OCG

Navigating Life's Crossroads: Choosing Love Over Escapism

There are times when you find yourself in situations you could have never imagined. These situations reveal the deep imprint of sin that has been present in our lives since birth. The trials we face, allowed by God, confront us with a certain truth: How will we overcome this situation? Let us begin with the understanding that God does not place a test before us that is more difficult than we can endure. For this reason, each test is unique to the individual—different in situation, condition, and timing.

There comes a point when we find ourselves at a crossroads. One path is the easiest and most common, consisting of filling the empty space created by sin's imprint, revealed by the test, with an “escape” from reality. This escape provides enough dopamine or pleasure to satisfy the longing of our body and soul. However, this escape requires repeated actions, performed thousands of times, to continue releasing that feeling. In other words, this path leads to dependence on actions that provide temporary relief. In the case of Job, he chose the second path. Which path is that?

The second path isn’t necessarily the hardest, but it is perhaps the longest and the most effective: falling in love with Jesus. Can falling in love with someone help fill an empty space? When you fall in love, you constantly seek to communicate with that person, you do things to gain their attention, and you’re even willing to stop doing things that hurt or bother them. In the Bible, we learn that we cannot do anything to earn God’s favor, because He has given us grace—an undeserved gift. Our natural tendencies go against God’s commandments, but when we are born again, we become new creations, living with God in our hearts. As a result, the things that once brought us pleasure and dopamine in our past lives now begin to cause us disgust.

Of course, we will continue to make mistakes because we are human. But through this process, we will first understand our identity, then our purpose, and finally, God will change our destiny. As a result, the other things our hearts desire will be given to us by God.

Gabriel Soto

Ojo Con Gabriel