Sluggard
Transcript
All right, well, good morning. As Chet said a little bit ago, my name is Adam Gibson. I am one of the pastors at Midtown Fellowship. We're in downtown Columbia. We started, I guess, about 12 years ago almost now, getting close to there. We started meeting weekly in January 2007.
We were, at the time, we planted almost all college students, and so it was a nightmare, as you can imagine. We had no wisdom, no money, and lots of energy, and no clue what to do with it. And one of my favorite memories is one Sunday we were passing around the offering basket, and somebody, and this is not a joke, someone put a pack of Skittles in the offering plate, and that was their contribution. And it's like, thank you. I do like Skittles, so I appreciate that. So we have grown since then, and we've got some families and some kids, and we've planted a few churches, and we're now a family of churches in the Columbia area.
And then in, I guess it was 2012, I met Chet. We went to lunch at Monterey's in downtown. He said he wanted to plant a church. We said, that's great, you should do that. And so we just sort of sent him out. Our church planting process has gotten a little more beefy since then, that was what it was back in the day.
And Raz was a part of Midtown, and we happily sent him, and they got to meet Matt. I really like Matt and Raz, still deciding about Chet. I'm grateful for the invitation this morning. I think I'm not qualified to be a pastor here. I can't grow facial hair. And it seems like maybe that's one of those unspoken pastor qualifications at Mill City.
So I'll have to remain at Midtown with our underdeveloped facial hair. But I'm glad to be here today. So pretend like I have a nice man beard, and maybe you'll be more willing to listen to what I have to say. It'll sound more authoritative. So last summer, we did a study in the book of Proverbs.
Our church did. And I came across sloth or the sluggard. I don't know if you're familiar with the book of Proverbs. It comes up a lot, and it wasn't something that I had studied before. Up until that point, I thought sloth or slothfulness or someone who was a sluggard. I just thought it was laziness.
That was all that I had heard of it. I'd heard of sloth as one of the seven deadly sins. I don't know if you're familiar with that or the movie Seven. Not that I would recommend it, but it is a great movie. But they talk about sloth in that movie.
And the Latin word that sometimes gets used as part of the seven deadly sins is acedia. That's the Latin term for sloth or sluggard. And as part of what you guys are studying over the summer, the hammer in the hammock, which is a brilliant series name. I don't know who came up with that, but that's gold right there. This fits really, really well. And so Chet invited me to come and share some of this.
And honestly, what I'm doing is just I had to do some research on it and heard some people teaching on it. And I basically am just taking what they taught and would love to share it with you guys today. And I think you'll find that it is helpful and fits right in with your summer series. And so if you want, you grab a Bible because we'll look at the book of Proverbs together. We'll start in chapter 24. So if you want to grab a Bible, it looks like there's some on seats around you.
If you didn't bring a Bible, you can use one of those and flip. Proverbs chapter 24 is where we'll start. Proverbs is almost dead in the middle of your Bible. And so if you just want to almost try to cut it by 50 percent, you're probably pretty close to Proverbs. And then you can navigate from there. So if you're familiar with the book of Proverbs, you know that it's not written linearly.
It's a collection of wisdom and sayings, most of them from a father to a son. And so it's a little bit scattershot. And so we won't necessarily work straight through a passage this morning because that's not how Proverbs is written necessarily to be done. What we'll do is read a few different places in the book of Proverbs that talk about the issue. And then we'll draw some points out of that. So let's look at Proverbs chapter 24 first.
And then we'll flip to chapter 26. And we'll read both of these. And that will sort of launch us in. So Proverbs 24. We'll read 30 through 34. Here's what it says.
I passed by the field of a sluggard. So that's the way that Proverbs describes a person who is slothful, called a sluggard. By the vineyard of a man lacking sense. And behold, it was all overgrown with thorns. The ground was covered with nettles. Its stone wall was broken down.
Then I saw and considered it. I looked and received instruction. A little sleep. A little slumber. A little folding of the hands to rest. And poverty will come upon you like a robber.
And want like an armed man. Alright, flip over to chapter 26. Proverbs chapter 26. And look at verses 13 through 16 with me. The sluggard says, There is a lion in the road. There's a lion in the streets.
