Carry On

Bible Reading:  Luke 19:11-28
        

Key Verse: Verse  13 -  “And he called his ten servants, and delivered them ten pounds, and said unto them, Occupy till I come.”
           

Key Words: Occupy till I come

The word occupy means “to carry on,” so we are to carry on about the Master’s business until He returns.

John Corts tells the following story, “When I was sixteen years old I went with about eight of my cousins out to grandfather’s farm for a big celebration.  The kids wanted to go out and work in the fields, but grandfather said that was not such a good idea.  We begged and finally grandfather said, ‘Alright, but you will not come in until the end of the day.’

‘We were all so happy.  There we were riding on the tractor and pitching hay, and for about an hour it was wonderful.  Then the sun came up, the hay went down our collars, we all began to get all gritty and grimy, and we asked grandfather to take us home.  ‘Nope, we are going to stay out here all day,’ he said.  ‘But it’s hot,’ we all whined. 

“At noontime we were all hot, miserable, tired, and whining, ‘We want to go in.’ Again we heard the words, ‘Nope, we are going to stay out here all day.’  About three o’clock there came an incredible thunderstorm and the lightning was striking across the sky.  ‘Surely we will go in now,’ we all thought, but we were wrong.

“About five o’clock, we finally heard the words we had hoped for, ‘Alright, we are going in.’ When we got to the house, we all got a bath and had supper.  We were all so proud that we had done it – we had stayed in the fields all day.

“After supper grandfather gathered us all together and said, ‘Children, God has blessed us.  We have a fine farm.  We’ve got a good heritage.  God has blessed us.  There have been times when we were hot and tired and grimy, and we wanted to come in but we didn’t.  We stayed in the fields, we carried on.’”

Do you know why some churches are thriving spiritually?  They have carried on.  When Jesus comes, will He find us occupying [carrying on]?

Dr. Mike Rouse

What to do: 

✞Carry on-day by day, moment by moment.

✞Understand it is always easy to do what we want to do, but serving God is not something that we do naturally, it comes supernaturally.

✞Stay close to God.

✞Remember, winners never quit and quitters never win.