THOSE LITTLE DECISIONS

History celebrates the great decisions that turned the tide in a nation's or the world's history. For example, the decision of the day and the location of the allied invasion of Europe on D-Day; General George Washington's decision to cross the Deleware and attack the Hessians the day after Christmas in 1776; John Adam's decision to assign Thomas Jefferson to write The Declaration of Independence instead of the Committee of Five. Momentous decisions all.

What is often overlooked are the little decisions that are also the hinges on which history turns, personal decisions that set the course of one's life on one path or another. We all make them. One of the leading scholars in New Testament Greek, while a non-Christian in college, decided to take a beginning course in Greek only so that his schedule would be clear to enroll in the physical education course in golf.

Robert Frost wrote in his famous poem, "The Road Not Taken," about a traveler who comes upon "Two roads diverged in a yellow wood," and concludes with: "I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference."

Those little decisions that set the course of our lives and "make all the difference." One such decision occurred in the life of Daniel, a teenager far from home and ripped from all that was familiar. In a new country, where he didn't want to be, taken there by the force of a powerful conqueror, there was a new language, a new education, new literature, and a different religious mindset. It was required that he throw off the old and embrace the new. Daniel and his friends were to become brainwashed Babylonians. And by embracing the new, the ultimate result would be conformity to the world-system.

It was at that time, at that young age, that he made a decision, a small one, but one that changed everything. He decided he would reject the food the government cooked and commanded him to eat and instead, keep the dietary prescriptions of the Mosaic Law. In rejecting the food, he made the decision to become a vegetarian. (This is a description of what he did, not a prescription of what we're to do.)

He took his stand when he said, "Please test your servants for ten days, and let us be given some vegetables to eat and water to drink." Later we read, "So the overseer continued to withhold their choice food and the wine they were to drink, and kept giving them vegetables."

In world history, that decision appears to be a minor incident, but in reality in world history, it "made all the difference," because without rejecting one diet and keeping for another, we would never have heard of Daniel.

What we might consider a little decision in our lives may set us in motion on one path instead of the other. Therefore, Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight."