Probing Proverbs - $0 + $0 = Something?

Probing Proverbs 10:26 Like vinegar to the teeth and smoke to the eyes, So is the lazy one to those who send him.

One of the habits I had when I was younger was when I walked I would put both hands into my pockets. At one job I had, my boss called me into the office to talk to me. His office looked down on the entire floor so he could see me when I was walking. He said, “Nate I know how hard of a worker you are, but when I see you walking with your hands in your pockets it drives me crazy. Lazy people walk that way!” I asked him if he felt I was slow in my work or lacking in any area. He said no. Then he said it was just his problem and excused me. For the next week I would look up and see him just fidgeting as I walked by. 

Well, I had become a believer by then, and the Holy Spirit was teaching me to be “all things to all men.” So I felt bad that this bothered him, even though I produced like everyone else. So the next week I sewed my front pockets shut on my uniform pants. After a few days he called me to the office and asked me why I stopped putting my hands in my pockets. I showed him my pants. He just started to laugh and asked why. I told him that as a Christian I did not want to offend anyone if possible. He smiled and said, “you’re a nice guy and a hard worker.”

Although God afforded me the opportunity to give a testimony about Christ, which I appreciated, it also reminded me that “laziness” is not a position of the body, but the condition of the spirit.

This Proverb states an obvious truth: When someone is counting on you and you are lazy about what you are doing, it irritates people! No secret there, but let’s investigate what this means and how does it surface in our lives.

Here are the meanings of “Lazy”:

·      Unwilling to work or use energy.

·      Characterized by lack of effort or activity.

·      Showing a lack of care.

Where do these tendencies show up in our life and in our society? There are several foundational mindsets that lead to this kind of behavior.

·      First: When we want something for nothing. This is completely contrary to reality, yet the flesh craves this. I have a weight problem, I want to lose weight, but the effort required is difficult. My flesh wants to just take a pill and still live like I have – that is why I am still struggling! Whenever I succeed to lose weight, I know it because it requires real effort. Consider:

In our Society, we give money to those that cannot and will not work. The one’s that cannot work are receiving what a caring society should do. However, the ones that will not work are being enabled by a society that has lost the discipline to demand proper behavior. The people that do work are being punished to pacify people who are too lazy to put effort into living. Paul warned of this:

2 Thessalonians 3:10 For even when we were with you, we used to give you this order: if anyone is not willing to work, then he is not to eat, either.

In my country we have what is called “Welfare.” The intention was honorable – to help those that could not help themselves, but it has become a system to enable the lazy to live for free off the work of others. I once wrote a politician suggesting this idea:

Dear Sir,

My concern is that we give healthy men money for doing nothing. These men have 40 hours a week more free time than those that work, what do you think they will do with it? What has history shown they do with it, why are our prisons and rehab centers filled with these men. How can a man build integrity and self worth when he produces nothing, instead he leeches and consumes? I would suggest an answer to this dilemma. Anyone that desires assistance must work. When they explain that a job at MacDonald’s will not support their family, we will agree and inform them, when they get the job we will supplement their income to a level where they can support their family. This removes this person from being idle 40 extra hours a week, and builds their integrity and self worth, as they become a provider for their family.

Sadly, most politicians are not after societal improvement, they are after votes and job security. Instead of building a path to freedom for the poor, they have enslaved them to nurse off the giant breast of mama welfare, YET, some brilliant mind figured out how mama can get most of that tax-free money back from the poor, the LOTTO! Check the stats – they will show you that the majority of people that play the lotto are those that receive tax free funds! 

Individually we approach much of life this way. Let’s look at believers. We pray for patience, yet become angry when we have to wait in line! We pray for unconditional love, yet whine because we have difficult people in our life! God is answering our prayers, but we do not see that because we want it with no effort, because we are spiritually lazy. 

We say we want to grow spiritually and become more like Christ, but when I counsel the average believer I find that they spend little if no time in the Scriptures, hardly pray, are not in discipleship and their idea of worship is usually whatever the latest flavor of the week is…most are not Biblically sound, if not heretical. How can anyone expect to grow with an effort like that? We need to face the fact that NOTHING is free! Not even Salvation! Wait! Before you react…THINK! Is Salvation totally free? Do we get something for nothing? Is the death of Christ nothing? Salvation is free for US…but it cost God His Son! Anything of worth always involves effort and cost! Jesus sweated blood to go to the cross; it was the greatest effort in the history of the universe. Yes, it is offered as a gift to us, but do not insult God by thinking we got something for nothing.

John 3:16 “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.

Romans 8:32 He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?

Philippians 2:5–8 Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men.  Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

Let’s seek to give an effort in our life to attain the “somethings” we desire.

Next time we will look at two more foundational mindsets that lead to laziness.