Discussion Jumpstarter
Study leader reference - not a definitive answer
Question 9
The speaker says we “choose our situation” because we could always “drop our responsibilities…run away from…Jesus,” and that we’re choosing stress over selfishness; where does this collide with the modern habit of describing ourselves as trapped victims of circumstances, and how might owning our choices change the way we endure stress?
Another way to ask: How does the idea that we choose to keep our responsibilities challenge the way we often say we’re stuck as victims of our circumstances? How might owning our choices change how we handle stress?
Discussion Jumpstarter
Direct Answer
According to the speaker, feeling like a trapped victim makes stress harder to endure, but recognizing that we are still choosing faithfulness reframes our suffering as a deliberate, moral choice. Owning our choices can increase endurance and even joy because we can say, “This is the life I would rather live than the alternatives.”
- Principle: “It’s harder to endure something when you don’t feel like you had any say in what you’re enduring.”
- He argues we actually do have a choice: we could “drop our responsibilities, run away from our families, run away from Jesus, and then we’d be stress-free.”
- He admits it’s an option but not a good one: “It’s not a very good option, but it is an option.”
- Therefore: “the fact that we choose not to do that means that we are actually choosing the life that we’re living.”
- Motivation: “we’d rather be stressed than be selfish.”
- Result: saying “we chose our lives” helps us “endure…better and enjoy…better.”