Have you ever had a case of the “I can’t waits”? They seem to run rampant in my life. When I was young, I couldn’t wait to play on a football team. When I was in junior high, I couldn’t wait to go on a date. When I was in high school, I couldn’t wait to go to college. When I was in college, I couldn’t wait to get a job… you see how this is progressing… and now here I am 29 years old…. And I can’t wait to grow a beard.
29 years old and I have yet to have a full beard. I could pass military inspection after not shaving for 2 days. How pathetic is that? You see, I know how to grow the beard. It’s not a complicated process. There’s a 4 step process to it. I have it figured out. It’s rather simple. First Day, do nothing. Second day, do nothing again. 3rd day, do nothing twice. On Day 4, verify that nothing is still being done. Then simply repeat the cycle.
Not overly difficult. But, I can’t do it. I’ve tried. Enough times to have my ego shattered when my lovely wife asks me to shave off that rashy looking excuse for or beard. Or my dad tells me I look ridiculous and unfitting of the name Johnson. So, after repeating the cycle on how to grow a beard, I have always removed it in an act of shame. I did not want to bring reproach on my family.
But why a beard?
You see, there isn’t a stronger sense of masculinity than a beard. It beams virility and machoism. And I really need that in my life. There’s also the receding hairline that I can thank my mom’s dad for. When it’s all finally gone, I want someone to come up to me and say:
Now, why did I share this embarrassing fact of my life with you? There is lesson I want us to see in all of this because I have learned something.
We’ve all heard the saying that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over trying to get a different result.
In growing a beard, I did nothing and got the same result. It brought shame and reproach on me. No matter how much I wanted it, the more I repeated the cycle of beard growth, the results never changed. Simply, doing nothing brought nothing.
In our world today, we want things very badly. We want to lose weight. We want to get out of debt. We want to grow stronger to our family. Or maybe we want our church to grow. We want our kids to grow up in the Lord. We want to become spiritually close to God. And we do all of this with my beard-growing plan of doing nothing.
Instead, we cherish that opportunity to sit around and complain. We want to make everyone aware of what we want to be done, but yet do so while we employ the do nothing strategy. Although it may work for most people, I have found that it doesn’t. Doing nothing at all in my experience, has always brought about the same results, nothing.
I ask that you consider what you are doing and what you need to do.. and if we can help you in any way….
There is a degree of risk involved in stepping out in faith… and when I think of risk and the parable of the talents, I always think about investments… Honestly, if the 1 talent man had at the very least put the money in a bank instead of the ground, then he would’ve at least has some return… But, if you want to become financially stable, then you have to place your money in sound investments… you could just put your money in the ground and have it secure… but, to be wealthy, you have to invest it in various instruments….but on a spiritual level, what are you investing your life in? have you put your talent sin the ground so you won’t lose them or are you taking some risk by putting them to use for God? Have you found new roles to play in serving God?
1 cor. 13: 11…. Have you invested you life in such a way to become a stronger Christian?
In the world today…. It is very simple….
if you want to lose weight, if you want to get out of debt, have a stronger family, have a better relationship with God, to have a stronger church, then you must find something to do. And that something can be found in the Bible.
Simple instruction is waiting and all you have to do is crack open the scriptures to find the Word of God speaking to you. The Book of James tells us in chapter one verses 22 and following that we can’t be hearers of the Word, but doers. It requires doing something. James continues in chapter 4:17 to tell us that to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.
That is a powerful responsibility and one I wish all of us would take seriously. If we can apply this mentality of I’ve got to do something to make a difference in my life, in the lives of others, and in the work of Christ’s church… then we’ll be doers of his word… we’ll see the benefits of our labors….
1 Cor. 3: 7-9
I can’t wait to see everyone in Christ’s church to act on their talents… to see this congregation grow… to see each family striving to serve God and loving each other… to see each of us go to Heaven…
I hope you share the same sentiment… and that you, like I, realize that to do this we must do something…
I don’t know if there’s anything I can do to grow a beard… just don’t think that’ll happen… but I do know that if I apply my spiritual talents… if I look to God’s word to find strength and opportunity, that God will give the increase… I don’t want to be called a lazy and wicked servant… I don’t want to spend eternity in darkness… I want to live in eternity with God…
Wed. night we discussed the parable of the talents in Matt. 25:14-30. I want to bring special emphasis on the man that was given a talent but did nothing with it. Now, he was given lots of opportunity to, because this scripture emphasizes that the master was on a long trip which gave each person an opportunity to do something with what he/she was blessed with…. But the one talent man did nothing… and in the end, he lost his talent… he was called wicked and lazy and thus cast into darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth… all because he employed a strategy of doing nothing but expecting some reward….
