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Epiphany 2 – Jan 19, 2014
Seven Deadly Sins - #2 Sloth
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
We’ve started the 7 deadly sins, and I have an important question: Why do we
call them deadly? Isn’t all sin deadly? The wages of sin is death, any sin, so
every sin is deadly. That’s why Satan was trying to tempt Jesus to sin just once,
and he would become a sinner, separated from God. But because he kept himself
holy and without sin, and because he took the punishment of all of our sins, we
have life instead of death!
But what makes a sin so deadly for a Christian is when we don’t repent of them,
think that they are no big deal, that it’s alright. That’s what makes our seven sins
so dangerous and deadly. When you deal with sins like murder, adultery or theft,
even those who are not Christian understand that those are wrong. But these
seven are sins of thought, and thoughts are hard to control, hard to admit to, hard
to confess, harder to avoid. Most modern Americans probably don’t even
recognize such things as sin at all. I would say that the sin we are considering
today is perhaps the deadliest one of them all. How could that be? If you are
guilty of sloth, you just don’t care.
Recall how I updated our ancient list of 7 sins:
Anger
Road Rage
Sloth
Living Off the Government
Pride
We’re #1
Gluttony Addictions
Lust
Pornography
Greed
Gambling
Envy
Follow the Rich & Famous
I had given as an example of sloth, living off the government, implying laziness
and not wanting to work, letting others provide for your needs. Now sloth can
indeed be that, but I have no intention of spending your time, harping about
welfare programs and turning this into some political exercise, trying to promote a
way of getting the slothful back to work. We’re not going to spend our time
pointing the finger at lazy people out there somewhere; no, the accusing finger is
going to be pointed back at us. It’s all too easy to become a sloth.
The sloth is a slow-moving mammal that lives in trees. Sloths spend most of their
lives hanging upside-down from tree branches; they eat, sleep, even give birth
upside-down in the trees. They hold onto tree branches with strong, curved claws
that are on each of their four feet. Sloths are nocturnal; they are most active at
night and sleep all day, up to 18 hours a day.
Now that’s the way the Lord made sloths, but that’s not the way he made human
beings. He has put us together with many abilities and talents that sloths don’t
have and he wants us to use them! But Solomon depicts the sloth this way:
A sluggard says, “There’s a lion in the road,
a fierce lion roaming the streets!”
I can’t work – there’s a lion out there, it’s too dangerous. You see, there is always
an excuse.
14 As a door turns on its hinges,
so a sluggard turns on his bed.
Like a door, the slothful person goes back & forth on his bed, with no sleep, no
decent rest. Guilt hangs heavy when you’re doing nothing. A good day’s work
means you need sleep and you sleep well.
15 A sluggard buries his hand in the dish;
he is too lazy to bring it back to his mouth.
Procrastination – this person has no drive to even get the food to his mouth. More
and more people have no commitment to get anything done.
16 A sluggard is wiser in his own eyes
than seven people who answer discreetly.
Thinks he is wise, even boastful about how he can get through life without doing
anything, even to the point of mocking others who work hard. I had an uncle like
that, who tried to live off everyone else, and then criticized those who tried to help
him.
But now, I want you to realize that sloth is not just laziness, and not wanting to do
any work. That’s just the surface. The real problem goes much deeper than that.
Sloth is a spiritual laziness, an apathy and lethargy when it comes to the things of
God.
That’s what Jesus was touching on when he told us the parable of the talents,
where each person was given money to work for him while the master was gone.
It was up to each person to decide how to manage the master’s money. One man
just hid his bag of gold in the ground, and when the master arrived, it was time for
excuses:
24 “Then
the man who had received one talent came. ‘Master,’ he said, ‘I
knew that you are a hard man, harvesting where you have not sown and
gathering where you have not scattered seed. 25 So I was afraid and went out
and hid your talent in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you.’
26 “His master replied, ‘You wicked, lazy servant! So you knew that I harvest
where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered seed? 27 Well
then, you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so that
when I returned I would have received it back with interest….Throw that
worthless servant outside, into the darkness, where there wiall be weeping
and gnashing of teeth.
