Monday, October 24, 2016

"Don’t Break Your Vow" by Margaret Slaughter


“When you tell God you’ll do something, do it – now.  God takes no pleasure in foolish gabble.  Vow it, then do it.  Far better not to vow in the first place than to vow and not pay up.  Don’t let your mouth make a total sinner of you.  When called to account, you won’t get by with ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean it.’  Why risk provoking God to angry retaliation?  But against all illusion and fantasy and empty talk there’s always this rock foundation:  Fear God!”
Ecclesiastes 5:4-7
 
Remember when you were a kid, and you and your friends made a promise, and you would do the ‘pinky promise’.  That meant you were absolutely, positively going to keep your word.  One of my biggest pet peeves is people promising or agreeing to do something, and not keeping their word.  Unfortunately there is a lot of that in the body of Christ.  We commit to a ministry or committee with our words, but we are severely lacking in the actual work.  Other ‘things’ take priority over the commitment or vow we made.  We have a real lackadaisical (lacking enthusiasm and determination; carelessly lazy) attitude towards the work of ministry.

As much as I am aggravated by this type of behavior, just consider for a moment how God feels.  If you had to stand before God today and explain why you didn’t keep your vow, what excuse would you give?  What if God treated our prayer requests the same way we treat our vows to Him?  We would be a sorry bunch of Christians!

The Word says, “Don’t let your mouth make a total sinner of you”.  Let’s begin today with a renewed commitment to the vows we’ve made.  The body of Christ needs your service.  Jesus laid down His life for us, the least we can do is keep our vow to Him!
Margaret Slaughter

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