Do Your Part (Friday Devotional)

“Fight the good fight of the faith; take hold of the eternal life, to which you were called and to which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses.”

- 1 Timothy 6:12

“You approach two doors. One is hot to the touch and bears an unusual design in the center, a symbol so strange it just might be…alien. The other door appears perfectly ordinary but for one amazing fact…it is not resting on hinges, but rather is somehow mysteriously floating above the floor! WHICH DOOR WILL YOU CHOOSE? To open the first door, turn to page 75. To open the second door, turn to page 98.”

This sort of scenario will be familiar to anyone who has ever picked up one of the “Choose Your Own Adventure” books, a children’s series that began in the 1970s and continues to this day. These books upend the traditional reading experience by placing the direction of the plot in the hands of the reader, ending each chapter with a choice like the one above. A veritable fiction buffet, any given book might have a dozen different endings, with wildly divergent paths to get to those endings.

The result is that reading a “Choose Your Own Adventure” book makes for a totally different experience than reading a “normal” book. Accustomed to a passive involvement with the story, where you are simply carried along wherever the author takes you, these books flip the script—in order to keep the story going, you must do your part.

The life of faith, 1 Timothy 6:12 indicates, should embody that sort of involvement—rather than being passively carried along by God, we are called to participation in His work. Paul refers to faith as a “fight”, of eternal life as something we “take hold of”—that sort of active language assumes that with faith comes struggle, that there is more to living for Christ than business as usual. Written by an apostle who was repeatedly beaten and imprisoned for his faith, the words of 1 Timothy 6:12 serve as a reminder that faithfulness is more challenging and more participatory than we sometimes like to think.

We derive great comfort from knowing that in Christ we do not have to go through life alone, that God is with us in every struggle and every work. But as you thank Him for His faithfulness, don’t lose sight of your part of the relationship—God is faithful to you, so may you also be faithful to God, using your spiritual gifts for His kingdom. Don’t just watch the good fight of faith, don’t just sit on your hands waiting for new life in Christ—do your part.