Adapted from a sermon illustration I recently heard: If I tell my daughter to do the dishes, what I want, is for her to do the dishes. But let’s say two hours later I look, and I see that she has not even filled the sink with hot water, and all the dirty dishes are still on the table. What should I think? Perhaps she did not hear me, perhaps she is intentionally disobeying me, or perhaps she is waiting for someone else to do the dishes. So, I go to her room to tell her again, that I want her to do the dishes. She replies very sincerely, “Yes, Daddy, I heard you, and I have been very busy learning all about doing dishes. I read a Wikipedia article on the history of doing dishes, I have found many interesting YouTube videos and some good podcasts on doing dishes, and I have even seen a whole bunch of funny memes on doing dishes. I called some of my friends, and they are coming over in a little while, and we are going to talk about doing dishes. Was there anything else you wanted me to do, Daddy?”
Jesus has told us to do a few things. We hear sermons about the Good Samaritan, we go to Bible Studies on the Sermon on the Mount, we read books about what it means to be a servant of Christ, we ponder upon the book of Proverbs, and we memorize Bible verses about bearing one another’s burdens. But do we do what Jesus tells us to do? Probably to a certain extent. Could we do better? Probably.
Yogi Berra once said, “I really didn’t say everything I said.” That was Yogi’s way of saying that some of the famous quotes attributed to him, were not said by him at all.
The same is true of many of the quotes attributed to Mark Twain. One of the most famous is, “It ain’t those parts of the Bible that I can’t understand that bother me, it is the parts that I do understand.” Since Twain probably did not say that, we don’t have to care what he really meant by it. I think it means there are plenty of clear commands in the Bible to keep us busy, without spending all our time trying to figure out the parts that are difficult to understand.
——————————-
“On the day of judgment, surely, we shall not be asked what we have read but what we have done; not how well we have spoken but how well we have lived.”
–Thomas a Kempis
“Knowing the Bible is important, but biblical wisdom goes beyond knowing what God says. Real wisdom is putting God’s Word into practice. It’s not just about what you know, it’s about what you do with what you know.”
–Source lost.
**********************************
James 1:22 — Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.
John 14:15 – (Jesus said) “If you love me, keep my commands.”
Luke 6:46 – (Jesus said), “Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say?”
Luke 11:28 – (Jesus said), “Blessed are those who hear the word of God and obey it.”
Luke 7:24-27 — “Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock… But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand.”
1 John 3:18 — Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth.
**********************************
Our dear Father in heaven:
Give us the desire, give us the strength, and give us the love,
To act on the bit of truth that we know. Amen.
Related Posts