As a door turns on its hinges, so does a sluggard on his bed. The sluggard buries his hand in the dish. It wears him out to bring it back to his mouth. The sluggard is wiser in his own eyes than seven men who can answer sensibly. Proverbs actually says some really funny things about sloth, slothfulness. Someone who is a sluggard says that this person makes up these silly excuses.
There's a lion. I can't do my job today. I can't be responsible. I can't get up. There's a lion that might get me. It's quite obviously not what's going on.
It's a silly excuse for not doing what he should be doing. It says that he turns in his bed as though he's hinged to it. Like a door is hinged to its frame. He just rotates back and forward. A very funny picture about someone unmotivated to get up and get to work. He buries his hand in the dish.
It's like I've got this nacho in my hand. But it just sounds exhausting to lift up my hand. I have to bring it all the way to my mouth. Then I'm going to have to chew it if I do all that work. There's just still more work to be done. Just a silly, ridiculous excuse, ridiculous picture that's being painted.
This is an image of someone who starts things and doesn't finish them because it's too much of a burden. Proverbs presents the sluggard as a person who makes excuses, who can't finish tasks, who leaves work undone. But it's not just laziness. So I was reading from a book by an Eastern University professor named R.J. Snell. He wrote a book called Ascedia and its Discontents, Metaphysical Boredom in an Empire of Desire.
As you can tell from the title, it's a real page turner. But here's what he said. It's really helpful. Let me just read a little excerpt here. This is from R.J. Snell.
He says, It is a mistake to think that sloth is laziness. More than indolence or apathy, sloth rejects the burden of order, choosing instead the breezy lightness of freedom, loving self more than relation or relationships, and autonomy more than the good. In sloth, one rejects the weight and density of living in an ordered creation. In sloth, we abhor what is there. We abhor what is. We abhor limits and place and order and being.
Our misguided addiction to freedom without truth is a revolt of the self against any charged world, which might demand attention, care, obligation, or respect, and certainly against any mandate of working to fill God's beautiful kingdom. They are seen as insufferable demands, as illegitimate restrictions on our unbridled freedom. And so we find ourselves hating the place God has provided, the work God has given to us, and the proper ways of laboring. He says that underneath all of what might appear to be laziness, that slothfulness or someone who is a sluggard, this is a refusal and a rejection of purpose.
That's what's actually happening in the heart of a sluggard. That really what's going on is that they've rejected God's purposes for their life. It's the rejection of being created and designed for a purpose or a particular end. The thought that I would have expectations or demands on me is too burdensome. This is a rejection of responsibility because it encroaches on my freedom. Responsibility and having a particular purpose introduces into my life restraints, and I don't want those.
I don't want to be designed for it. This is what philosophers would call a telos, a designed purpose, an end, an intended end, an aim for our lives. And slothfulness is a rejection of being designed for a purpose with a particular end in mind. So in other words, this idea is not the absence of activity. You could be filled with activity and yet still be eaten up with slothfulness in your life. God has designed us for some particular reasons with particular intentions.
So for example, God has made us in such a way that we are to relate to him. I'll give you three. God's designed purposes for our lives. He's given us this higher purpose, this higher calling, and slothfulness is a rejection of, number one, the fact that we're made to relate to God. But God has made us to know him, to glorify him, to enjoy him forever, to worship him, to submit our lives to him, to love him with all of our heart and our mind and our strength, all of our energy to be given in pursuit of God.
And slothful people reject this purpose. They don't see their life as meant to relate to God. They don't pursue God with zeal and energy and effort. They don't exert energy in glorifying God with their lives. That's too burdensome. That's too, I'm tired.
That's too constricting. Too much restraint is brought into my life to love God with all my heart and soul and mind and strength. I'd rather just lay here. It's a rejection of purpose. Speaking of the slugger turning on his bed like he's hinged, commentator Matthew Henry says, this is an elegant hyperpoly, showing how his sin is his punishment. Those that are slothful in the business of religion will not be at the pains to feed their own souls with the word of God, the bread of life, nor to fetch in promised blessings by prayer, though they might have them for the fetching.
