Excuses, Excuses
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. Romans 1:16
Do not give dogs what is holy, and do not throw your pearls before pigs, lest they trample them underfoot and turn to attack you. Matthew 7:6
“He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else.” This quote is attributed to Benjamin Franklin a long time ago. It has me thinking about what I see around me – and in me – today.
Excuses, excuses.
Considering the two verses at the top, are we likely to take our “ashamedness” of the Lord and try to pass it off as discernment? Too often the Christian response I see (especially, on social media) is that the culture is not going to listen to us anyway, so why speak truth to those who are living contrary to the Word of God?
Many excuse their lack of work for the Lord as, “It’s not my call.” I am all for doing what the Lord calls us to do but doesn’t every Christian have a call to serve the Lord in every sphere He has placed us in? Think, daughter, sister, wife, mother, co-worker, sister in the Lord. Speaking the truth in love doesn’t seem to have a limitation about where we are or to whom we are speaking.
“Go and make disciples” doesn’t seem to limit the possibilities of who we are to speak to, either.
The thing about not giving to dogs what is holy and not throwing pearls before pigs is that we have to judge who the dogs and pigs are. This may take a few tries before we can discern that they are not just resisting, but they are rejecting the gospel.
When Jesus sent the disciples out two by two, He told them “if anyone will not receive you or listen to your words, shake off the dust from your feet when you leave that house or town (Matthew 10:14).” They had to speak the words of the Lord before they could discern if the people were unwilling to receive them.
In our day, the tendency seems to be to decide before we get there that the people are not interested in the message. Does that seem discerning or does that sound like shame for the message?
Romans 1 says that every person is without excuse not to have faith in the Lord because God has given us understanding in our hearts. Does this not indicate that absolutely everyone is, on some level, interested in the message of salvation and the hope of the Word of God?
What excuse could we possibly have not to tell them? There seem to be only two choices.
- We have tried and failed, discerning that they are as dogs or pigs, unable to receive it.
- We are ashamed of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.