Minding Your Business

A dear friend shared a great story with me this week.  The story was about an elderly man who remembered when he was a little boy during the Depression.  The boy and his family were fairly isolated from the details of the bad news that flooded the country, but occasionally someone returning from a trip to the big city would stop by their farm for a quick visit.  The boy and his father would then stop their work in the fields and come to stand by the fence and talk with the visitor, who proceeded to tell them how very bad everything really was.  After listening for a while, the father would then turn to the boy and say, “All right, son, that’s enough bad news.  It’s time to get back to work.”

Beloved, that is a powerful word to us today.  Regardless of how we spend our days or what we do for a living, we’ve had enough bad news to last us for a very long while.  It’s time to get back to business.

And what is that business?  According to Jesus in the Gospel of Luke, it’s the “Father’s business,” the same business Jesus was here to conduct in a lost and dying world.  Jesus came to save sinners, to open the way for reconciliation of relationship with the Father.  And, according to 2 Corinthians 5:18, Jesus has “given us the ministry of reconciliation” to carry on to completion.

The time is short, dear ones.  Whether Jesus comes for all of us one day soon or for one of us tonight, we dare not waste the precious moments God has given us.  We’ve spent enough time listening to the bad news.  Jesus has commanded us to do the “Father’s business” and proclaim the Good News, so let’s get back to work while there’s still a bit of daylight left.

PRAYER: Lord, please help me focus on the good news of Your gift of salvation!  Help me share Your message and be busy about Your business today.

“And he said unto them, How is it that ye sought me?  Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business?”  Luke 2:49 KJV.

Today’s devotion is by Kathi Macias, award-winning author of nearly 30 books, including Mothers of the Bible Speak to Mothers of Today.  She penned the best-selling devotional A Moment a Day and assisted with Zondervan’s New Women’s Devotional Bible.  A mother and grandmother, Kathi and her husband, Al, call California home.