That in being slothful, we're rejecting our purpose that we were made to relate to God. We're also, number two, made to relate to each other. This is part of God's created order for all people. If you think about back to the garden, that Adam and Eve are made to love one another just as God has loved them. That they're designed to pour out their lives for one another. But slothfulness rejects this as a purpose because relationships are hard.
People are so exhausting and they never stop sinning, especially in the annoying ways that they sin. Those are the ones they just can't ever stop. People require things of me. They want me to talk. They want me to help. Right?
Slothful person says, Oh my gosh, I don't want to be obligated. I don't want to have responsibilities. I don't want you to need my help. No, I can't have you with my phone number because you might text me or heaven forbid call me. I don't want to have to answer the phone and talk. It's hard work relationships are.
Self-donating love infringes on our autonomy and a sluggard resists relationships, particularly difficult ones. Number three, created purpose. We're made to have dominion. Dominion. We're to harness the earth's resources to create culture. For the good of humanity.
We're supposed to take the raw materials of creation and rework them in such a way that people are blessed. In a way that makes others' lives better. We're to fill the earth with beauty and goodness. To be a help to other people. So educators work to fill the earth with people who have knowledge.
It's part of our calling. Artists take raw materials and they draw out beauty from those raw materials. Accountants take the chaos of Numbers and they bring about order. And we could just go on and on and on with whatever your field or profession is. You're designed to have dominion. But a sluggard rejects this because that takes a lot of work.
Proverbs says, The land of the sluggard was filled with thorns and thistles. The walls are in disarray. The earth itself is languishing under the failed dominion of the sluggard. That he or she is contributing nothing to creation. Nothing to humanity. No one is helped.
No one is nourished. This is failed dominion. He's turned inward on himself. Instead of being turned outward towards God and to the people that were called to love and bless, the sluggard is turned inward on himself. He's folded his hands. He sleeps.
He slumbers. His personal comfort and freedom and rest and pleasure are his only pursuits. He prefers to be left alone with no responsibilities, no demands. It's actually a picture of anti-love. This idea of slothfulness. It is anti-love.
No restraints. No expectations. No demands. No obligations. Just leave me alone. Stop bothering me.
Stop needing things from me. It's an abhorrence, sloth is, of place and calling. It's a rejection of the idea that God has put me in this place, in this marriage, in this family, in this job, in this church, in this town, in this school. And I don't like those restrictions and I don't like the obligations that come with them. I actually think this is part of why Americans, statistically speaking, are more and more delaying marriage and delaying having kids. And there could be some reasons for that.
It's not necessarily wrong to do that. But if you actually look at the trends, we are pushing marriage and children further and further and further off into our lives and getting older and older and older. And I think part of the reason why that's happening is because of sloth. We understand that to be married is to be obligated to someone else. And we don't want that kind of restriction. That to have kids is to be obligated to these little humans who will constantly need you at all times, in all ways.
And we don't want anything to do with that. And so we just push it off. I think this is what happens when someone has what we call a midlife crisis. I think this is what happens when someone just all of a sudden it's like they just explode and they're gone. They're running away. They're off, you know, in the convertible with the secretary or whatever.
It's actually a slothfulness explosion. And I realize that term doesn't just roll off the tongue. So I'm not trying to like change the phrasing of midlife crisis. I think what's happening though is it's this sort of I have all these restrictions and I've built my life a certain way and now I realize I can't change it. My life is the one that I have. And I've done it long enough now where I realize I can't get out of this and I've got all these restrictions and all these obligations and people just snap because they don't want it anymore.
I'll tell you that this idea shows up in some smaller ways as well for me in particular. I've got a five-year-old, a three-year-old, and a three-month-old right now. Made a huge mistake. We had way too many kids. And if I'm not careful, that was a joke. I realize you don't know me so you don't know when I'm joking and when I'm not.
I've got to be more careful with folks who I don't know. If I'm not careful, the mentality that will sneak in is I am just counting down the clock until I finally get to put them in bed. And at the end of the day, when their day is over is when my life begins. And that is a broken, busted way to lead your family and to be a dad. And it's sloth. It's, this is tiring, this is exhausting.
When you're awake, there's things I have to do. But when you're asleep, I get to do what I want to do. So whether it's these big extreme ways or these maybe smaller and more subtle ways, I would argue that all of us have some level, some degree of slothfulness going on and we need some help. So I'll continue to investigate a little bit here and give you some consequences of slothfulness. I'll just give you three consequences of slothfulness. Here's the first one.
