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Gilligan –
Sloth
Luke 18: 18 - 23
Tonight we are going to talk about the sin of Gilligan, and I am pretty
sure that you are all settling for an easy night right about now. You
know when we get to lust while there will be many of us who struggle
with it but very few of us will have the courage to admit it. Its one
thing to come forward at church and say that you've been forsaking the
assembling of ourselves together. It's another to come forward and say,
"I have a problem with lust."
And in a few weeks we will talk about it and actually, I don't think
coming forward is the best way to handle that particular struggle. But
when you talk about something so private and yet so glaring you can’t
help but have people who leave feeling doubly guilty; not only are the
committing the sin, they won't do anything about it.
Last week we talked about the sin of anger. We said last week that the
problem with anger is that while most everyone will admit that from time
to time they have a problem with it, we don't think it's a big deal.
"Yeah, I get angry sometimes, I lose my temper, I even break things, but
it's not like I'm guilty to lust or something."
Then tonight we get to the sin of Gilligan and we are going to notice
that the problem with tonight's featured sin is not that no one will
admit it. It is not that no one thinks it's a big deal. The problem is
that no one thinks they're guilty of it. If you remember Gilligan’s sin
is slothfulness.
Now you are going to have to admit that you don’t think that's a problem
for you, do you? If I had announced this morning, "Tonight we will be
looking at the sin of slothfulness and I know you'll want to be here to
find a solution to this sin that has been plaguing your Christian life,"
you'd have said, "Well, I'll be here, but don't hold your breath that
I’ll feel very confronted. I mean I'm so busy. I don't have time to
breath. I'll admit I've been pretty uncomfortable with some of the other
deadly sins, and I am counting up to see which ones I need to miss but
this one is a cake walk. Bring it on."
I believe that part of the reason that we feel that way is that we've
made an assumption about what slothfulness is. We've been taught or just
assumed that sloth is just another word for lazy. And Lazy people lay
around the house eating bonbons and watching soap operas all day long.
Slothful people take lots of naps and sleep in and are intimate
companions with their sofas.
And we don’t have any of those people here. I mean this church is filled
with people who have 27 acre gardens and an old broken hoe that they use
to work that garden with. We can't be guilty of this sin because we get
up early and go to be late and we are busy constantly and have lots of
deadlines and are fidgety when we have to be still, like now, in church.
If we can identify with any Biblical character it’s Martha. Busy, Busy,
Busy we are fast moving and performance oriented and we have the ulcers
to prove it. We may be a lot of things, but we aren't sluggards.
If you have come here tonight with that assumption then I want to ask
you to try to forget everything that you have ever learned or heard
about slothfulness. Tonight I want to try to define slothfulness a
little more carefully. You see while Sloth does refer to laziness it’s
not they type of laziness that you might think.
An old farmer and his wife were sitting at the kitchen table one night
shelling butterbeans and after a long period of time his wife spoke up
and said. “Jeb, it sounds like it’s raining outside go and see.”
The old farmer just sat there for a minute longer and then called out to
the dog. "Blue, Come here Blue. Come here boy."
His wife looked him in the eye and asked, "Why are you calling the dog?
I wanted to know if it was raining, not where the dog was."
He said, "I know. If the dog's wet, it's raining. If the dog's dry, it's
not."
If I were to ask you in that story who was the slothful one, you would
probably think well it has to be the wife because she was the one who
wanted to know if it was raining and was to lazy to get up and go see
for herself. It couldn’t be the man because he didn’t need to know what
the weather was doing and he had a really good way to figure it out.
But remember I said that Slothfulness was laziness but not the type of
laziness that you would expect.
First Slothfulness is intellectual laziness.
We have come up with a lot of different types of creativity when it
comes to matters of the mind. We're content with what we know, the books
we've read, the things we've learned. We've made up our minds. We know
the truth and the truth has set us free -- from any further inquiry.
Remember what Luke wrote in Acts 17:10-12?
The brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea, and
when they arrived they went into the Jewish synagogue. Now these Jews
were more noble than those in Thessalonica; they received the word with
all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things
were so. Many of them therefore believed, with not a few Greek women of
high standing as well as men.
Luke says that the Bereans were more noble because they searched the
scriptures daily. Now what scriptures do you think that they were
searching? Well it wasn’t the New Testament. The Bible wasn’t adopted
yet, and it is believed that even the gospels didn’t show up until
around the 70’s so what would they have been studying?
