When someone tells you to do something ...
Do you obey?
Do you obey quickly?
Do you procrastinate?
Do you ignore?
Does your reaction to being told to do something vary depending on who told you to do it?
Sure it does. If a policeman with authority tells me to do something, I will probably act quickly. If I am in danger and a fireman tells me to do something, I am gonna try my best! If my trusted doctor tells me how to get well and what to do, yessiree, I’m gonna try hard to do it.
One day I asked Daniel to do one of his chores. He put one foot down, brought an arm up, slowly put the other foot down, slowly brought up his other arm, making his way at a snail’s pace.
“Son, what are you doing? You look like you are moving through molasses,” I said.
“O mama, I’m gonna do what you said; I’m just gonna do it slow!” He responded.
I was not pleased.
Delay in obeying good instruction can cause problems. Procrastination can lead to failure, stress and anxiety.
Think of the student who procrastinates writing a complicated paper or doing a difficult assignment. The work to be done can be in the back of the mind, exerting pressure, can cloud the present with stress knowing the work has to be done, or can be totally forgotten until the panicked moment it is remembered. The task may wind up not being done, being done poorly, or causing the person to turn to unethical methods of completing the work.
So why do we procrastinate, fail to act, or allow ourselves to fall into disobedience when God tells us what to do, how to live, attitudes to have, and how to live?
Why do we think, “I’ll do that later,” “I will wait ’til I’m old to become a Christian. I have plenty time to obey.”
Turn to your Bible. Open it up. Search verses about obeying God and the results of disobedience and the need for timely obedience.
Hebrews 3:15: “Today if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion.” Ephesians 4:18: “They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts.”
Matthew 13:15: “For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes.”
Where do you fit in?
