Diligent Initiative

Diligent Initiative

Proverbs 6:9-11, Ephesians 5:1-2, 8-16

Captain Moy Hernandez, Jr.

Let me ask you this… are you a wise person? Not a wise crack… although I suspect there is a little bit of that in each of us. But a wise person!

DID YOU KNOW THAT WISE PEOPLE TAKE INITIATIVE?

I mean they just don’t sit and watch, they take action to accomplish what they believe God wants.

Throughout the scriptures there are many biblical principles which are meant to equip us for life – to live our lives to the fullest, to live well.

Wise living is understanding and patterning our lives according to the structure and order that God built into the world. A truly wise person tries to always live according to God’s plan not just for their lives but for His Church. But in order to do this we first must understand what it is required to live wisely.

We enter the road leading to wisdom through the fear of God defined as: Not being frighten, or scared of God (although we should). It is deep and healthy respect for God, and His authority, which, makes us personally loathe sin and love righteousness.

Job 28:28 - ’Respect God. And refuse to do evil things. Then you will be wise.’

Today, I would like for us to look at this idea of wise living from the perspective of taking initiative or as the sermon title suggest taking diligent initiative in our lives.

Someone said there are three types of people in the world: those who do not know what is happening; those who watch what is happening; and those who make things happen.

Wise people make things happen. Wise people take initiative. They see a problem and act on it. They don’t just sit passively and wait for opportunities to come. They prayerfully take actions.

When faced with a problem, or a need, the wise person goes to God, seeks for wisdom, and then takes a piece of paper, and begin to consider his/her options. What should I do Lord? What do you want me to do? And then take action.

You have heard of the saying What Would Jesus DO? I’ve always thought it to be a bit silly, Jesus will do what he will do. I much rather say… What would Jesus HAVE ME do… in wisdom seek out his purpose.

Unfortunately, not many people, followers of Christ, included, do this. This perverted human tendency causes the writer of Proverbs to warn us of laziness.

Instead of taking action, the lazy person does nothing. Instead he or she sits passively, watching, waiting for something to happen.

The Book of Proverbs calls people who live by this philosophy sluggards. A sluggard is an idle or slothful person. I could be wrong but by the spelling it looks like it also refers to some sort of slug!

And we all know that slugs are slimy snail like creature that has no shell. It walks so slowly and without direction. Sluggards then are lazy.

Proverbs 6:9-11 read as followed and I am using the Message Paraphrase.

“So how long are you going to laze around doing nothing? How long before you get out of bed? A nap here, a nap there, a day off here, a day off there, sit back, take it easy – do you know what comes next? Just this: You can look forward to a dirt-poor life, poverty your permanent house guest!”

Dirt-poor life! Poverty your permanent house guest! While the OT may have viewed this warning as referring primarily to material poverty, we are safe to apply this to every area of our lives: mental poverty; physical; social; emotional; spiritual; potentially resulting in unfulfilled lives and unrealized potential.

Laziness causes a lot of damage in people. One proverbs that drives this point with humor is Proverbs 19:24: “Some people are so lazy that they won’t even lift a finger to feed themselves.” (NLT)

This is a humorous exaggeration meant to make us feel the pain as we laugh, because we know this is so true with our lives. The spiritual food is right there in front of him, but the slug has neither the energy nor the motivation to eat it.

But why would people not take action? The lazy person says why? Why take action when you can blame someone else for your problems for your short comings.

It is much easier to sit and complain about the unfairness of life or the overwhelming frustrations of the modern world. Or to sit and not even care?

Why take initiative in solving your problems when we have the fashionable option of blaming our parents, our spouse, our friends, our employer, our teachers, our pastors, our government or even our God for our problems.