What was his problem? He just didn’t care about the master’s work so very
much, he was unwilling to take the time and the effort to put the money he had
been given to work. He was condemned.
What about us? The Lord has given us all that we have, not just the money but all
our abilities and talents. Are we so busy putting what we have to work for
ourselves or our families, that there is nothing left for the Lord? And we can
make excuses too: “Oh, I’m not very good at that. Someone else can do the
project much better.” “I can’t invite my friend to church. He may turn me down
and I’d be embarrassed. Besides I don’t know what to say.” Underneath all these
excuses is sloth—that person really doesn’t want to anything for the Lord all that
much.
That’s what we see in the congregation at Laodicea, which Jesus said is making
him sick to his stomach. Why? I know your deeds, that you are neither cold
nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are
lukewarm--neither hot nor cold--I am about to spit you out of my mouth.
Some people like to drink hot tea; during the summer, we usually want it cold.
No one cares to drink it lukewarm. Most people like their milk cold, and a few
might like it hot, and may even add chocolate to it. The taste of lukewarm milk,
however, might make someone feel kind of sick. That’s the problem with this
church. Because they are neither hot nor cold, just kind of lukewarm in their
devotion, Jesus says it makes him nauseous, sick to his stomach, and I am about to
spit you out of my mouth.
What does he mean by hot or cold? Those who are hot are on fire for the Lord,
they have flame of faith, a warm heart of love for God. They have a burning zeal
to follow him. The cold ones are those with cold and stony hearts, they have
rejected the Lord completely and want nothing to do with him. Jesus said that
even that is preferable to being lukewarm. How could that be? When you’re cold
to the Lord, you know that you’re in the wrong. These people were lukewarm,
and that made them think they were OK with God.
What does it mean to be lukewarm? They didn’t deny the Gospel, it just didn’t
matter that much to them. They knew that Jesus died on the cross and rose again,
but that made no difference in their daily lives. They knew all the right teachings
of the Bible, but didn’t try to practice them. They didn’t deny sin, but didn’t try to
stop it either. They believed in Jesus, knew that they were saved by faith alone, so
couldn’t see why they had to study the Bible anymore. They knew all that stuff.
You could say they were Sunday Christians. They could worship, give money,
build buildings, but it had no impact on daily life. It’s like someone saying: It’s
Sunday, let’s get this church thing done, and then we’ll get back to the real world.
Does any of this sound familiar? Have you or I ever been lukewarm? This is
sloth.
Sloth in its root form in the Latin means indifference and apathy about the things
of God. An expert wrote about this word: “It is that sin that believes in nothing,
cares for nothing, enjoys nothing, loves nothing, hates nothing, finds purpose
in nothing, lives for nothing, and remains alive only because there is nothing it
would die for.”
Some of you might not be familiar with all the songs of the Beatles anymore, but
they sang about that: He’s a real nowhere man, sitting in his nowhere land,
thinkingg of all his nowhere plans, for nobody. Too many people today are
adrift, they don’t know where they are going and they don’t care!
Now, what if God felt that way? I really don’t care what happens to those people.
I’m just tired of all their complaining and ingratitude and rebellion. I’ll just forget
about them. But no, God still loved this nowhere world.
And that led Jesus to become the most important nowhere man. Paul writes that
Jesus “made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made
in human likeness. He humbled himself and became obedient to death, even
death on a cross. Phil 2:7-8. He became nothing to make us nothings into
something.
He died for us to pay for all our apathy and lethargy and acting like nothing is
important. He changed us and made us a new creation, living breathing sons and
daughters of God who delight to do his will! He made us caring, loving people
who really do care about others and want to help and guide them and get their
nowhere lives back on track with the Lord, if we can. What a joy to serve the one
who served us all the way to the cross!
And so when we get tired out and worn out, and start doubting where our lives are
going, and feel sometimes that we don’t care anymore, he invites us. Come to me
all who are weary and burdened. You’re tired and worn out and just can’t
go anymore, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and you’ll
find that I carry the heavy burden.
And so we pick ourselves up and go on and know it’s so very worthwhile to serve
him and make God’s work our priority. When the going gets tough, remember
that someday he will return. Then we’ll rejoice to hear him say: “Well done, good
and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you
in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!’ Amen.