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Scripture for the day: 1 Samuel 14:1-2 Now it happened one day that Jonathan the son of Saul said to the young man who bore his armor, “Come, let us go over to the Philistines’ garrison that is on the other side.” But he did not tell his father. And Saul was sitting in the outskirts of Gibeah under a pomegranate tree which is in Migron. The people who were with him were about six hundred men.
Thought for the day: I know, this bit of scripture makes no sense by itself. But if you’ll allow me to fill in some gaps, I think we will see something very important for each of us. The background is this; Saul blew it. The Philistines were attacking Israel – again. They were winning – again. David had killed Goliath, battles had been won and lost, Saul had been disobedient to the Lord’s commands given through the prophet Samuel and the kingdom had been promised to David rather than Saul’s family. Now the king had been told to move on with the battle, and he did nothing. Instead of doing right in response to having done wrong, he did nothing. Saul went and camped under a pomegranate tree. He had all the authority of God at his command and he went camping. He had been promised victory and he stayed in the shade.
 Lord, forgive us for too often being Saul. Putting the situation in the present day, I fear we’ve become so focused on avoiding evil that we’ve become blinded to doing good. We have tended to define holiness by what we avoid instead of what we give ourselves to. James said, “Faith without works is dead,” and we all echoed, “Amen.” James went further and said, “To him who knows to do good and doesn’t do it, to him it is sin,” and we say, “Now, wait a minute, James!”
 Listen, we need to understand that we can’t follow God in neutral. The “life more abundant” is lived by choice, not chance. We are meant to be proactive, not reactive. The issue is too often between action and reaction. You see, when we simply react to life as it is, we are unwillingly forced out of our neutrality. But when we decide to act, it’s because we have refused to remain in neutral. I believe one of the greatest dangers we face as Christians today is the amazing degree to which the Lord has blessed us. With great blessing often comes great fear; fear of losing what the Lord has given. We become like the man who was given a single talent and, because of his fear of losing what he’d been given, went and buried it.
 This is how the whole dilemma too often works: We begin to move out with God and the more we move, the more He blesses our activity. The more He blesses us, the more we have to lose. The more we have to lose, the more we have to risk if we continue. The more we have to risk, the higher the price of obedience. Oh, we’re not living hand to mouth as we did in the beginning, but we face a new kind of poverty, being stuck in a rut. We suddenly face the danger of gaining the whole world and losing our own soul. One day we wake up and realize that what He's given us now stands between us and Him. 
 I’m convinced that four little words in our passage for today separated Jonathan from Saul: “Come, let us go.” He wasn’t satisfied sitting in the shade of God’s blessings. There was more that needed to be done and he was in a position to do something, anything, no matter the opposition or danger that might be involved. The answer to the problem of fear and anxiety over what we might be risking if we should dare to put our hand to the task the Lord has put in our path is that we intentionally move from passive to passionate. I want to talk more about this tomorrow, but in the meantime, look around you to see what the opportunities might be.
Now go take on your world.  -  Bill