I Must Work

We need to be driven by a sense of responsiblity that we ought to work the works of Him that sent us. We need to see God cast out devils, heal the sick, and bring about true repentance in the hearts and lives of people with whom we come in contact with.

4. Urgency

Jesus was driven by a sense of urgency:

John 9:4 I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work.

If Jesus had a sense of urgency, ought we not also to have one?

Urgency is that strong prompting that makes us do something now!

Urgency is that strong prompting that heightens our sense of responsiblity and the need for action.

Urgency is close cousin to the word motivation.

Jesus had a sense of urgency about all He did, and yet it has been two thousand years since He uttered that phrase: the night cometh, when no man can work.

What gives?

If you understand the phrase "the night cometh, when no man can work," to be referring to the end of time I think you are in error. I believe the text may refer to that future point of time, but more correctly I believe it refers to the fact that there is a time in everyone’s life when it is a time for judgment and the opportunity for mercy is over. We call that death.

Jesus had to be speaking of the fact that there were people all around Him that He only had a short window of opportunity to reach and touch. For each and every individual there is a night coming when no more can be added to your life.

You cannot buy life insurance for a dead person, even so there is time when the window of opportunity for salvation is eternally closed.

The bible says: Hebrews 9:27 ... it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:

Judgment follows death, there is no time for any decisions about God after death.

This sense of urgency was brought home to me recently by two very serious events:

a. My sister was diagnosed with incurable metastatic lung cancer which has spread to the lymph nodes. She has been given one year to live. She is going to die soon, apart from a miracle of God. We are all going to die soon.

There is a secular song with the following line in it: "If you believe in forever, than life is just a one night stand." Used in that song it takes on the sense "hey, we are going to be around for a long time." I want to use it stir your sense of urgency, "life is just a one night stand." We don’t have much time. The time is short 1 Corinthians 7:29 But this I say, brethren, the time [is] short: it remaineth, that both they that have wives be as though they had none;

Psalms 103:15 As for man, his days are as grass: as a flower of the field, so he flourisheth. Psalms 103:16 For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone; and the place thereof shall know it no more.

It is no wonder then that the psalmist prayed: Psalms 90:12 So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.

b. Yesterday, in Walmart I saw a young boy apprehended for stealing a fishing lure. Once he walked out the door, the opportunity to change his mind had passed. His age didn’t matter. His reasons didn’t matter. His mother couldn’t change the facts. While in the store he had the opportunity to change his mind, once out he couldn’t undo what he had done. So it is after death. You cannot change the facts of your life or your guilt or innocence before the court.