A Minute Meditation

If you keep waiting for just the right time, you may never begin. Begin now. Do what you can with what you have right where you are and do it now.

Many people have failed because they were always waiting for what they thought would be the miracle time to begin.

Solomon tells us, “He that observeth the wind shall not sow; and he that regardeth the clouds shall not reap.”

Many people talk about what they will do when their ship comes in, but their problem is they haven’t sent one out. If we don’t sow, we don’t reap; if we haven’t sent a ship out, there is none to return.

In the same chapter that Solomon told us about not sowing because of procrastination over the weather, he also told us to “cast our bread upon the waters: for thou shalt find it after many days.” No bread cast; no bread to return.

Paul tells us to “preach the word; be instant in season, out of season.” This means that all the time is the right time to tell others of our hope. Many times we have missed an opportunity to share with others the good news of the coming kingdom of God. Looking back later, we have realized that a golden opportunity to share our hope has slipped away.

Again, Paul instructs us by saying, “Behold now is the accepted time; behold now is the day of salvation.” Wherever we go and whomever we meet, we should be willing to give them an answer for the hope that is within us. Does everyone you know, know of your faith? If not, why not? Because we are ashamed of our Lord? Let’s hope not, for if we are ashamed of him now, he tells us that he will be ashamed of us at his coming.

We can’t make people listen to us, but we can’t be stopped from telling them of our hope if it is really a burning fire within our breast. At onetime, Jeremiah thought to be quiet. He describes his feelings saying, “Then I said, I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name. But his word was in mine heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay.”

Let us hope that God’s word is a burning fire within us like this. Ezekiel tells us that if we warn others and they refuse to listen, then it’s their problem, but if we fail to warn them, then it’s our problem.

We need to tell everyone the good news of God’s soon-coming kingdom. Sometimes the least likely person will listen and the ones we thought would show interest, don’t. Never mind, just keep preaching in season and out of season. The time is coming when it will be too late to preach that Jesus is coming.

The angel of the Lord told the apostles after Christ’s ascension to “Go, stand, and speak…to the people all the words of this life.” Peter obeyed and was arrested. When he was reprimanded — “Did not we straitly command you that ye should not teach in this name?” — his reply was, “We ought to obey God rather than men.”

It is still our duty to obey God rather than men and we ought to be sharing our hope everywhere we go. Don’t wait for perfect timing. We often sing from our hymnal, but we also need to live the words that “Life is the time to serve the Lord, to do His will, to learn His word.” “The days are quickly flying, and Christ will come again with all his saints attending, triumphant in his train.” Share with others “How frail at best is dying man, how vain are all his hopes and fears.” Encourage everyone to sing and live with you that “Life’s fleeting treasures I resign, and fix my hope on Thee alone.”

At one time there was a radio program called “Job Center of the Air.” The hosi said that of the 2,500 people he helped find employment, only 10 sent a thank-you note. He was surprised and somewhat hurt.

Jesus healed 10 lepers and only one of those turned back to thank him. Jesus asked a searching question. “Were there not ten cleansed? but where are the nine? There are not found that returned to give glory to God, save this stranger.”

Do we have the attitude of gratitude? Do we thank God every day for all the blessings that He has bestowed upon us?

Some of us seem to take for granted the goodness of our Heavenly Father. We don’t think much about our eyes until we face blindness. Our hearing is an accepted fact until we begin to lose it. Those who can run and jump do not realize what it is like not to walk.

No doubt Zacharias had taken his ability to hear and speak for granted until the angel struck him deaf and dumb for nine months.

The spiritual gifts we receive from God are even more important than our physical ones. To think that the Lord has called us out of all the teeming billions of people living on this planet should fill us with overwhelming gratitude. Jesus has told us that none can come to him except the Father which had sent him draw him.

Since we have been drawn, called and invited to live and reign forever with His son on this earth, we ought never to take this for granted.

Do we act like we are thankful? Paul writes to the Romans about some who “When they knew God, they glorified him not as God neither were thankful.” On the other hand, Paul exhorts us to “let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful.”

One of the ways we can show thankfulness to God is by the way we show thankfulness to one another. By the way we treat each other we are showing Him that we love Him because we love His other children.

A retired school teacher in her eighties was overjoyed to get a letter from a former student thanking her for her role in his life. She responded immediately: “I can’t tell you how much your letter meant to me. You will be interested to know that I taught school for 50 years and yours is the first note of appreciation I have ever received. It filled me with cheer.”

How sad that out of the hundreds or thousands of students this lady taught only one said, “thank you.” And that one waited until she was in her eighties. What if she had died the year before?

Are there kind thoughts we have meant to express but haven’t? Are there kind deeds we have meant to do but haven’t? Do it now. “Whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a cup of cold water only in the name of a disciple, verily I say unto you, he shall in no wise lose his reward.” Do it now.

If we are the recipient of a kind word or deed, please remember to say “thank you.” But if we are the doer of the kind word or deed, do it whether they say thank you or not, for Jesus tells us that our Heavenly Father “is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil. Be ye therefore merciful as your Father also is merciful.”

Here is a ridiculous story that teaches us a lesson we would all do well to remember: A man from Los Angeles is invited to fly to Chicago to call on an important business contact. The man in Chicago mails him a street map as he will be renting a car at the airport and traveling into downtown Chicago to make the call.

Unfortunately, the map company made a mistake and some maps of the City of Detroit were mistakenly labeled City of Chicago. It was one of these maps that the man in Los Angeles received.

The traveler picks up his rented car and proceeds to travel toward the city with his map on the seat beside him. As he nears the heart of downtown, he pulls over to consult the map. He is totally confused and cannot tell where he is or where he is supposed to go. Since he is parked near an outside pay telephone, he quickly dials the man he is trying to find and informs him that he is lost and cannot find his way.

The man in Chicago proceeds to give him a lecture on self-determination, on persistence, and the attitude of never giving up. The bewildered man gets back into his rented car and begins to drive twice as fast and proceeds to get lost twice as fast.

Finally, in desperation, he makes another phone call. He is a little agitated as he speaks once again to his Chicago contact. This time he gets a lecture on having a negative attitude. He is asked what he can see from his vantage point at the phone booth. He describes the four corners explaining that there is a bank on one corner, two gas stations on opposite corners and a book store on the other. He is told to go into the book store and buy a book on a positive mental attitude and see if that won’t change his negative and frustrated feelings. He is more than a little upset, but he proceeds to read some of the power-of-positive-thinking from the book that he was told to buy.

Now he is so charged up, he jumps in the car and takes off at break-neck speed. He is still lost but now he is so full of positive thinking that he doesn’t even care.

Obviously the lesson we learn from this silly story is that all the positive thinking in the world will not help if we do not have the right road map.

Think how many people go through life reading the wrong road map or ignoring the only road map that will lead them to a place in the kingdom of God. They may be filled with positive thoughts but they are still lost. The faster they go, the further they get from the goal of the kingdom.

It is good to have a positive mental attitude but it must be coupled with a proper understanding of where we are going and how to get there.

Solomon tells us that there is “away that seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death.”

Let’s begin our journey by consulting the correct road map, the Bible, and then let us follow it step by step as we journey on the path of life to the kingdom.

David says, “Preserve me, 0 God: for in thee do I put my trust…Thou wilt shew me the path of life: in thy presence is fullness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore.”