For example, this is certainly true, when it comes to:
• Sports
• Academics
• Cooking
• Building
• Teaching
• Saving money
Sad to say, but this is also true when it comes to lying. Some are much better at telling lies than others are. Some people lie so much, that you know they are lying if their lips are moving. Some are so good at lying, they even convince themselves with their lies.
Illus: A police officer pulled a fellow over for speeding and had the following exchange:
Officer: May I see your driver's license?
Driver: I don't have one. I had it suspended when I got my 5th DUI.
Officer: May I see the owner's card for this vehicle?
Driver: It's not my car. I stole it.
Officer: The car is stolen?
Driver: That's right. But come to think of it, I think I saw the owner's card in the glove box when I was putting my gun in there.
Officer: There's a gun in the glove compartment?
Driver: Yes sir. That's where I put it after I shot and killed the woman who owns this car and stuffed her in the trunk.
Officer: There's a BODY in the TRUNK?
Driver: Yes, sir.
Hearing this, the officer immediately called his captain. The car was quickly surrounded by police, and the captain approached the driver to handle this tense situation:
Captain: Sir, can I see your license?
Driver: Sure. Here it is. It was valid.
Captain: Who's car is this?
Driver: It's mine, officer. Here's the owner' card. The driver owned the car.
Captain: Could you slowly open your glove box so I can see if there's a gun in it?
Driver: Yes, sir, but there's no gun in it. Sure enough, there was nothing in the glove box.
Captain: Would you mind opening your trunk? I was told you said there's a body in it.
Driver: No problem. Trunk is opened; no body.
Captain: I don't understand it. The officer who stopped you said you told him you didn't have a license, you stole the car, you had a gun in the glove compartment box, and that there was a dead body in the trunk.
Driver: Yeah, I'll bet the lying rascal also told you I was speeding.
But also, I regret to say this, some of the biggest liars in the country are in Washington, DC. They can look into the television camera and say with all sincerity, “I did not have sex with that woman!” and all the time they are lying.
Politicians are known for their lies.
Illus: Someone tells the story of a busload of politicians driving down a country road when, all of a sudden, the bus ran off the road and crashed into a tree in an old farmer's field.
The old farmer, after seeing what had happened, went over to investigate. He then proceeded to dig a hole and bury the politicians.
A few days later the local sheriff came out, saw the crashed bus, and asked the old farmer where all the politicians were.
The old farmer said he had buried them.
The sheriff asked the old farmer, "Were they all dead?"
The old farmer replied, "Well, some of them said they weren't, but you know how those politicians lie, you can’t believe a thing they say."
But you can also find some (I want to emphasize the word “some”) very good liars in the church, and you can’t believe anything they say either. In fact, some are as good as those you will find in Washington, DC.
WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE? These are people who have built their life on making excuses.
They live their life as they want to live their life, continuously violating the commands of God, and they come up with some ridiculous excuses. They call them excuses, but they are no more than lies.
Illus: These excuses makes me think of how it was many years ago in high school. If you did not want to go to school, you would skip school, and the next day get some girl in the class to write you an excuse, such as, “Please excuse ___________, one of his relatives passed away and he had to attend the funeral.”
But one boy was called into the office, and the principal said, “I want to talk to you about your missing so much school. According to these excuses, this year you have lost four of your grandparents, five aunts, three uncles and ten cousins.”
The boy looked at the principal and said, “Yes, it has been a very bad year for the family.”
The principal did not buy that, but he stuck to his story.
There are people who live their life DOING AS THEY PLEASE, and MAKING EXCUSES as they go through life. These are people who have never learned that there is a difference between A REASON and AN EXCUSE.
Illus: Early one morning, a mother went in to wake up her son. "Wake up, It's time to go to school!"
"But why, Mom? I don't want to go."
"Give me two reasons why you don't want to go."
"Well, the kids hate me for one, and the teachers hate me too!"
"Oh, that's no reason not to go to school. Come on now and get ready."
"Give me two reasons why I should go to school."
"Well, for one, you're 52 years old. And for another, you're the Principal!"
There is a vast difference between making an EXCUSE for not doing something, or having a REASON for not doing something. But an excuse is no more than a lie.
Illus: A large family, with seven children, moved to a new city. They were having a difficult time finding an apartment to live in. Many apartments were large enough, but the landlords objected to the large family.
After several days of searching, the father asked the mother to take the four younger children to visit the grave side of some loved ones in the cemetery, while he took the older three to find an apartment. After they had looked most of the morning they found a place that was just right. Then the landlord asked the usual question: "How many children do you have?"
The father answered with a deep sigh, "Seven ... but four are with their dear mother in the cemetery."
He got the apartment, but he also deceived the landlord.
Many folks are good at deceiving people with their excuses, which in reality are no more than lies.
We all are very good at this, and so was Moses. When God appeared to Moses at the burning bush, He called him to the task of leading the children of Israel out of Egyptian bondage. Moses gave God a number of excuses as to why he did not think he was the man for the job. Look at -
I. HIS RELUCTANCE
He was called upon by God to deliver the Children of Israel out of bondage.
Look at Exo 3:1-10, we read, “Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father in law, the priest of Midian: and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb. And the angel of the LORD appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed. And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt. And when the LORD saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I. And he said, Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground. Moreover he said, I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. And Moses hid his face; for he was afraid to look upon God. And the LORD said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters; for I know their sorrows; And I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land unto a good land and a large, unto a land flowing with milk and honey; unto the place of the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites. Now therefore, behold, the cry of the children of Israel is come unto me: and I have also seen the oppression wherewith the Egyptians oppress them. Come now therefore, and I will send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou mayest bring forth my people the children of Israel out of Egypt.”
