deal with such set backs we are further strengthened that we might be better equipped to deal with adversity when it comes unbidden.

We do not know and we cannot know why particular consequences attach to particular actions. Such are details God does not see fit to share with us.

We do not know why particular consequences attach to particular actions. All we have is faith that the ultimate outcome of good actions will be good consequences.

Yet we also know that if we focus on doing right even if we get hurt by so doing, we are assured of this much: we are assured of never having to apologize or repent for doing wrong. If we focus on doing what is right even as we recognize the difficult consquences that may come, we need never worry about having regrets.

Likewise, we should realize that if we do the wrong thing even though we seemingly get away with it in the moment, until we at last do repent of that wrong thing it will forever hang over our heads. We should realize that if we do a wrong thing even knowing we can escape immediate justice for it, regret will hound us from that day forward.

Consequently, even if the immediate consequence of doing a right action is difficult or painful to bear, we may be reasonably assured that it is superior to the consequences that will ultimately attend upon doing the wrong thing.

Thus it is that, no matter how difficult or painful a consequence, if it arises from doing right it must surely be a good fruit. Thus also it is that, no matter how pleasurable a consequence, if it arises from doing wrong it must surely be a bad fruit.

This is how we may know, as Peter writes in his Second Letter, that God will in the end deliver the righteous man from trial, and deliver the unrighteous man to punishment. We may know this because our own conscience will itself be the means by which God delivers both men.

In life we are assured that, for all that we do, consequence will come for us all. Thus we are also assured that whether the sum total of consequence in our lives be good or bad will be determined by how much the sum of our choices and therefore our actions are likewise good or bad.

Thus we are assured that God has ordained this to be the order of things.

It is on us to choose, and to act. God takes care of the rest.