During Lent the first reading and the gospel are chosen specifically for that day. Today’s lesson from the Old Testament, “Choose Life,” is paired with the words of Jesus in St. Luke, “Take up your cross daily.” At first glance the command of Moses, “Choose life,” seems obvious. Who wouldn’t choose life over death! But it meaning becomes clearer when looked at through the lens of taking up one’s cross each day. Choosing life involves real choices, costly choices, choices that make demands upon you. It is the daily effort that we must make each day to live with compassion, generosity, forgiveness that are the cost of choosing life. Choosing a genuine, human life requires that we give of ourselves not simply take what’s there.