August, 1945
287
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This searching message cannot fall to reach the heart of every minister and every Christian,
I SRAEL’S King Ahab, contrary to the will of God, had allowed Ben-hadad, King of Syria, to go free. A prophet dared to reproach the king: “Thy servant went out into the midst of the battle; and, behold, a man . turned aside, and brought a man unto me, and said, Keep this man . . . and as thy servant was busy here and there, he was gone" (1 Ki. 20:39-40). Here is a man unfaithful to his trust. A charge was committed to him, and, while he was “ busy here and there," he failed in his chief responsibility. Mind you he did not fail because he was asleep or drunk or inat tentive, but because he was busy! Can it be wrong to be busy? We glorify busyness these days. “Idleness is the devil’s workshop," we are reminded. Busyness can be used by the devil too if it causes us to miss the principal thing in life. America is a beehive, much of our activity is not worth the trouble. We are like squirrels in a cage; there is plenty of action, but no progress. We are like one going the wrong way on an escalator, feverishly energetic, but never arriving any where! While we are so ’busily engaged with unimportant details, the im portant thing gets away. A ll of us have been entrusted with sacred charges, but while we are “ busy here and there,” the main responsibility is disregarded and neg lected. How well this kind of busyness is illustrated in the home! God gives parents a child to rear for Him, and, while they are “ busy here and there,” with such good things as food, shelter, clothing and education, the soul of the child gets away. There is no time for the bread of life or the family altar. Then these parents wake up one day to discover that while they were “ busy here and there,” the children followed the road to hell. If some mothers and fathers were as concerned about the souls of their children as they are about their daughters’ social success and their sons’ business prosperity, more names would be written in Heaven, and there would be fewer broken hearts. Thank God, my father lost no time rigging me up according to fashion charts! I had little acquaintance with first-class haberdashery! But he did fortify my soul against the years ahead and deposited in my heart convictions that have stood the strain of life. Old Noah made a lot of mistakes but he got his family into the ark! While you are “ busy here and there,” are your chil dren going down the wide road that leadeth to eternal destruction ? While Christians are “busy here and there” with
inconsequential matters, souls are lost and chances to win them are gone. The fields are white unto harvest but we keep on saying, “There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest.” We are not buying up the oppor tunities and numbering our days that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. We are our brother’s keeper, and we should look not on our own things, but on the things of others. But while we are “ busy here and there,” souls go into eternity without God. A dying man was asked if he wanted a certain professing Christian to come and talk with him. “No,” he replied, “he has worked beside me for years and never has mentioned Christ. If he couldn’t talk Christ then, I wouldn’t want him to talk Christ now.” “Busy here and there,” he waited to do the significant thing until it was too late! What is our business? We read that the apostles would not assume the finan- cial responsibilities of the church, lest while they were “ busy here and there,” the ministry of the Word and prayer would be neglected. The biggest problem many pastors face is that, while they are engrossed with such trivia as church suppers, social calls, pronouncing an invocation here and laying a cornerstone there, they for get that their calling is to preach the Word. It is so easy to become an ecclesiastical bellboy! I Would rather dwell in the woods, drink spring water, and live on blackber ries, than to fail to fu lfill my Divine commission by such “piddling around” here and there! One can become so busy at “church work” that he misses something better. The man referred to in our next text was not idling or dissipating. Whatever he was busy about may have been good in its place, but it was not that for which he was responsible. All too often “the good is the enemy of the best.” The church today is squandering her devotion and strength by having so many irons in the fire that none of them are hot! We need not only consecration, but concentration, on our main business. The church of Sardis had a name for being alive, but Jesus pronounced her dead. Without doubt it was a very busy church. So was the church at Ephesus: ortho dox, active and aggressive, but deprived of fhe best thing—its first love! While we are busy with reports and committees and conventions and campaigns—things all right in their place—the best things: the deeper Chris- tion life, growth in grace., the saving of the lost, fail to get our time and attention. (Continued on Page 291^
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