Feb 10 - Excuse me!

Feb 10

Excuse Me!

Lu 14:18 And they all with one consent began to make excuse. The first said unto him, I have bought a piece of ground, and I must needs go and see it: I pray thee have me excused. 19 And another said, I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to prove them: I pray thee have me excused. 20 And another said, I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come. 

It is commonly said “A bad excuse is better than none.”  But these excuses are so bad the only person that would use them would be the village idiot. 

In Luke Christ is using a parable about a man who prepared a dinner and invited people to come and dine with him. The first guy said “I paid for some land that I have never seen.”  Sure, he did. Imagine trying to have a conversation over the dinner table with this dimwit!

The next fellow is not any brighter. “I just paid a guy for five yoke of oxen but didn’t see if they were worth anything.”  Sure he did! 

Finally the last excuse maker says “I am married and cannot come.”  He had been invited at some earlier time and had given his consent to attending the dinner.  Now that the meal is prepared he uses his wife as an excuse. (She probably wanted him out of the house anyway!) 

The purpose of the parable is for Christ to point out that even though the Pharisee’s were invited they all had some excuse to not follow Christ.  Christ’s use of such silly excuses was to show how worthless the excuses of the Pharisees were.  

But my favorite dumb excuses are in Proverbs.

Pr 22:13 ¶ The slothful man saith, There is a lion without, I shall be slain in the streets.

Here we should start with Webster. Slothful implies a tempermental inability to act promptly or speedily when action or speed is called for.  Or for our purposes – Lazy.

The slothful invents whatever is required to avoid doing his duty or necessary work. In this excuse, as silly as it is, he reveals both laziness and cowardice. If they were giving away free pizza across the street the fear of lions would be gone.  But the invention of the mind to avoid duty that does not suit us is sufficient. Here his argument is not there are lions in the area, but without. As though the lion sat on his doorstep.  He feared he would only make it to the street before he was slain.  I am not an expert on lions but I doubt lions lurk the streets of town in the daylight.  

      But his example is repeated by Christians who would prefer to only do work that was convenient for them, and within the realm of their own liking and at the least cost of energy or goods possible. Yet these would be the first to say they have accepted Christ’s cross.

If any man will come after me, let him deny himself,

and take up his cross daily, and follow me.

Cowardice lurks in the spirit of such excuses. The spies came back from the promised land and said "...the giants will step on us like grasshoppers."  Little faith resides there too. "We be not able to conquer the land.  We fear God is unable or unwilling to deliver on what he has promised."

 Pr 20:4 ¶ The sluggard will not plow by reason of the cold;

 therefore shall he beg in harvest, and have nothing.

He will not plow by reason of the cold and also the hot sun, or rain, or wind or whatever excuse comes to his mind without much effort.  Charles Bridges remarks on this verse “And does not the most trifling difficulty hinder, where the heart is cold in the service of God?”  That person who professes love for Christ, but avoids the inconvenience of even the least service for the Master, has little faith, if any at all. If wishing would secure heaven then all would sit waiting for it to come to them. Oh learn of the sluggard. He will not plow and will suffer the consequence when there is no harvest. He will have nothing. He shall beg at that time, as those who have refused to stir themselves to acknowledge their need of a savior. At that last day they shall beg and be turned away. Their excuses shall be too little, too late.  They shall be as the sluggard and have nothing. 

     Men may come up with all manner of reasons to avoid accepting, serving and/or sacrificing for Christ. But they are all without excuse.

Ro 1:20 … so that they are without excuse: