Why We Must Care

It’s amazing how parents can ask their teenagers to clean their rooms or take out the trash, and they’ll say, “I want to, but I’m so busy. I don’t have time.” But if something comes along that they want to do, they suddenly and mysteriously have time in their busy schedules.

It is not about having time; it is about a lack of will. They don’t clean their rooms because they don’t want to clean their rooms. They don’t take out the trash because they don’t want to take out the trash.

That is motivation. We must have the motivation to do something. And if we don’t have the motivation, we aren’t going to do anything.

Let’s expand that to the spiritual realm. When it comes to sharing our faith and reaching out to others with the gospel, we offer up a plethora of excuses as to why we cannot do it.

Jesus told the story of ten bridesmaids, five of whom were wise and five were foolish. The five who were wise had oil in their lamps, and the five who were foolish did not. When the cry went out that the bridegroom was coming, those who didn’t have any oil said, “Please give us some of your oil because our lamps are going out” (Matthew 25:8).

But the other bridesmaids answered, “We don’t have enough. . . . Go to a shop and buy some for yourselves” (verse 9). Essentially, “That isn’t our concern. We’re set. We’re happy. Work out your own problems.”

Quite honestly, that is the way many people in the church feel. Talking about the need for evangelism or designing programs to mobilize the church to do it is of no consequence if we lack one simple thing: a burden and a concern for unbelievers.