Valley of Decision
6 min read
14 Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision! For the day of the LORD is near in the valley of decision.
15 The sun and moon will be darkened, and the stars no longer shine.
16 The LORD will roar from Zion and thunder from Jerusalem; the earth and the heavens will tremble. But the LORD will be a refuge for his people, a stronghold for the people of Israel.
— Joel 3:12
The quality of my faith might be measured by how I respond to the truth that “the day of the LORD is near.” And the day of the LORD is near for every single one of us because our bodies will return to the dust from where it came, no exceptions.
But if God does not exist, if Jesus is not coming back, if the word of God is just fanciful mythology, then life and death have no meaning at all. Without Christ, whatever “meaning” we try to impose upon our lives is the actual “fanciful mythology.” In that case, the “meaning of life” is always manufactured by our own limited understanding and experience—and truth be told, manufactured by our idolatry to “me, myself, and I,” the unholy trinity.
Of course, skeptics will always ask, “What makes the word of God true and everything else false?” And that is exactly the right question. That question is why every single one of us find ourselves in the “valley of decision” every single day of our lives.
Everyone has faith in something. Meaning, people hold on to certain beliefs that they consider to be inalienable. And these inalienable beliefs are revealed in the things that are said and done. Usually, we don’t really fully understand what those beliefs are, or we might be too proud or ashamed to actually articulate them. Because in our world today, the one belief that pretty much every single person clings to for dear life is that “me, myself, and I” is the most important person in the world.
Some people know how to decorate this idolatry in more appealing ways than others.
But this belief in the absolute priority of the self has always been the main problem of humanity—from the moment that Eve “saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom” (Genesis 3:6). In the valley of decision, Adam and Eve made an absolutely terrible, horrific choice. There are not enough adjectives in all human language to express how bad their choice was.
But if the word of God is true, then there is hope for the world, including “me, myself, and I.” If the word of God is true, then “me, myself, and I” can continue to live for all eternity in hell, or “me, myself, and I” can decide to trust in God and die so that we might live for all eternity together in Christ.
The day of the LORD is always today. The valley of decision is always in our minds and in our hearts. Until Jesus comes. And He will come, soon enough.
Father, I thank You for saving me. I confess that I am unworthy of Your grace. Yet, Your love has found me and filled me up. Everyday, I fall short of Your love, mercy, and grace. And everyday, You pour out Your love, mercy, and grace into my life. I ask You, Holy Spirit, to help me die to my self so that I might live in Christ today, together with all the Lord’s holy people. In Jesus’s name. Amen.