May 25

The wisdom of small creatures

Proverb 30:24‑28

In our culture we tend to parade modern day superstars and beautiful people as our hero’s and models. If you wear a bikini in the Miss America pageant, stand against homosexuality and say you are a Christian you are put up front. If you can throw a hardball 95 miles per hour and say you are a Christian you are on the cover of our magazines. Today in our reading we have a sage named Agur who models downward not upward. He picks four creatures that normally I would squash with my feet and says they can teach us something very important.

Let’s just consider the Ant. Ants teach us that time is later than we think. Ants are creatures of little strength, yet they store up food in the summer. The ant works today for tomorrow. Putting it another way, the ant knows what time it is in life. One thing you will never find is a lazy ant. Today is Memorial Day, and many of us will be attending picnics. Ants attend picnics, but they don't play at picnics. You will never find ant sitting back on lawn chair stuffing potato salad in his face. When ants attend picnics they are working. Ants are wise because they know picnics don't occur in January so now is the time to gather the food and store it up because HARD TIMES are coming. Ants are always at work, straining and carrying the load. Instinctively they use summer to prepare for winter.

So let’s take the wisdom of an ant and apply it to our lives in 2009. Here is a lesson they teach us. Don't let the Urgent crowd out the Important. This is an ant's motto. Urgent things are… things that act on us, visible things, pressing things, insisting, popular actions, often they are pleasant, easy, fun things to do. Important on the other hand has to do with results, contributing to the mission, values, high priorities, goals... things that count for eternity.

-Urgent things are watching the TV, surfing the internet, newspapers, keeping the grass green.
-Important things… knowing God, reading the Bible, praying, going to church, spending time with our families, getting involved in a small group, loving people, listening to people, taking a walk with a child, mentoring a young person, having family devotions…. things that are truly important… Be careful of the tyranny of the urgent. Winter is coming.