Day 4/365- Genesis 11-14- Part 2

"Is not the whole land before you? Separate yourself from me. If you take the left hand, then I will go to the right, or if you take the right hand, then I will go to the left.” (Genesis 13:9)

"While Lot settled among the cities of the valley and moved his tent as far as Sodom. Now the men of Sodom were wicked, great sinners against the Lord." (Genesis 13:12-13)

Sometimes God gives us a choice. Growing up, Christians I knew talked a lot about God's will. Not only did they mention God's will, but the center of God's will. I head Louie Giglio talk about this once. He mentioned how not only do we have to be in God's will (as if we always know what that is) but now we have to be in the center? It seems like a daunting task.
I've also heard it said that God's will is not so much like a target that we have to be in the center of but more like a field where we have to stay between the fences. God gives us choices. We choose. We daily make choices to do whatever it is we want to do.
Lot makes a choice. He is given the whole land to choose from. Abraham tells him to pick & choose. As the knight in the Indiana Jones & the Last Crusade said, "He chose poorly." (clip here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DGFuHC75aY)
Lot chose to pitch his tent toward Sodom. The Bible describes Sodom as "wicked, great sinners against the Lord." Again, he chose poorly. Later on in the Bible we see that Lot starts with his tents "toward Sodom" but ends up "in Sodom".  He goes from near Sodom to inside of Sodom. They were a bigger influence on him than he was.
DISCLAIMER: I know that Jesus is the friend of sinners & we have to be light to dark, but we also cannot surround ourselves with constant wickedness & expect to come away unscathed. If we play with fire, we will get burned.
When it comes to who we surround ourselves with, we must make sure that they are people that can point us to Christ not away from him. I'm not saying we don't have friends that don't know Christ. Of course we should! But, we have to be careful that we are being a better evangelist than they are!
We must take care where we "pitch our tents". We must protect ourselves from "the sin that so easily entangles us."
We have a choice, let's make sure we choose wisely!