It seemed innocent enough at the time. I had just come home from high school and told my mom that I was going to a friend’s house to play football. She insisted that I stay home and do my homework. Instead, I slipped out the back door and spent the next 2 hours making tackles and touchdowns in my friend’s backyard. But on the last play, I was tackled into a swingset and knocked out my front tooth. It hurt like crazy, but not as badly as telling my parents.

That choice to disobey put me on a 10-year path of dental problems and pain that have continuing implications today. Ballplayer Roy Hobbs said in the film The Natural, “Some mistakes you never stop paying for.”

Centuries earlier, Paul captured the same idea in the universal law of sowing and reaping. He said, “Whatever a man sows, that he will also reap” (Gal. 6:7). Our choices often have a reach and impact that we could never imagine. Thus the apostle’s words remind us to choose wisely.

The choices we make today produce the consequences we reap tomorrow. It’s far better to avoid sin in the first place than to struggle to overcome its consequences.

Lord, we need Your wisdom to help us make good choices, and forgiveness when we make bad choices.  — Bill Crowder