Metaphysical boredom. I'm trying to use big words to impress you. Metaphysical boredom. Let me think about for a second how much time we spend trying to cure our boredom. Like how much entertainment and social media we just flock to. Those things are fine.
There's nothing wrong with those things. But we just flock to them. Americans check their social media accounts on average 17 times per day. One seven times per day. We spend an hour and 40 minutes per day on social media. Adults actually spend more time on social media than teenagers do in case you were about to blame the teens for skewing the data.
7.5 Hours per day teenagers spend engaging media. Just all types of media. YouTube, Netflix, whatever is cool. We're just inundated with media to cure our boredom. And I'm not... When I say boredom this is why I said metaphysical boredom I'm not saying the problem is I don't know what to do right now.
That's not what I'm... I don't have anything to do right now. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about bigger than that. I'm saying we are now plagued with I'm not sure what I'm supposed to be doing. I don't know why I'm here.
I don't know the purpose for which I exist. That's a different kind of boredom. That's a metaphysical boredom. Not just I don't have anything to do it's I don't know what I'm meant to do. So I have nothing to give myself to.
This boredom is a result of being unhinged from our purpose and design. So this is something people don't realize. Purpose is meaning you have to do this. To have purpose in your life you have to say this is what I exist for. This is why I'm here. I'm not here for all these other things.
Purpose. So if you want to have purpose in your life you are going to have to cut off some options. You're going to have to say this is not for me. These are not why I'm here. These are not why I exist. And if you demand that you keep all of your options open and that you are never obligated and you're never committed you can do that but you cannot also have purpose.
You will have to pick one or the other. You can either have obligation and commitment and purpose or you can have none of them. But you don't get to have it both ways. Purpose requires limiting yourself restraining yourself restricting yourself. And you know this in all kinds of smaller ways. If you want to be a world class musician you're going to have to spend a lot of time practicing.
Right? You have to cut yourself off from other options and say this is what I'm going to do because this is my purpose. If you want to be a world class athlete you have to spend a lot of time refining your skills and working out and all sorts of things you could be doing that you now cannot spend your time doing. You're going to be limited. To have a purpose means other things are not for you. And right now in America we don't know why we exist we just instinctively reject any answer that actually places limits on us.
So as soon as somebody starts talking about this is our purpose and this is what we should do and these are the things we should not do people start freaking out because we don't want to have any sense of commitment or obligation or restriction but it's coming at the cost of our purpose. If you're not gripped with something bigger than yourself to give your life to you're going to struggle. We aren't gripped with purpose we've not let anything great capture our imagination and therefore nothing is bigger in our lives than our own convenience and comfort and pleasure and desires. And I'll just tell you when you're not pouring yourself out you're going to try to find something to fill yourself up with and so we just consume social media celebrity gossip inner workings of sports teams TV show after TV show shopping whatever it is for you I've got a friend who says you can tell how he's doing spiritually just by looking at his smartphone data usage for the month.