Moses quickly let the Lord know He was making a drastic mistake by calling him to do such a thing.
Illus: He makes us think of the Congress in the 90’s, under the Clinton Administration that passed the “No Abilities Act”, that provided protection for more than 135 million unskilled Americans.
These are the millions of U.S. citizens who lack any real skills to carve out a meaningful role for themselves in society,
We are told that "Roughly 50 percent of Americans fall into this category.
To assist these people, the “No Abilities Act” provides corporations with tax breaks for those who hire one “no ability” worker for every two talented people they hire.
Had this “No Abilities Act” existed when Moses was living on earth, he would have been the ideal candidate. When God told him he wanted him to deliver the children of Israel out of the bondage of Egypt, he quickly let him know he had no such skills.
But before we are too quick to condemn Moses, we need to remember that God has also commanded us to deliver the lost people of our age out of the bondage of sin.
Look at Mark 16:15, we read, “And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.”
It is clear from the scriptures, God wants to use us as Christians to deliver the lost from the bondage of sin.
But every week, many look at this clear command from the Word of God as if it is a big mistake on God’s part. They give the impression that God has asked them:
• To do something they are not capable of doing
• To do something they do not have time to do
Many will stand before the Lord and have to give account to God almighty, because they spent their entire life here on earth and personally never won one soul to Christ. Remember, God gave us a specific command to win the lost, as much as He gave Moses a command to deliver the people of Israel out of bondage.
God did not make a mistake in commanding them, they made a mistake in not obeying Him. We might ask someone to do something and they might not be capable of doing it.
Illus: Have you ever been to a revival meeting in a country church where the pastor will call folks from the congregation to sing? If you have, you do not know the people, but when that person comes up and they open their mouth and the first word comes out, you can not help but think that it was a mistake to call them to sing. THAT DEFINITELY WAS NOT THEIR CALLING.
But God has never made the mistake of calling someone to do something they are not capable of doing. The fact is, if we could not do it, HE WOULD NOT HAVE COMMANDED US TO DO IT!
And if Moses could not have done it, God never would have asked him to lead Israel out of bondage.
We have looked at HIS RELUCTANCE, but now let’s look at-
II. HIS RIDICULOUS EXCUSE
The American People are ridiculous people. That is not very hard to prove.
Illus: For example, did you know that in America:
• A pizza gets to our house faster than an ambulance
• There are handicap parking places in front of skating rinks
• Drugstores make the sick walk all the way to the back of the store to get their prescriptions, while healthy people can buy cigarettes at the front
• People order double cheeseburgers, large fries, and a diet coke
• Banks leave two sets of front doors unlocked and open and then chain their pens to the counters
• We leave cars worth thousands of dollars in the driveway and put our useless junk in the garage
• We use answering machines to screen calls, and then have "call waiting" so we won't miss a call from someone we don't want to talk to in the first place
• We buy hot dogs in packages of ten and buns in packages of eight
• We use the word "politics" to precisely describe our crazy process: "Poli" in Latin means "many" and "tics" means "bloodsucking creatures"
• We have drive-up ATM machines with Braille lettering.
Some of the excuses that folks come up with to keep from doing what they do not want to do, are ridiculous.
Moses also came up with some ridiculous excuses. Look at HIS EXCUSES -
In Exodus 3:11, we read, “And Moses said unto God, Who am I, that I should go unto Pharaoh, and that I should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt?”
Though Moses was once a member of the ruling house of Egypt, he was now an 80 year old man, who felt like God was asking to much of an old man.
Sometimes older folks are better at making excuses than others. I guess it is because of their years of experience at making excuses.
Now listen, it is obvious that when we start to get older, we can no longer run the hundred yard dash as fast as we once could. But still there are things that older folks can do, and they can do them better than young folks. .
Illus: You can ask some of the elderly people to do something like teaching a Sunday School Class, and you can hardly get the request out of your mouth before they excuse themselves by saying, “Let someone younger teach the class.”
We can see why Moses could have reached that conclusion as he looked at the time of his life when the Lord asked him to do such a thing. He felt he had a good excuse, and he did not hesitate letting the Lord know it.
But when God asks us to do something, we are without excuse. Why? Because God’s Word says in Romans 8:3, “…If God be for us, who can be against us?”
God quickly let Moses know that HE ASSISTS those people HE CALLS.
Look at Exodus 3:12, we read, “And he said, Certainly I will be with thee; and this shall be a token unto thee, that I have sent thee: When thou hast brought forth the people out of Egypt, ye shall serve God upon this mountain.”
We, like Moses, are without excuse when you consider what God has called us to do.
WHY ARE WE WITHOUT EXCUSE? Because God has never called us to carry out assignments He gives us, in our own strength. We are to do them in His strength.
Our sufficiency is in God. Look at 2 Cor 3:5, we read, “Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think any thing as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God.”
Many of the apostles were uneducated men, but look how God used them.
Look at Acts 4:13, we read, “Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men, they marvelled; and they took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus.”
Today, we may look around us and feel that many folks are more qualified than we are, but we read in Phil. 4:13, “I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.”
Conclusion:
We can come up with all kinds of ridiculous excuses to disobey God, and many times folks who hear those excuses may believe them. But listen, GOD DOES NOT!
God knows when we have a REASON for not doing something, and God also knows that many times some folks just do not want to obey Him, and they hide behind these ridiculous excuses.
I. HIS RELUCTANCE
II. HIS RIDICULOUS EXCUSE
