No Excuse For Excuses

No Excuse for Excuses

LUKE 14:15-24

INTRODUCTION...

School Time Excuses

Douglas Bernstein, a psychology professor at the University of Illinois recently asked faculty members for the ‘most unusual, bizarre, and amazing student excuses’ they had ever heard. He got dozens of responses from his fellow professors:

* Grandparent death: an old favorite, but one professor’s class established some sort of record when 14 of 250 students reported their grandmother’s death just before final exams. In another class a student reported that he could not take a test because of his grandmother’s death. When the professor expressed condolences a week later, the student replied, ‘Don’t worry, she was terminal, but she is feeling much better now.’

* Car Problems: "I had an accident, the police impounded the car, and my paper is in the glove compartment."

* Animal Trauma: "I can’t be at the exam because my cat is having kittens and I am her coach."

* Crime: "I need to take the final early because the husband of a woman I am seeing is threatening to kill me."

We seem to have an excuse for everything, don’t we?

There are even websites on the internet that will help you generate an excuse! It is true... you type in the type of excuse you need and it generates one for you (www.zompist.com/excuse.html).

Also, you can by a doctor’s excuse from a licenced physician for $14.99 to give to your employer (http://www.doctorsexcuse.com/) or PE or class or anyone else. I find that totally amazing!

What exactly is an excuse? In a court of law, "an excuse is a defense in which a defendant argues that he or she was not liable for his or her actions at the time a law was broken and thus he or she should not be held liable for a crime.

Excuses include diminished responsibility, duress, infancy, insanity, involuntary intoxication, mistake, provocation, and unconsciousness (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excuse).

I think my favorite excuse from that list is ‘infancy.’ I was a baby when the crime happened... it wasn’t me!

I think an excuse is a reason we give when something happens that does not go our way. It is the ‘why’ we did something when we get caught. It is our reasons for not doing something we know we should do.

The Bible is full of people making excuses and making excuses is as old as human beings.

InGenesis chapter 3. Adam ate the forbidden fruit, then when confronted about it, he came up with an excuse: "The woman you put here with me-- she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it" (verse 12). Then the blame was shifted to Eve. What did Eve have to say? Genesis 3:13 records her excuse: "The serpent deceived me, and I ate."

It was the serpent’s turn and he didn’t have a leg to stand on.

Excuses why people don’t attend church regularly.

Listen to some of the ones that I have heard.

Now that the nice summer weather is here I think we will stay home today and enjoy the beautiful day.

Oh do I not to get dresses up to go to church, I need a break from dress clothes, I think I will stay home.

We slept late this morning and Sunday School is over what will the kids do?”

The building gets so hot this time of the year.

The building is kept so cold.

Every time I go to church they are asking for money.

The people I sat next to didn’t talk to me and they didn’t seem very friendly.

The pews were too hard; they hurt my back and are so uncomfortable.

That choir director sang Hymns that I did not know and the music was just not my style.

The service times just don’t fit into my schedule.

That place is filled with a bunch of hypocrites.

I was forced by my parents to go to church every week when I was a child and now it is time to take a break.

That church made some decisions that I don’t agree with, so I am just not going to attend.

That pastor is so long winded that by the time he is done the restaurants have a long wait just to get a table.

People have so many reasons for not attending Church.

Exodus 32 The story of the Golden Calf.

The people of God finally arrived from Egypt and settled at the mountain of God to receive the Ten Commandments.

Moses was gone a long time and the people became restless. The people wanted Aaron, Moses’ brother, to make idols that they could worship.

They gave him gold. He made a calf. They were persistent in their request. Moses returned with the Ten Commandments in hand and asked Aaron if he had made the idol.