How he's doing spiritually just by looking at his smartphone data usage for the month. That if he's doing really well spiritually that he's way less addicted to his phone and his data usage goes down he said a couple of months ago he had the worst month he can remember having and he over tripled his data for the month. He's just constantly something to fill up something to distract
Something to numb it's consumption without contentment so there's no deep peace there's no lasting joy because we're not fulfilling our purpose for which we are created we're meant to love God to love people and to do good work for the good of humanity here's how Proverbs 13 4 says it the sluggard craves and gets nothing but the soul of the diligent is content the sluggard craves
It's this constant consuming but there is no contentment because the sluggard does not embrace his purpose of giving himself in love and contributing something consuming is easier but it's also emptier it's the first consequence of slothfulness number two second consequence of slothfulness is that we lie about God that to be slothful is to speak
Lies about God we were made to be thrilled with God to be enamored with him to be caught up in how incredible he is and how beautiful he is and how smart he is and how wise he is that how somehow he's always working all things for the good of those who love him these are the kind of things that are supposed to fill us
With energy and joy and be thrilled by him but the bored sluggard says God is boring to me there's nothing about God that would make me want to put this remote down there's nothing about God that would make me want to close this app and think about him for a minute there's nothing
About God that would make me want to pursue him with everything that I have he's not worthy of my awe and attention and service his words are irrelevant to me see our misuse of time says something about our view of God and living in a persistent state of sloth and boredom is actually a denial of God's worthiness
What if just like every now and then when you were bored you prayed instead of picking up your phone not like all the time just every now and then what if you picked up a Bible instead of picking up the Netflix marathon where you left it when you had some
Time on your hands not every now and then let's still let's still do some Netflix I'm not being ridiculous here Netflix is great it's just not as good as God is right we're saying with our time and energy God TV and media and
Clothes and whatever is better than you so we get bored we start looking at pictures of other people's vacations and we look up and it's been three hours and that got the head nods because y'all do it too huh okay number three
Third consequence of softfulness is brokenness brokenness like things just fall apart things just fall apart around you and that's the language of the Proverbs is that surrounding this sluggard is just sort of disarray it's just overgrown it's broken things aren't what they're supposed to be because God gave this person this person who's being spoken to in Proverbs he gave him things to do
And without him doing those things they left they're left undone so there's just brokenness where sloth reigns you will find brokenness where people shrug off the work of of cultivating relationships then you'll find people around them who are hurting and lonely and struggling where people shrug off the work that's been given to them you're just gonna find life breaking down
My wife and I have a good friend who just decided she wanted to leave her husband he's great he's a sinner but he's great I mean he's done nothing that would necessarily you would think cause this sort of reaction they've got two kids and she just said I don't want to be obligated anymore I feel tied down I feel restricted I don't want to do it anymore and so she's out with no concern for how this is
Gonna affect her former husband or these children and so now because of her slothfulness there's this breakdown in their family and there's all this brokenness and now each of the three of them are in counseling to try to work through some of this stuff if you've been through these situations you know that these kids are now blaming themselves and thinking what should I have done so
That mommy would stay this is what happens where slothfulness reigns in rules where people reject the good purposes that God's given to them is that there's gonna be brokenness there's always collateral damage and the slothful person leaves a wake of hurting frustrated people in her wake in his wake so we gotta ask how do we break free like what do we do to reject slothfulness and
Embrace our good design I'll give you three three answers how do we break free number one carry your load carry your load that's language from Galatians chapter six verse five in that passage it says that that God has given each of us a load to carry particular things that we're supposed to carry work to do that's contrasted in Galatians chapter six with burdens burdens are unusually heavy things that we all need help with
That we need the community of faith to come around us to help us with that's a burden the language here though is is load these are the normal regular things of life that God gives each of us it's work to do and we're supposed to carry those things your your load is the work that God has given to you it's a demand and expectation and that we're called to reject false freedom and embrace our design to carry the load of the work and the people that God has given to us to embrace the call
To give ourselves to God to others our spouses our kids our roommates our neighbors RJ Snell whom I quoted earlier speaks about carrying our load and here's how he talks about it he says we do this in concrete ways finishing the report paying our bills wiping away childish tears washing the car caring for our tools doing the dishes staying in mundane ordinary work while perhaps unromantic allows for virtue since natural virtue requires repetition
There is no virtue without repetition and so we stay put we sink our roots deep parents can confirm this exhausting yes but a new character forms with every nap meal diaper wet bed and smile we become the people we are by what we choose to do again isn't that a good last line we become the people we are by what we choose to do again so carry your load carry your load in your work
