Ron Hutchcraft Ministries - Nothing But the Best - #5103

Wednesday, August 2, 2006

There's an interesting story that's told about Queen Elizabeth at a time when she wanted to get away from all that hustle and bustle of London and Buckingham Palace. She just wanted to go for a walk, and it's kinda hard if you're the Queen of England. So, she got all dressed down, she had her chauffer take her out to the countryside, and she said, "Let me out and you can come and pick me up later." Well, as she walked for a while a shower began to come up, and the weather changed, and she came to this old, old kind of hut. She knocked on the door and an elderly woman came to the door, and the Queen, of course dressed down in disguise, said, "Listen, can I borrow an umbrella from you?" The old lady looked and she had two umbrellas by the door; one was a brand new one and the other one was her beat up-old umbrella. She gave the lady the beat-up, old umbrella and the Queen said, "I'll make sure you get your umbrella back." The next day that big ole limousine pulls up in front of that hut, the chauffer knocks on the door and presents the umbrella to the lady and says, "The Queen asked me to return your umbrella." And the old lady was heard to say, "If I'd only known who it was, I would have given her my best."

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Nothing But the Best."

Our word for today from the Word of God comes from Jeremiah 48:10 . Listen to these sobering words, "A curse on him who is lax in doing the Lord's work." Wow! Don't be lax. Don't be lazy. Don't be careless in doing the Lord's work. That's strong words; a curse on that person. You see, sometimes we give the Lord what's easy for us to give Him even though the King deserves our best.

A lot of people unfortunately are lax doing the Lord's work. That's why a strong word like this is needed. Some of us maybe have been financially lax with the Lord's work. We've been careless with the money. Maybe there's not been full integrity in the way the funds have been taken care of. We've got to say, "Man, every dollar is God's money." I had one Christian leader tell me, "Ron, this money is blood money. It's been bought and paid for with the blood of Jesus Christ. Jesus sacrificed his life for the work this money was given to. We can't be wasteful with it." Maybe some are lax with their time. A lot of time gets wasted in the service of the Lord. Let's be honest about it. We need to be doing every task as if it were a royal task because it is. It's for the King of Kings; giving it 100% however big or small it is, whether it's in or out of the spotlight, realizing that time is too precious to waste. And maybe we've been lax with the quality of our work for the Lord. Settling for mediocrity when the King should always be represented by excellence, don't you think?

In a very busy world, in our very busy lives, the King too often gets our leftovers. Our leftover time, our leftover energy or talent, and that's wrong. We forget this isn't work for the church or for some Christian organization, or for the people around us, or the people we report to. This is for the King! This is the King who bought me back with the life of His Son.

Someday you'll stand before this King and you'll offer Him the work you did for Him. Make it work that Jesus will be proud of and you don't have to be ashamed of - "...a workman who needs not be ashamed" (2 Timothy 2:15 ) the Bible says. Then you won't ever have to say, "If only I had known this was for the King, I would have given Him my best."