Risky Business

What was the riskiest stunt you ever pulled off as a kid?

Was it pedaling down the street in your banana seat bicycle as fast as you can and careful hold the handle bars still as you drove up on the ramp and sailed into the air for a brief moment into what seemed like infinity?

Or was is risking riding with your friends in the dead of night as you slowly drove down the street to your principals house to decorate his front lawn with Charmin toilet paper?

Or maybe risking crossing over into old man Carriers land to help yourself as you plucked one of his prize watermelons from his garden. Only to hear a distant shout from his front porch as you scampered across his watermelon patch desperately clutching that watermelon as if it were a football. All the while trying not to snag your jeans on the rusty old barb wire fence.

Remember the exhilaration and adrenaline rush you got from taking those risks

Life is made up of opportunities in which we make decisions that count.

And it even counts more when we do it for our Master.

Those opportunities require RISK when we would rather play it safe.

RISK involves questions such as what will I do with my life?

RISK involves questions such as what am I going to do with myself-now?

IS TAKING A RISK a sucker’s game--to give myself for others--when everyone else is looking out for themselves?

Should I get involved with my neighbor’s problems--which seem endless and beyond any solutions?

RISK INVOLVES answering the question--should I try to help them? ---or should I just read my Bible, study, and pray?

Maybe you need to leave your COMFORT ZONE

One of the most inspiring sights in nature is the eagle in flight.

With an endless expanse of blue SKY behind it the eagle spreads its mighty wings and soars majestically across the sky.

Free, powerful, complete. Because of this the eagle becomes a symbol for how we’d like to be.

We all want to soar like an eagle in life. But I wonder if you know how it is an eagle learns to soar?

I am told that there is a particular species of eagle which builds its nest high up on the face of a cliff overlooking the sea.

In this nest the chick is hatched and spends its first days watching its mother come and go, collecting food and bringing it back.

One day mom decides it’s time her chicks learned to fly. You know how she does it?

She forces her way into the nest and then pushes her chicks out.

The chick starts plummeting down the cliff-face, terrified, shocked, heartbeat racing, aware that death is just seconds away.

And then something amazing happens.

The chick instinctively stretches the wings which it never knew it had, and the terrifying fall now become a gentle rise.

And soon the chick is soaring like its mother in the great blue sky.

It’s in that split second of terrifying danger that the chick comes face to face with itself, and face to face with wider reality.

In those terrifying moments the chick discovered what it is.

And without that terrifying moment it will never learn to soar.

When it comes to God investing His power in you here on earth, have you learned to fly as the young eagle?

Have you RISKED spreading your wings?

What made the difference between the servant getting 5 talents instead of 2 or 1?

It’s called TAKING A RISK – Risky Business

He looks our abilities and sees NOT JUST WHO WE ARE, but who we can become and what we can accomplish for His glory.

If you have a pretty bad outlook of yourself, then you’re essentially telling God that He didn’t do such a good job.

That’s like telling your boss that He really didn’t do a good job in hiring you because you know what you’re really like!

DISTRIBUTION OF THE TALENTS – HOW DO I GET MINE?

The servants in this parable were each given talents according to their abilities and faithfulness.

Each servant had potential. Potential is what we will call undeveloped skill.

Potential is that God-given skill or ability that has been walking the sidelines in you life-----that looks for the opportunity to be unlocked and developed.

Go to any High School Yearbook or Annual and look at the Senior class and you will find those that have been given a special status by their peers---

You have the most wittiest, most popular, best dressed, most talented, most spirited, most intelligent, friendliest, best looking, best all around, most athletic, most dependable and last but not least, most likely to succeed.

Maybe you’ve never been one of those---and chances are, some or many never accomplished WHAT THEY WERE LABELED in the yearbook.