And we all have work if you're a student if you're in school if you're in middle or high school part of your work is to honor your father and mother in school you get the report done like on time you read the assignment right you carry your load at your job you be on time you get your work done on time you be reliable you follow up with the client you put the finishing
Touches on the painting you keep setting the alarm and you keep getting to work on time you don't be late you take care of your tools you see the project through if you primarily stay at home with children then your work your load is to build into them to draw out their potential to nurture and come alongside of them we carry the load in our jobs we carry the load
In our relationships you allow yourself to be inconvenienced by others you do the the hard work of pursuing difficult people including your difficult weird roommate have you guys picked up on the fact that you always have one weird roommate you know this is how life works there will always be one weird roommate if you don't have a weird roommate I have horrible news you are the weird
Roommate I'm sorry to be the one to tell you that when I was in college there was a group of us that stayed at a house that we rented and one of our roommates he was downstairs and there were some mice that were sneaking in and so he went and bought a mouse trap caught a mouse
Took the mouse out of the trap cut its head off put the head on a stick put the stick in the ground he said as a warning to all the other mice of what would happen if they came around so we all saw that and we were like just I'm going to slowly back away with no
Comment you always have a weird roommate and part of carrying the load is to continue to serve and love and be a blessing even to difficult people even to weird roommates you carry the load in your marriage in a room this size
I would bet some amounts of money that someone is thinking about leaving their spouse stay do the hard work of staying of pursuing you carry the load and God will bless it he will use it in your life your persistence your commitment
You stay you serve your spouse you carry the load with your kids especially if you have younger kids they're exhausting but you do the baths you do the bedtime routines you explain the same thing
For the 100,000th time without losing your patience you carry the load with your kids carry the load in your community group I know some of you are in a group and you have difficult
People that are killing you and it would be so easy to just begin to distance yourself from that person some of you have been distancing yourself from your group because they want more for you than you
Want for yourself right now if we're honest but you haven't said anything like you haven't said hey guys I'm just going to drop out of the group I think because you knew they would actually confront you and come after you and pursue
You so you've just gotten more and more creative with your excuses don't reject your purpose don't reject your design stay stick it out God will use it we become
The people we are by the things that we do again we carry the load in our relationship with God some Christians lack any sort
Of discipline and energy in their pursuit of God that's a shirking of responsibility to pursue God with all your heart and I've heard people who I swear they sound like the
Dude in the book of Proverbs with their excuses as to why they're not getting any quality time with Jesus why they're getting no time in prayer it's like oh gosh I was going to but there's a lion outside you were made to relate to
God to pursue him with all your heart and mind and strength and when you carry the load that God has given to you over time you develop virtue your character develops over time but the more that you give yourself in love to others
You're formed and to say it more strongly you cannot become the person God is shaping you to be if you refuse to carry the load that he has given to you when you serve your roommate again you are taking yet another step in the direction
Of becoming a servant hearted person that's how it works but to get there you got to stay you got to carry what's been given to you and a lot of life is doing the same things over and over like I can't clean a room in
My house without one of my kids running behind me just knocking everything back onto the floor right after I just picked it up my kids don't want to play with a toy they want to play with the toys they just throw them all on the
Floor and do snow angels in the toys it doesn't this the type of toy is irrelevant it just needs to be a pile so I'm just constantly doing the same stuff over and over and over your character is shaped with every single load
Of laundry because we become the people we are by what we choose to do again the big moments in life are not going to be what ends up shaping you the most we have some false beliefs as Christians sometimes that these mountaintop experiences
Are the life defining life altering moments and I'm not taking away from those they can be really powerful but what I'm telling you is the things that are going to make you the person you become are the things you do a thousand
Times not the things you do once very rarely is it one single thing going to dictate the direction of your life but the things that you do over and over and over again will absolutely dictate the direction of your life you're formed by the things you do
Again here's how Proverbs 21 talks about all this he says the desires of the sluggard kills him for his hands refuse to labor all day long he craves and craves but the righteous man gives and does not hold back
The righteous man has he has become the kind of person who gives who invests who labors who stays and does I can't read this stuff and not think about my dad he's such a good example for me he's
Been a real estate agent for 30 years and he is just so faithful he does a good Job he's honest he has integrity his clients love him one of the pleasures of my adult life has been growing up and meeting
People that my dad has worked with through the years and hearing how they brag about my dad it brings tears to my eyes how proud I am that this is my dad who is faithful with the work that God gave him growing up when I would ask my dad
