The Lazy Blog

Nathan Stam
Children/Communications Pastor

I have a confession to make as November draws to a close and December peeks its frosty head around the corner: I'm lazy by nature. It's a roaring grizzly bear that I've had to wrestle as long as I remember, although I think that as I've gotten older and matured some of that laziness has been tempered. At least, I hope so! I don't know where it came from; my Dad and Mom are some of the hardest working folks I know. My work ethic must have been a genetic mutation.

Here's an example of my sorry lazy self. When I was in high school I was given the all important job by my Father of mowing the grass on Saturdays. Now, this was back in the day before there was a neighborhood behind my parents' home and our backyard was much larger. (That was my one mitigating comment.) I would literally take our mower and mow a small square in about fifteen minutes and go back inside to cool off for an hour or so. Then I would head back outside and repeat the process. Ad infinitum. What should have taken me maybe two hours would literally take all day. My Dad would come home and stare incredulously at his half-cut grass. (Wait, I do have one other mitigating comment: One time our lawn mower was broken and we borrowed Mr. Jones' riding mower. I knocked that job out in no time and forever lobbied for a riding lawn mower to no avail.)

It really shames me to dredge up those memories, but maybe some of you can identify. The challenge in my life is, how do I overcome this slothful inclination in my heart when I study my Bible? Because really studying the Bible, getting down to the nitty and the gritty of it, is hard work. We went through Living by the Book in our Life Groups this past Spring and Howard Hendricks gives an example of Acts 1:8 when he discusses the art of observation. It's one verse and he mentions that over the years in his classroom students have come up with over six hundred observations on Acts 1:8. Did I mention it's only one verse?! Six hundred observations!

In my Bible study, I have to develop my powers of observation and that requires hard work! It doesn't come naturally to me. My constant prayer has to be Psalm 119:8: "Open my eyes, that I may behold wonderful things from Your law," and 2 Timothy 2:15: "Be diligent to present yourself to God, a worker who doesn't need to be ashamed, correctly teaching the word of truth."