Ki Tavo “When you come”
Deuteronomy 26:1–29:8
Isaiah 60:1–22
Revelation 1-5

The Choice is Yours

Last week the Torah portion brought us to take a good look in the mirror called responsibility. It taught us that no matter what we are doing in life from watching a neighbor's animal to relieving yourself we are to take responsibility for our own actions and the piece of the world we inhabit at the time. This week we see that the choice we make with that responsibility has a direct influence on our life. It is in the end a very simple mathematical equation we each choose to live out. It goes something like this:

Responsibility + Right Choice = Blessings
No Responsibility + Wrong Choice = Curses

The above equation is no more complicated than 2 = 2 = 4 and no matter how modern math tries to change things and make 2 + 2 = some number other than 4, in the end the laws of math will prevail and 4 will forever be the right answer.

As Moses was speaking to the people, he was bringing them to an end of an era. Life in a few days was about to change dramatically for them. Moses was asking the people in Deuteronomy to take a good look inward and do some self examination before they made their final steps of the journey. He was also showing them how to bring their lives more in line with the plans Elohim had for them. Before they could make changes though, they had to come to grips with the fact that the life they were living on that day and the life they would live from that day forward would come down to the above equation. They would not be able to change the reasons for curses in their lives, nor would there be another road to blessing. If they found themselves walking a life of curses, they would not be able to blame the way they were treated as children in Egypt or some other silly excuse. They were being told in no uncertain terms that the life they would have would be based on what each of them did with it. If they found themselves walking in a curse they were not to blame satan, but rather change their life by taking responsibility to make the right choice based on Torah.

I believe we today are on the brink of a change very similar to that of the Hebrews so long ago. Our lives are really not much different than theirs. Sure, we may look a bit different on the outside We may have possessions they never dreamed of, but inside we are the same. We, just as they have to take responsibility for our own choices in life. If we find ourselves walking in the wrong side of Deuteronomy 28, let us not be a people who try to make 2 + 2 =- 5 by blaming others, blaming our past, blaming our "lot in life", or some bad roll of life's dice. Let us be a people who instead look to our Creator and to His instructions of Torah to find why things may not be going like we would desire.

Of course this all sounds like just another way of saying the same thing we have been saying all year. The reason for that is because it is! It is the same thing I have been saying and it is the same thing Moses said for forty years. (Talk about saying something till you were blue in the face!)

So I guess if saying it all one more time was good enough for the Hebrews then, it is good enough for us to hear one more time today;

Responsibility + Right Choice = Blessings
No Responsibility + Wrong Choice = Curses

Lets do ourselves all a favor and choose the right equation because in this walk, the end result does not only affect you, but affects us all.