To play I have this is a true story I have no memory of him saying no I won't play with you now he had to have said that right like there's no way he just always did but I'm just telling you I have no memory of that because more often
Than not the answer was either yes I would love to or give me ten minutes let me finish what I'm doing and then I'm outside let's play basketball so all I remember is my dad being faithful with what God entrusted to him it's him serving and blessing and
My entire family and everyone that my dad has worked with all through the years would say they've been blessed by being around him and being associated with him simply because he carried the load that God had given him you're becoming a certain kind of person by
Staying under the weight and continuing to carry the load that God gives you and the demands on your life will form you into the person God has called you to be that's number one number two way that we break free we gotta distinguish between rest and escape
We gotta distinguish between rest and escape I think this is important and I'm glad you guys are studying it over the summer this idea of rest or the hammock rest is not escape those are different rest is when I'm recharging in a God in a Godward way so that afterwards I am ready to get back to work that's rest
I'm recharging in a Godward way so that now I'm ready to get back to killing things I gotta go to work I gotta get to hunting that's rest escape is a false substitute that we often turn to when we're tired just to turn our brains off so I don't know if you've
Ever been to the end of the day and you think I literally I'm so tired I can't do anything but watch TV my counsel to you would be no if that's all you can do then just don't do anything go to bed you need to rest if all you can do is watch TV
That's that's your body saying it's time to go to sleep right rest is not escape and you can watch TV but that's not rest because if you're anything like me you know that watching a show does not make you want to next get up and go out
To work it makes me want to watch more shows right escape begets more escape rest leads to work and we gotta learn what's restful for us and distinguish where are we inclined to just go towards escape I just don't want
To have to think about this anymore I just want to shut down I want to turn my brain off that's escape now what's restful for you might not be what's restful for me and that's fine so there's going to need to be
Some self awareness here and you got to know how you're wired so my Job as a pastor is lots of reading lots of talking and I'm never done people just keep sinning myself included so I'm never ever finished so what's restful
For me is something that is mindless I don't want to have to read I don't want to have to talk to people because that's what I do all the time and I want it to be something that when I'm done it's over and I never have to think about it
Again so sometimes yard work is actually restful for me because it's the opposite of my day Job sometimes cooking is restful for me it's just working with my hands I don't have to think about it too much it's done we ate the meal glad you
Liked it I'll never think about this ever again but now if you're a chef or if you're on a landscape company then probably those things aren't going to be restful for you so you got to know where you're coming from
And what actually is restful for you and some self-awareness is needed but if you don't know you need to learn otherwise you're just going to escape and find that you're never recharged to get back to work
So we got to distinguish between rest and escape lest we be tired and exhausted all the time and then number three and as I'm saying this I'll invite the band to come back up because we'll
Prepare to sing and respond a little bit number three look to Jesus we got to look to Jesus we break free from slothfulness by looking to Jesus Jesus carried the load that was given to him he was obedient to his parents Jesus spent
Most of his life as a carpenter think about this now the God of the universe incarnated and spent most of his time here doing work with his hands think about how honoring that is to labor and to work and Jesus did good work as a carpenter
He did not make bad tables Jesus made good tables like if you bought a table from Jesus it wouldn't wobble and you wouldn't have to fold up a napkin and put under one of the legs to get it to
Be balanced right he did a good Job he carried the load he said my food is to do the will of him who sent me and ultimately Jesus carried the load of the cross he stayed on the cross embracing the demands
And the responsibilities he could have saved himself or he could save us and he chose to save us we ultimately break free from slothfulness when we look to Jesus for our example when we realize that Jesus was our substitute that he carried
The load that he bore the price of our sin so that we might be free and through him we can renounce slothfulness and through the spirit's power we can embrace our purpose and embrace our design and find that God actually shapes
And blesses us through it let me pray for us Jesus thank you that you have embraced your load that you with joy set before you move to the cross scorning the shame Lord that you could have chosen to save yourself or to save us and that you saved us
As we want to look to your example we want to receive your righteousness and Jesus we want to reject sloth we want to repent where sloth has taken root in our lives and my assumption is for all of us we have some responding
And some confessing and some repenting to do so Lord would you send your spirit to help us see ourselves clearly to be aware to realize the places in our lives where we're pushing off the obligations and responsibilities
That you have lovingly given to us both for our good for the people around us good and for your glory and so would you help us as believers to embrace the load the restriction the responsibilities that you have given us that we would
Pursue you with all our heart soul mind and strength that we would serve and bless and pour out for others and we would do the good work that you've called us to do and the places
That you've put us now that our whole city our whole area would be blessed that's ultimately what we're after so we ask all this for your glory and for our good amen amen