We have all made excuses.
I teach high school. Periodically, my students will come to me having had some issues completing their homework assignments. Some favorite examples are: "My computer was not working," "I forgot," "I left it at home," or "You never said that..." (this last despite the fact that everyone else in the class heard me say it). I have even been given the classic "My dog at my homework" on several occasions. One student was wise enough to bring me the demolished shreds of said homework as proof.
While only one student was wise enough to bring evidence, it is quite possible that some of these other excuses were legitimate. The computer may actually have not been working, or perhaps in the busy-ness of the day you actually forgot about the assignment. What is common, regardless of the truth of the excuse or not, is our tendency as humans to make excuses when we find ourselves in trouble.
We use excuses to try and ease up the trouble or burden which we have to carry. This is a learned trait which we can trace all the way back to Adam and Eve in Genesis 3. Making excuses is not strictly an individual phenomenon: we can see it present everywhere from a group of kids on the elementary school playground to the highest levels of government.
With this abundance of excuses, it should not surprise us that we do the same thing with God. We think that we are too ill-equipped or unworthy to answer the call of God. We tell God that He could not use us because of what we have done; that our past is too dirty. We challenge God when He calls us to something hard because we do not like what it will cost us (financially, socially, or in any number of other ways).
A classic example of this can be found in Exodus 3-4. God was calling Moses to be His servant, to go "to Pharaoh, so that you may bring My people, the sons of Israel, out of Egypt" (3:10). This was a very specific purpose. If you read through the rest of these chapters, you will find Moses doing the same thing that we so often do: he made excuses based on his insufficiency. Each time, God challenged Moses with a divine response.
Paul in 2 Corinthians 12 writes that he was given a thorn in the flesh. He begged God that it would be taken away from Him. God's response can be found in verse 9: "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness."
Here's the point: those things which we use as our excuses may be the very things which God wants to use for His glory. The call which He places on our lives may seem scary, and often we will not be good enough to fulfill it on our own, and that is fine- He wants to make us good enough. He wants to use our lives as examples through which to demonstrate His own strength.
Our challenge this week is quite simple: NO EXCUSES. Let's have courage to trust God as He leads, not relying on our strength but His.
I teach high school. Periodically, my students will come to me having had some issues completing their homework assignments. Some favorite examples are: "My computer was not working," "I forgot," "I left it at home," or "You never said that..." (this last despite the fact that everyone else in the class heard me say it). I have even been given the classic "My dog at my homework" on several occasions. One student was wise enough to bring me the demolished shreds of said homework as proof.
While only one student was wise enough to bring evidence, it is quite possible that some of these other excuses were legitimate. The computer may actually have not been working, or perhaps in the busy-ness of the day you actually forgot about the assignment. What is common, regardless of the truth of the excuse or not, is our tendency as humans to make excuses when we find ourselves in trouble.
We use excuses to try and ease up the trouble or burden which we have to carry. This is a learned trait which we can trace all the way back to Adam and Eve in Genesis 3. Making excuses is not strictly an individual phenomenon: we can see it present everywhere from a group of kids on the elementary school playground to the highest levels of government.
With this abundance of excuses, it should not surprise us that we do the same thing with God. We think that we are too ill-equipped or unworthy to answer the call of God. We tell God that He could not use us because of what we have done; that our past is too dirty. We challenge God when He calls us to something hard because we do not like what it will cost us (financially, socially, or in any number of other ways).
A classic example of this can be found in Exodus 3-4. God was calling Moses to be His servant, to go "to Pharaoh, so that you may bring My people, the sons of Israel, out of Egypt" (3:10). This was a very specific purpose. If you read through the rest of these chapters, you will find Moses doing the same thing that we so often do: he made excuses based on his insufficiency. Each time, God challenged Moses with a divine response.
Paul in 2 Corinthians 12 writes that he was given a thorn in the flesh. He begged God that it would be taken away from Him. God's response can be found in verse 9: "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness."
Here's the point: those things which we use as our excuses may be the very things which God wants to use for His glory. The call which He places on our lives may seem scary, and often we will not be good enough to fulfill it on our own, and that is fine- He wants to make us good enough. He wants to use our lives as examples through which to demonstrate His own strength.
Our challenge this week is quite simple: NO EXCUSES. Let's have courage to trust God as He leads, not relying on our strength but His.
Bibliography
New American Standard Bible. La Habra, CA: Lockman Foundation, 1977. Kindle.
New American Standard Bible. La Habra, CA: Lockman Foundation, 1977. Kindle.
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