Excuses, Excuses

Woot woot! Did you notice? We finished Genesis! Hurray!

I love hearing stories from people about how it's going as they read the Bible. One person said it's so interesting that sometimes she keeps reading beyond the assigned chapters! Another couple were on a car trip and decided whoever was NOT driving would read to the one who was driving! And the person I was visiting in the ER Saturday night was lamenting the fact that he wasn't going to get his reading done for the day because he didn't have his Bible with him. (I guess "Do you want to bring your Bible with you?" is not a standard question ambulance drivers ask.)

As a pastor, it does my heart good to hear stories like this because I know it does God's heart good too. I think I'll schedule a "Year of the Bible" evening at the church, for people to chat about how things are going and so they can ask their "Stump the Pastor" question. Check back here in a couple of days for more details.


Here's the question and answer from yesterday:
Sun, Jan. 25: When the new king (who didn’t know Joseph) comes into power in Egypt, what does he decide about the Israelites and their pro-creation rate? (How else can I say that?) (Ex 1)
Exodus 1:8-11 8 Then a new king, who did not know about Joseph, came to power in Egypt. 9 "Look," he said to his people, "the Israelites have become much too numerous for us. 10 Come, we must deal shrewdly with them or they will become even more numerous and, if war breaks out, will join our enemies, fight against us and leave the country." 11 So they put slave masters over them to oppress them with forced labor, and they built Pithom and Rameses as store cities for Pharaoh.

And here's the question for today:
Mon, Jan 26: Peter asks Jesus, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me?” Jesus tells a parable as part of his answer. At the end of the story, what does the master do to the servant? (Matt 18)


And here's today's reflection:
Excuses, Excuses

Hmm . . . I've always noticed something about Moses, but until reading through the Bible like this, I never really noticed that it took up almost two whole chapters! Moses is FULL of excuses! He comes up with every excuse in the book for why he's can't be "Johnny on the spot" for God. And one by one, God takes away every excuse. One by one, God answers Moses for every concern and insecurity he comes up with to use as an excuse.

We know we all have excuses. We all have flimsy excuses we cling to as reasons we can't do something for God: too young, too old, too busy, too ill; not good enough, not smart enough, not enough faith; can't pray out loud, can't speak in front of people, can't teach a class. Inside, we know these are just excuses. We know that if we were in Moses' shoes God would have an answer to each of these excuses.

But we're not in Moses' shoes. We didn't see the burning bush. Or maybe we did, but we were afraid so we just kept walking on by. God's probably not standing in front of us with a clear task that He wants to do. Or maybe He is standing in front of us, but we're slinking by with our eyes averted.

I could preach until I'm blue in the face about casting off our excuses and facing up to what God is calling us to do, but the truth is, I can't make you do anything. I can't; I'm just one person. What I CAN do is encourage you each to find an accountability person--someone you know and trust and love. Find someone--if you haven't already--who can look you straight in the eye and say, "That's just an excuse." Find someone who will encourage you to look at the burning bush and to listen to where God is calling you to go.

Keep on reading!
Allison