PLEASE...EXCUSE...MY EXCUSES

 Greetings and Salutations Friends and Neighbors.

Have you ever caught yourself making excuses?  For me...I am usually in the middle of justifying why I am doing or saying the things I do and say.  After all...there must be some rhyme or reason for WHY I am conducting myself in my life.

C.S. Lewis...in his book Mere Christianity in the section called The Law of Human Nature...covers this concept of reason or excuse and why we behave the way we do.

EVERY ONE HAS HEARD people quarreling. Sometimes it sounds funny and sometimes it sounds merely unpleasant; but however it sounds, I believe we can learn something very important from listening to the kinds of things they say. They say things like this: "How’d you like it if anyone did the same to you?"--‘That’s my seat, I was there first"--"Leave him alone, he isn’t doing you any harm"--"Why should you shove in first?"--"Give me a bit of your orange, I gave you a bit of mine"--"Come on, you promised." People say things like that every day, educated people as well as uneducated, and children as well as grown-ups.
Now what interests me about all these remarks is that the man who makes them is not merely saying that the other man’s behavior does not happen to please him. He is appealing to some kind of standard of behavior which he expects the other man to know about. And the other man very seldom replies: "To hell with your standard." Nearly always he tries to make out that what he has been doing does not really go against the standard, or that if it does there is some special excuse. He pretends there is some special reason in this particular case why the person who took the seat first should not keep it, or that things were quite different when he was given the bit of orange, or that some thing has turned up which lets him off keeping his promise. It looks, in fact, very much as if both parties had in mind some kind of Law or Rule of fair play or decent behavior or morality or whatever you like to call it, about which they really agreed. And they have. If they had not, they might, of course, fight like animals, but they could not quarrel in the human sense of the word. Quarreling means trying to show that the other man is in the wrong. And there would be no sense in trying to do that unless you and he had some sort of agreement as to what Right and Wrong are; just as there would be no sense in saying that a footballer had committed a foul unless there was some agreement about the rules of football." (C.S. Lewis Mere Christianity: The Law of Human Nature)


The bottom line is that you feel that you are right...and the other person is wrong...so you become a lawyer as you defend your case.  "Never mind the furthermore...the plea is SELF defense.  We are defending our SELF nature with what is in essence our SELF-RIGHTEOUSNESS.

How quickly we forget from where we come...from dirty, rotten, sinner (Romans 3:10; Romans 3:23) to the RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD IN CHRIST. (Romans 1:17; II Corinthians 5:21)

Of course between "there is none righteous" to "the righteous live shall live by faith"...something took place that put us in the position of the righteousness of God...IN CHRIST." (II Corinthians 5:21)  That SOMETHING was the D.B.R.




 EXCUSE:  par-ahee-teh'-om-ahee (par-ahee-teh'-om-ahee)=to beg off, that is, deprecate, decline, shun: - avoid, (make) excuse, intreat, refuse, reject.

In the parable of the slighted invitation...may are invited to a feast...but everyone was coming up with EXCUSES about WHY they could not come.  The Master of the feast sends his slave out to the highways and byways to compel them to come in.  Jesus stated,
"For I tell you, none of those men who were invited shall taste my dinner." (Luke 14:7-24) 

Our EXCUSES will keep us from experiencing the FEAST OF THE LORD in our lives.  The menu for the feast includes: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, and self-control. (Galatians 5:22-23)

Don Adams...aka Maxwell Smart (Agent 96) on the show GET SMART came up with some far fetched excuses...and would precede them (in his nasal voice)  with..."Would you believe..." The chief would say..."No...I wouldn't." Then Smart would give two or three more improbable excuses.

Another word for an EXCUSE is found in Romans 1:20 where people excuse themselves for there sins by saying they did not see or know God.

EXCUSE: anapologētos (an-ap-ol-og'-ay-tos)=indefensible: - without excuse, inexcuseable

Paul speaks to people who have all kinds of excuses for NOT BELIEVING...affecting their LIFESTYLE that goes against the grain of God...and they are WITHOUT EXCUSE.

"For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is KNOWN about God is EVIDENT...WITHIN THEM; for God made it EVIDENT TO THEM.  For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes...His eternal power and divine nature, have been CLEARLY SEEN, being understood through what has been made, so that THEY ARE WITHOUT EXCUSE." (Romans 1:18-20) 
 
What can we do...if our EXCUSES have wrapped us up in the rope of sin?  What can we do to hydrate our thirsty and dried spirits and souls? 

You have heard of the 3 R's...Readin' Rightin' and Rithmatic.  Well Acts 3:19 had the Spiritual 3 R's...
Repent...Return...Refreshing.

"Repent therefore and return that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord." (Acts 3:19 NASB).

Oh I know...excuse may not be a sin to you...but when your excuses begin to affect your life...when your excuses give you what in your mind are valid reasons to do or not do something...then it is turning into sin...and at the least...moving in the flesh and not in the spirit.  A good indicator if you excuses are turning into sin...is the PEACEOMETER.  Are you in a constant state of UNREST in your life?  Do you constantly want to avoid FELLOWSHIP with people you once loved?  Are your excuses...a good justification for why it is OK for you to continue in SINS and DEEDS OF THE FLESH? 

Instead of an excuse..Repent....have a change of  heart, mind, attitude, direction.  Return to your first love...remember from where you have fallen...repent...and do the deeds you did at first. (Revelation 2:5; Acts 3:19)

FINAL THOUGHTS...FINALLY

What is your excuse?  Is your excuse...other people....circumstances...your emotions...you intellect... your special gifts?  What ever your excuses...don't let them rob you of your peace and your connectivity to the Lord and His people.


Love and No Excuses Kisses
Rodney "If...But" Boyd