God: Lover of the Excuse Makers!
By Rev. William Dohle
God has a strange sense of humor sometimes!
You spend so many of your younger years making excuses for things. Why your homework didn't get done. Why you CAN'T do the dishes right now. Why your bedroom will always stay a mess.
Then you grow up, get married, and have kids and...THEY start making excuses!
Little things at first, just like you did. "I didn't hear you..." they say when you've asked them countless times to do something. "I forgot to bring home my book..."when a certain assignment is due. "I didn't know I had to..." they say when you ask them again, for the umpteenth time to finish their chores.
Ahh, yes. God has a righteous sense of humor! The excuses we give...come right back to haunt us later in life!
God should know too because God's chief prophet. His messenger to Pharaoh. His right-hand man. The only person to ever have seen God face to face. The author of five books of the Bible. Moses. Moses was...above all things...the king of excuses.
Don't believe me? Just read chapter 3 and 4 of Exodus. Then you'll see what I mean.
It begins with a simple question. "Who am I?" Moses says. The excuse? I'm a nobody. Choose someone else.
Then Moses thinks up another excuse. "What's your name? I don't even know your name, God!" The excuse? Not enough information.
Then Moses thinks up another excuse. "What if they don't believe me?" The excuse? My friends! Peer pressure!
Then Moses thinks up another excuse. "I just can't talk." The excuse? It's just too hard!
Four times Moses offers God one excuse after another and each and every time God shoots his excuses down. Talk about persistent! I wonder sometimes if I chased after people as God chased after Moses, could I overcome their excuses?
But God does... in a way. Moses does lead Israel out of Egypt into the wilderness. True...Moses complains the whole way. He really gives God a hard time...but he does it! Excuses and all!
We laugh at Moses, but frankly we're really no different. We too are excuse-makers. We are like little children to God. And the number of excuses we offer God is staggering! Numbering in the thousands! And what does God do with our excuses? Take them? Of course not! God leaves our excuses and keeps pressing.
We say to God... "We don't know who you are..." And God surrounds us with creation and gives us Scripture and the Church to teach us about his grace.
We say to God... "We don't have time..." And God makes time for us, sometimes in the most inopportune moments, to call upon him.
We say to God... "We can't do it. We just don't know how." And God gives us gifts of the Spirit and a community to teach us how to use them.
We say to God... "What if we fail?' And God gives us forgiveness in His Son, Jesus, that overcomes all our failings.
God doesn't take our excuses. He never has. And He never will. And, though we may give excuses to the world, to his church, to our families, and to everyone else, God still remains close to us. Close enough for us to touch. Always ready to break open our excuses with his grace and lead us into service.
Heavenly Father, Moses was the king of excuses...and I am his prince. Help me to put aside my excuses and trust you, no matter where you should lead. Amen.
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