Pursuing excellence Without Bitterness

Pursuing excellence
Without Bitterness


When you are a person that pursues excellence, but there are others, many, around you that are haphazardly pursuing very little,   you are going to run into conflict. Most of this conflict will be within you. It is not going to bother  those around you, who are pursuing less than you are, because
they are happy and content in moment.  Their goal is to have a good time.  The Bible calls it, "eat, drink, and be merry."

Nonetheless, this steep contrast of interests and pursuits must be understood and overcome within our souls, and bitterness not be allowed to enter into our hearts lest we be deprived of all that we are working so hard to achieve.

Joyce Meyers told a story in one of her books about a person who wanted to dig for gold. He knew of a place where the gold was located, but all previous attempts had proved non-cost effective. In other words, it cost too much to mine that gold.

But, this one fella wanted to mine that gold. He set out on seeking the best method to get the gold.  Instead of going out with the boys after work and having a good time, this one chap set himself a goal to discover the best method.   It took time and he was mocked for having such a pipe dream.  Nonetheless, he stayed with it, missing out on all the fun and games of life.

But when it came time to mine the gold with the method that he discovered,  he was successful and those other chaps came to work for him.

We might not be mining for gold, but we are called to be those who labor in the Lord's harvest.  We do not all use the same tool in our labors, but we should be experts with the tools that we do use.

But the point that I want to make is that we cannot allow what our eyes see when we look around us and consider the lack of diligent labor from others.  It can get very frustrating to see others being lazy while we labor profusely. We cannot allow this frustration to get under our skin. Shake it off.

Our father knows and sees what is going on around us.  Each of us will be rewarded for our own personal labor. What are we going to say? "Lord, I saw what was going on around me and I just could not focus on my own job."  Not!  That is not going to work for me, nor is it going to work for you.

Regretfully, I have allowed myself to steam over these types of situations.  All I did was waste time. I also found out that our enemy, the devil, would pounce on these opportunities.  Sometimes it would take me even a couple of days before I could get back on track. As matter of fact, this was happening so much that it became ridiculous.  It was in this "rediculous-ness" that I realized I was wasting time, and I was chasing foxes. They were stealing my time, my effort,  my energy, and in time they tried to steal my desire.

If you are going through this, or if I go through it again, may the Lord God Almighty bless us with quick wit and wisdom, and allow us to see that we need not chase the foxes.  Trust the Lord and he will tend to his workers.

 And in time, if we are diligent and faithful, He  may even use us to instruct others to pursue excellence.  But first we must have excellence within  our own lives.