Overcoming Laziness: A Call to Spiritual Diligence
Devotional
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I went past the field of the sluggard, past the vineyard of the man who lacks judgment. Thorns had come up everywhere, the ground was covered with weeds, and the stone wall was in ruins. So his approach to life has paid its dividends. We go past this house, we say either there is no one living in that house, or the person is unwell within it or has been removed on account of illness, or the person within it is frankly lazy. Any one of those deductions would be valid. [00:00:55]
Indolence is one of the vices from which those whom it once infects are seldom reformed. Every other species of luxury operates upon some appetite that is quickly satisfied and requires some concurrence of art or accidents, which every place will not supply. In other words, if we had a craving for eating tubs of peaches, once you get a tub of peaches, you eat 14 of them, it pretty well is satisfied. [00:01:31]
Laziness is a sin. God made us to work. Indeed, six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh is a Sabbath to the Lord. And the contemporary quest for leisure feeds on indolence, feeds on a mentality which says nobody's going to tell me what to do or when to work. I will just order my own program, and my desire in life is to reduce the six to as small a number as I can. [00:05:03]
The Christian is supposed to be radically different from that. The problem for the individual is that he is so stuck in his mentality that he's unprepared to learn lessons even from nature. He's not prepared to go and look at the ants. Consider the ants, says Solomon, and be wise. He doesn't have an overseer, he doesn't have a manager, and still, he is industrious. [00:06:22]
As parents, we have a great responsibility in this, and in a totally leisure-consumed society, the challenge for us is to breed children that are known for the quality of their work, for the consistency of their attendance, for the honesty of their endeavor, for the extra mile given in the place of their employment. These simple things will increasingly be the marks of the godly as our world gives up on the standards of God's word. [00:07:44]
Some of us this morning would say that we know Christ and we follow after him, and therefore it is legitimate for us to ask if there is any sense in which laziness is intruding into our walk with Christ. How am I doing in the things of God? How am I doing in my personal devotional life? What happens in my reading of the Bible, my own personal prayer? [00:09:10]
What about our relationships within our homes? What about our commitment to our marriages? What about diligence in relationship to that? Has laziness crept in? If people came and examined our marriages, do they see the flowers in place? Do they see that it is weeded, that it is cared for, or do they see the walls broken down? [00:11:22]
The best adventure you and I will ever have is found along the pathway of goodness, is found along the path of duty. Get to the thorns and get to the thistles and get them out, God helping you. And in the work of the Lord, when I'm asked to take part, do I take part, or do I just put things off bit by bit? [00:12:21]
Are you applying the same level of diligence to the discovery of who Jesus is and why he came and what it means to know him as you are to the pursuit of excellence, which is valued and esteemed and rightly so and is commendable within your home and community? [00:18:14]
Surely security has to do with dealing with the Terminus. Surely security has to do with dealing with the one appointment that you must keep, the one appointment that cannot be avoided. It is appointed unto man once to die, and after this comes judgment. Put it in your diary, Mr. Businessman, you are definitely going there. [00:17:59]
What would it profit a man if he was the most diligent man in the business, and his diligence was such that he gained the whole world, and his laziness in spiritual things were such that he lost his own soul? [00:19:47]
There has to come a day in your journey where you say, Lord Jesus Christ, I am lazy about these things. I can get up at 4:00 a.m. to play ball. I can caddy my brains out provided the tips are good. I can stay up with my girlfriend till 2:00 a.m. I can play PlayStation till my fingers don't work anymore. [00:20:47]
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Indolence is one of the vices from which those whom it once infects are seldom reformed. Every other species of luxury operates upon some appetite that is quickly satisfied and requires some concurrence of art or accidents, which every place will not supply. In other words, if we had a craving for eating tubs of peaches, once you get a tub of peaches, you eat 14 of them, it pretty well is satisfied. [00:01:31]
Laziness is a sin. God made us to work. Indeed, six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh is a Sabbath to the Lord. And the contemporary quest for leisure feeds on indolence, feeds on a mentality which says nobody's going to tell me what to do or when to work. I will just order my own program, and my desire in life is to reduce the six to as small a number as I can. [00:05:03]
The Christian is supposed to be radically different from that. The problem for the individual is that he is so stuck in his mentality that he's unprepared to learn lessons even from nature. He's not prepared to go and look at the ants. Consider the ants, says Solomon, and be wise. He doesn't have an overseer, he doesn't have a manager, and still, he is industrious. [00:06:22]
As parents, we have a great responsibility in this, and in a totally leisure-consumed society, the challenge for us is to breed children that are known for the quality of their work, for the consistency of their attendance, for the honesty of their endeavor, for the extra mile given in the place of their employment. These simple things will increasingly be the marks of the godly as our world gives up on the standards of God's word. [00:07:44]
Some of us this morning would say that we know Christ and we follow after him, and therefore it is legitimate for us to ask if there is any sense in which laziness is intruding into our walk with Christ. How am I doing in the things of God? How am I doing in my personal devotional life? What happens in my reading of the Bible, my own personal prayer? [00:09:10]
What about our relationships within our homes? What about our commitment to our marriages? What about diligence in relationship to that? Has laziness crept in? If people came and examined our marriages, do they see the flowers in place? Do they see that it is weeded, that it is cared for, or do they see the walls broken down? [00:11:22]
The best adventure you and I will ever have is found along the pathway of goodness, is found along the path of duty. Get to the thorns and get to the thistles and get them out, God helping you. And in the work of the Lord, when I'm asked to take part, do I take part, or do I just put things off bit by bit? [00:12:21]
Are you applying the same level of diligence to the discovery of who Jesus is and why he came and what it means to know him as you are to the pursuit of excellence, which is valued and esteemed and rightly so and is commendable within your home and community? [00:18:14]
Surely security has to do with dealing with the Terminus. Surely security has to do with dealing with the one appointment that you must keep, the one appointment that cannot be avoided. It is appointed unto man once to die, and after this comes judgment. Put it in your diary, Mr. Businessman, you are definitely going there. [00:17:59]
What would it profit a man if he was the most diligent man in the business, and his diligence was such that he gained the whole world, and his laziness in spiritual things were such that he lost his own soul? [00:19:47]
There has to come a day in your journey where you say, Lord Jesus Christ, I am lazy about these things. I can get up at 4:00 a.m. to play ball. I can caddy my brains out provided the tips are good. I can stay up with my girlfriend till 2:00 a.m. I can play PlayStation till my fingers don't work anymore. [00:20:47]
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