I Gave You An Example
Opening Prayer
Opening Illustration
A BOY Scout was on a plane with a pilot, a minister, and a computer whiz. There was trouble on the plane. The plane was beginning to dive. They realized that they had to put on parachutes and jump. The only problem was there were only three parachutes and there were four people. The pilot came and said, “Well, look, I’ve got a wife and four kids, I need a parachute.” So, he took the parachute and he jumped.
The computer whiz said, “Well, I’ve got all of this knowledge that the world desperately needs for the twenty-first century, and I can’t have it die with me, so I need a parachute.” So, the computer whiz took a parachute and he jumped.
The minister looked at the little boy and said, “Well, look, I’ve lived a long, full life and you’re just a young man. You take the last parachute, and I’ll go down with the plane.”
The little boy looked at the minister and said, “Mr. Minister, don’t worry about it. The brilliant computer whiz just took my knapsack and jumped out of the plane.”
A lot of us are too smart for our britches. We think more of ourselves than we ought to. We think we’re a life whiz and every time we jump out to do right, we fall flat on our face. God has what we need in order to jump and land on our feet. All we have to do is humble ourselves and submit to Him.
A BOY Scout was on a plane with a pilot, a minister, and a computer whiz. There was trouble on the plane. The plane was beginning to dive. They realized that they had to put on parachutes and jump. The only problem was there were only three parachutes and there were four people. The pilot came and said, “Well, look, I’ve got a wife and four kids, I need a parachute.” So, he took the parachute and he jumped.
The computer whiz said, “Well, I’ve got all of this knowledge that the world desperately needs for the twenty-first century, and I can’t have it die with me, so I need a parachute.” So, the computer whiz took a parachute and he jumped.
The minister looked at the little boy and said, “Well, look, I’ve lived a long, full life and you’re just a young man. You take the last parachute, and I’ll go down with the plane.”
The little boy looked at the minister and said, “Mr. Minister, don’t worry about it. The brilliant computer whiz just took my knapsack and jumped out of the plane.”
Reading of the Text
Christ’s Command
A student at a Bible school in the Philippines became disturbed over the condition of the men’s rest rooms, since they always seemed to be neglected in the cleaning routine. When nothing was done to eliminate the filth, he took matters into his own hands and complained to the principal of the school. A little while later, the student noticed that the problem was being corrected, but he saw with amazement that the man with the mop and pail in hand was the principal himself!
Later the student commented, “I thought that he would call a janitor, but he cleaned the toilets himself. It was a major lesson to me on being a servant and, of course, it raised a question in my own mind as to why I hadn’t taken care of the problem!”
Christ’s Example
Christ’s Warning
Closing Thoughts
Closing Illustration
WHILE IN seminary preparing for ministry, I was enrolled in a class that one day brought me great discouragement. Our class was asked to do a paper. Now I always loved to do challenging things in class and I was committed to making an A on this paper; I was determined to spare no research effort, no dedication, nor any steadfastness to make an A on this paper. It was a particularly difficult class and it was rare that anyone ever made an A with this professor. I was sure that I would be the exception to the rule. My Type A personality kicked in and I was committed to ace this class, which meant acing this research paper. I was committed to it.
When I got my paper back, there was an F on it. Not only did I not make an A, I did not make a B, C, or a D either. There was an F in bold red across the top. You can imagine how crushed I was because I did my work, I clocked all-nighters, I researched, I studied the original languages, and I dug in. Even though the paper was only to be ten or twelve pages, I had eighteen to twenty pages. I had footnotes. I had gone the distance. How dare he give me an F!
I noticed a handwritten note on the bottom of the paper below the big, red F. It said, “Great scholarship, great detail, and magnificent effort, but you answered the wrong question.” All that work mistakenly addressed the wrong thing. It wasn’t that I was not sincere; it wasn’t that I was not working hard; it was simply that I had addressed the wrong thing. I had been so focused on myself and what I wanted to achieve, that I missed the professor and what he wanted from me. In my desire to score high, I missed out on what could have been a wonderful assignment because I did not understand what the professor wanted from me.