I love watching ants work. I also love
destroying their work and watching them scramble! I guess you can’t get the
little boy out of me!
Have you ever seen ants going on strike?
They never have committee meetings that get nothing accomplished. Accept of course
in the movies. So what motivates the ants to work together to accomplish a
greater goal? God has wired them for their task.
The main point of these verses is that we
need to have purpose in our lives. We need to get up and do something, not just
sit around like bumps on a log. We need to be busy accomplishing our tasks.
This is not busy in order to avoid something
else, busy to get our mind off something. This is busy accomplishing the things
we are supposed to be accomplishing. The ant works at storing provision. It
doesn’t just run around aimlessly, or even needlessly. It has a purpose, and it
sticks to that purpose.
So often we become busy to get our minds off
something. We put our kids in every sports activity in order to ensure they don’t
get bored, or in trouble. We run ourselves ragged like a cat with its tail on
fire. And when we need energy for something really important, we have none. What
are we doing to ourselves.
Laziness can be disguised as busyness without
purpose. If we are not busy in productive activities, we need to slow down and
get back on course.
One of the problems I see in our society is
our disability system. People get money for doing nothing when they could be
doing something. They might not be able to build skyscrapers, but they could
spend time each day reading to elementary school kids. They could help at a
soup kitchen. They could help a new mom not feel overwhelmed. There are
hundreds of ways that they could “earn” their paycheck. But our system punishes
them if they do anything. So they do nothing.
Our politically correct speech says that
people are “differently-abled” not disabled. We need to allow them to use their
abilities and not punish them for it. Perhaps they can’t earn a full paycheck.
At least allow them the dignity of earning some.
We need to guard ourselves against laziness.
It only takes a little laziness to get us going down the wrong path.