Proverbs 15:19
“the way of the upright is a highway”
Greetings in the name of our lord Jesus Christ. So far, we have looked at the various characteristics of a lazy person precisely how it affects our spiritual journey with our Lord Jesus Christ. In this article, we will look at one more characteristic feature of the sluggard.
“The slothful man said, there is a lion without, I shall be slain in the streets. (Proverbs22:13).“
“The sluggard will not plough by reason of the cold; therefore, shall he beg in harvest, and have nothing. (proverbs20:4).”
As we read the above proverbs it’s clear that the sluggard is always bound with excuses. He says I might be killed by the lion if I go out to work. Excuses often comes out of fear. It could be the fear of failure, fear of responsibility, fear of embarrassment, fear of uncertainty, fear of making mistakes or fear of facing the challenges. To put it simple it’s to play a safe game only and not to come out of the safety or comfort zone. As believers in Christ we all have made excuses in some point of time but we never ever thought that it is the laziness in us driving the excuse factor which in turn is out of our own fear.
Let’s look at the examples from the scripture. Our first man Adam excused himself from the responsibility of disobeying god’s commandment. He said he ate the fruit because of the woman that god gave (Gen3:12). So surely Adam was not diligent enough to take gods command seriously and with much ease he in fact blames god for it. May be god has asked you to do the ministry or come out of a secret sin or may be something else that god has commanded you to do and if you are still running around the bush by giving excuses then today is the time for you to obey god with diligence. Moses was a man full of excuses when god called him to lead the Israelites. Moses denied to take the responsibility of a god send leader to free the Israelites out of Egypt (Exo3:11). We read in exodus chapter 3 and 4 about how Moses excuses himself even though god tried to persuade him in several ways. In exodus chapter 4 verse 14 we read that gods anger was kindled against Moses. Every excuse of Moses came out of fear of responsibility, embarrassment, failure, uncertainty and also fear for his life as he once murdered an Egyptian. Until god gave him Aaron to talk on behalf of Moses he wasn’t ready to go back to Egypt (Exo4:14).
Gideon too gives excuses in accepting gods commission as the deliverer of Israel (Jud6:15). Even the prophets like Jeremiah and Jonah too excused themselves from gods commission (Jer1:4-6), (Jonah 1). And if you ever wondered why god sought to kill Moses (Exo4:24) then it may be because of his excuses only. It does teach us not to be playful with god’s grace and not to be slothful as we do not know when the grace period would end. Remember it was because of gods anger that Jonah got into the belly of a giant fish (Jon1:17).
We read that the sluggard gives cold or the winter as the reason for not ploughing the field (Prov20:4). Why didn’t he plough? The answer is it was cold. There is a big deal in the cold. See as we already know that the sluggard loves his sleep and it is on those winter days that he enjoys the sleep tucking himself under the warm blanket. Or what if he gets unwell if he goes out in the winter to work? After all toiling in the cold morning is not his business. Do you see these excuses for not doing the task that he is supposed to do? In other words, knowing that he would starve and end up in misery. It’s a fact that every lazy person does know the outcome of his lame excuses.
Diligence and hardworking go hand in hand and so does laziness and excuses. Our spiritual journey with Jesus comes with risks and not safe play. It takes us to do out of our comfort zone. We have go that extra mile with a lot of struggle and pain. But don’t ever worry our god is able and faithful to perform in and through us for what he has called us to do no matter how difficult or unachievable it is. So be diligent and not slothful.
God bless you all. Amen.