Christian Living

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Larry Lilly's Letter Monday November 3, 2008

Over the now reasonably long span of my life I have often pondered the spectacle of some bright star falling upon the rocks of scandal of different sorts. Upon this demise of power, fame, wealth or all three, said people, men and women are counted out, down for the rest of their life.

Contrary to human reason many of these people endure the fall, dine at their plate of consequences, and voila, here they are again, right back at the top or at least near whatever their top may be. And others? For some reason they never get up. Have you ever wondered why one gets up and the other wallows in the mire of failure until they are swallowed up in life's ultimate futility? I sure have and do.

I have noticed two essential qualities in those who eat at the serving of consequence and rise; they have a different attitude and they improve their service, service which I call ability.

When you think about grand failures such as Martha Stewart, Charles Colson and many others the two qualities are glaring. Most of my colleagues miss these two truths, even when reading Paul's statement on the subject. First, notice; 1 Corinthians 15:10

"But by the grace of God I am what I am: and his grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain; but I laboured more abundantly than they all: yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me." In the preceding verse, 9, Paul tells us that he was not fit to be an Apostle due to serious past criminal actions in that he had persecuted the church of God. We know some of the persecution involved the cold blooded murder of Stephen. Paul overcame the consequences of this period in his life by first of all accepting the forgiveness of the Lord, learning to serve and certainly honing his skills to the point of near perfection. He states in verse 10 that he worked at serving Christ harder than anyone and claimed that God's grace enabled this effort.

Paul understood and used a basic principle stated simply as;

"Your ability must exceed your liability."

In some Christian circles of his day, Paul remained an outcast, a pariah and these groups never accepted him. Did this stop this gifted man? Of course not. He kept on doggedly offering his gifts, and they were many, in the service of Christ and in many ways turned his world right side up and all of humanity has benefited from Paul's labors, especially Western Civilization as Paul answered what is known as the Macedonian Call in response the need of the West.

Here's the deal. You mess up, sin is the biblical word. You're down and counted out. What can you do? Slink off into some corner and stoically wait for the grim reaper, hoping to soon embrace him and feel his cold breath summoning you to your "long home?" Or you can do what Paul and countless others have done and others now in the process. Acknowledge your sin, accept forgiveness provided by Christ, turn a deaf ear to continuing critics, hone your skills to the sharpest possible edge and get up early, stay up late and work at what is given to you. While you are doing this remember the simple though not easy formula:

"Your ability MUST exceed your liability."

Larry Lilly Copyright © 2008 Use with credit.

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