What's Your Excuse?

Have you ever thought “what would it be like if God had given up on His children after they failed Him just one time?”
• Abraham would have never fathered Isaac (Gn. 16)
• Moses would never have become Israel’s deliverer (Ex. 3 & 4)
• Jonah would have never made his way to Nineveh (Jonah 1:3)
• Mark (John) would have never written the Gospel of Mark (Acts 13:13)
That list could go for a considerable length---and doesn’t it represent our personal lives at times? We may be keenly aware of our past failures but God is equally aware of our future potential. When God has a great job to do, He begins with a person who knows he serves a great God.
Sometimes it takes longer to prepare the worker of God than it does to do the work of God. Moses was a son of Pharaoh’s daughter in Egypt for 40 years and then became a desert shepherd in Midian for 40 years. Finally, at age 80, the Lord called him to return to Egypt, deliver the Israelites from Egyptian bondage and bring them back to the Promised Land.
Moses presented a series of four excuses why he was not the man for the job:
1) “Who am I to do such a job as this?” Ex. 3:11
2) “Suppose I go…what would I say to them?” Ex. 3:13
3) “What if they don’t believe me?” Ex. 4:1
4) “I have never been eloquent; I am slow of speech” Ex. 4:10
As someone has said, “there seldom has been a man who was both good at making excuses and good at anything else.”
But the Lord countered each excuse and Moses did become the great deliverer of Israel. Fast forward to February 2011. Is there anything the Lord had laid on your heart for 2011 and you started well in January? Have those God ordained goals been scratched by saying, “yeah, but;” “well it is different now, my thinking has changed;” “I need a second opinion;” “I just cannot do it anymore!”
Failure is not final; when God is in this, it can be the back door to success. When you read about “famous failures” in the Bible, what does that encourage you to do…today? God will bless you as you go and do it in the strength He gives to those who seek Him and His ways.