Living With IntegritySample

THE COST OF WHAT'S RIGHT

When the sun rose that morning, Daniel and his fellow mountaineers were on the verge of their life’s greatest achievement. After days of arduous climbing, they were now only three hours from the summit of Mount Everest. But their character was about to be tested in a way they could have never anticipated.

Twenty-eight-thousand feet up, Daniel and his companions stumbled upon a man named Lincoln Hall. He was hallucinating and deathly ill from altitude sickness and hypothermia. He’d been sitting alone in sub-zero temperatures for twelve hours after his fellow climbers left him for dead. Now, Daniel and his teammates had to choose: abandon their life’s goal or abandon the man.

What would you do?

Reading this story from a place of comfort, the answer might seem obvious. But right and wrong can easily get blurred when everything you’ve worked for is at stake. It’s a powerful reminder that doing the right thing comes at a price.

That’s why a successful marriage is no accident. It’ll probably require you to sacrifice some of your personal ambitions. Or if you’re a parent, you may have to pass up a career goal or cut back on your busy schedule to be present in your kids’ lives. It’s a choice that has always faced God’s people because it drills down and exposes our true priorities: Do what pleases you, or do what pleases the Lord?

That day on the mountain, Daniel counted the cost and did the right thing. He sacrificed greatly to benefit someone else. Creating the family you’ve dreamed about may require you to do the same thing.

For a daily dose of encouragement and perspective, check out Jim Daly’s blog, Daly Focus, at JimDalyBlog.com.