It would have to be the Old Testament. The books of law and prophecy
that they had been raised with, and that they would have had to memorize
large passages from as young children. But they didn’t allow their
knowledge of the scriptures keep them from further study.
Several of you asked me last week how my classes and readings are going
and I have told you about the current book that I am reading where they
are arguing over who actually wrote the books of the Bible. Did Matthew
actually write Matthew or did one of his disciples write things that
they learned from the Apostle? I wish that you could see your faces when
I tell you about it. Across the board the people I have talked to get
this confused look on their faces and I am told something along the
lines “Well Matthew wrote it because it has his name on it.”
In the church we know enough to get by and what we don't know we can
pick up from the work of others. We seem to be scared of the questions
that come and the work that is involved in answering those questions.
I was brought up in a house were we were taught to doubt and question
everything that you have ever believed and search for the truth of God.
I believe in Baptism but I still question it to see where God stands on
the issue.
I believe in the autonomy of the church but I still search the
scriptures to see the wisdom in having an Eldership that meets the
spiritual needs of an individual church, and deacons that work at an
individual church.
I believe in communing around the table on the first day of every week,
but I still study to make sure that I am following the example of the
first century brethren.
Some of us live by the rule that “if it was good enough for my momma it
is good enough for me and the church suffers from lack of depth.” Just
because you made up your mind about something 20 years ago doesn’t
absolve you from studying about it today.
But the sin of sloth is even more than just intellectual contentment.
Next I believe that Slothfulness is Spiritual Laziness.
One of the best illustrations of biblically condemned sloth is in the
story of the rich, young, ruler in Luke 18:18-23. (Read text).
There are lots of lessons to be learned from this story, but the one I
want you think about has to do with the reason this man walked away from
what he said he wanted. He was a man of great wealth. Even if he
inherited that wealth, we have no reason to think that he was not an
industrious person. The truth is we've known people who inherited great
wealth and lost it.
A few chapters back, Jesus told the story of the prodigal son who
received an enormous inheritance from his father, yet in a short period
of time, squandered it all away. So even if this man gained his wealth
through the death of a rich relative, we can rest assured he was not a
lazy person when it came to work. Chances are he was a very busy man.
His laziness was of a different, more dangerous kind. He was spiritually
lazy. Jesus told him what he needed to do and he was unwilling to do it.
He was guilty of the sin of sloth. He didn't want to make spiritual
growth a priority in his life. He didn't want to change because change
is hard work.
Ecclesiastes 10:18 says: Through sloth the roof sinks in, and through
laziness the house leaks.
Now, you can live in a house that has straight rafters and a water tight
roof and still be guilty of sloth. Instead of sagging rafters, you've
got a sagging prayer life. Instead of a dripping roof, you've got
leaking convictions. Instead of weeds growing up through the cracks in
the sidewalks, you've got unconfused, uncomforted sin in your life.
The spiritual sluggard is the person who knows he has issues he needs to
work on, but never gets around to doing it. She is content to live with
her anemic prayer life, he is content to remain locked in the cycle of
lust and shame that's plagued him for years, she knows she should be
using her gifts in ministry, but just can't find the time. They hear the
challenge of Jesus and go away sad.
Elie Wiesel was a survivor of the Nazi prison camps. In his book, The
Town Beyond the Wall, he tells the story of a young Jewish man named
Michael who survives the holocaust and returns to his hometown after the
war.
Michael remembers the soldiers and the police who had brutalized him and
those he loved. He remembered the fear and the terror that gripped them
as they awaited their arrest and sentencing to the concentration camps.
And Michael remembers one other thing; Wiesel writes, "Michael, in a
strange way, understood the brutality of the executioners and the prison
guards, but what plagued him and what really caused him to want to go
back to his homeland was what he didn't understand. There was a certain
man who lived across the street from his Synagogue. This man peered
through his window, day after day, as thousands of Jews were herded into
the death trains. Reflecting no pity, no pleasure, no shock, not even
anger or interest. Impassive, cold, impersonal. "
Michael thinks to himself, "There is a bond between the brutal
executioner and the victim. Even though it is a negative bond. They at
least belong to the same Universe. But not so with the spectator. The
spectator is entirely beyond us. Seeing without being seen, present but
unnoticed."
Weisel concludes, "To be indifferent for whatever reason is to deny not
only the validity of existence, but also its beauty. Betray and you are
a man, torture your neighbor, you are still a man. Evil is human.
Weakness is human. Indifference is not."
That sounds a lot like what Jesus said of the church at Laodicea in
Revelation 3 doesn’t it? To be hot is human. To be cold is human. To be
neither is intolerable. God can understand a hot church. God can
understand a cold one. What God cannot understand is an apathetic
church. A church that has become slothful.
Some people refer to sloth as apathy or indifference. And those are very
good words to describe the feelings that betray the attitude. I still
like "sloth." It has a certain "yuk" to it.
The best synonym for slothfulness I can find in the language of our day
is the perfectly irritating term that rolls most often from the lips of
Trista’s younger sister Tina: whatever.
I don't care. I'm bored. I'm not excited about anything, I'm not
interested in anything, I'm not satisfied with anything, and I’m not
passionate about anything. Slothfulness is the sin of whatever!
Several years ago, Eugene Ormandy was directing the Philadelphia
Orchestra. During the performance, Ormandy dislocated his shoulder. How
would you like to explain that to a doctor? "How did you dislocate your
shoulder?"
"Well, I was trying to Que the piccolos and I got a little carried
away."
There's something in that story for us. Have you ever dislocated
anything because you were so passionate about it? So excited about it?
So zealous for it?
G. Walter Hansenin, in an article in Christianity Today a few years ago
wrote, "I am spellbound by the intensity of Jesus' emotions: Not a
twinge of pity, but heartbroken compassion; not a passing irritation,
but terrifying anger; not a silent tear, but groans of anguish; not a
weak smile, but ecstatic celebration. Jesus' emotions are like a
mountain river cascading with clear water. My emotions are more like a
muddy foam or a feeble trickle."
Those guilty of sloth might well live much longer than those who are
passionate, zealous and anxious. But they will have died long before
they draw their last breath. The most tragic thing in the world is to
remain alive because there is nothing you are willing to die for.
The word was like a fire in Jeremiah's bones.
Paul was willing to be a fool for Christ.
The disciples couldn't help but talk about the things they had seen and
heard. Jesus resolutely set his face for Jerusalem. He blessed those who
were hungry and thirsty for righteousness.
Slothfulness is the sin of Gilligan.
Well Jeremy I don’t really understand this because it was Gilligan who
was always doing the work for the Howells, Riding the bike to make the
washing machine go for the girls, or even collecting coconuts and
Bananas for the Skipper and the other castaways. But let me remind you
what sloth is. It is the refusal to grow spiritually or intellectually.
If you have never seen Gilligan’s Island let me give you a 30 second
cliff note version of 95% of the episodes.
The castaways find a way off the island and Gilligan does something to
wreck their chances. And even once they get off the island in the made
for TV movie, Rescue from Gilligan’s Island, he finds a way to get them
back on.
A satellite crashes on the island and the Professor uses parts to figure
our that a tidal wave is going to swamp the island. The castaways tie
their huts together and ride the disaster out. The wave hits and they
are swept out to sea. Once there, Gilligan accidentally starts a fire
trying to cook a meal and nearly burns the floating hut down. The smoke
catches the attention of a naval helicopter who calls a ship to rescue
the castaways. In triumph, they return to Hawaii, only to learn that
things have changed over the years and they will have trouble fitting
in.
They castaways decided to go on a Christmas cruse together and on that
cruse it is discovered that the compass will not work. When the Skipper
asks Gilligan what happened to the compass Gilligan confesses that He
cleaned it, by opening it up and taking all of the mud (grease) and
little rocks (magnets) out of it. Once again a storm comes up and the
original castaways find themselves shipwrecked once again, on thy same
island.
Gilligan had a chance to learn, he had a chance to be a better first
mate but he was happy with the level of knowledge that he had and as a
result 7 people were strained again on a desert isle.
Tonight I wonder how many of us have been given an opportunity to become
a better Christian, better husband or wife, better child, better parent
and have refused because we didn’t want to do the work necessary to get
better. You see that’s slothfulness, and it won't cut it in a religion
built from the timbers of a cross.
We need to pray that God will remove from us every splinter of sloth,
and use it to start a fire that will not be quenched.
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