Practice What You Preach!

"Practice what you preach!" I reminded myself as another bead of perspiration trickled down my brow. As soon as I finished my post, "I Believe," I armed myself with a scoop shovel and joined a mountain moving crew.

Our mountain was a mountain of soybeans, and scoop by scoop--and with some much appreciated help from gravity--we moved the beans out of the grain bin into the auger which loaded them into a semi-truck trailer. 2 truck loads (2000 bushels) was our goal for the day. Finally we finished the truckloads and took a much needed rest and headed over to Eldora to listen to Sugar and Spice. The next morning, we got back to mountain moving and emptied the grain bin (another truckload and a half). But, that was not the end. We had another mountain to move! This time it was a much smaller mountain of corn, and we did have a fun time. After moving soybeans, corn is a breeze. After 2 days of mountain moving, a person realizes nothing is too hard--and that writing in particular is easy compared to shoveling--so I finally finished an essay that I had procrastinated finishing for 2 months.

James 2 says, "What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him? If a brother or sister be naked and destitute of daily food, And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful for the body; what doth it profit? Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone. Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works..."

How would it work if I and the rest of the mountain moving crew just said, "Why should I get out there and work? I have faith that that mountain of soybeans will be moved," and then started lounging around on the sofa eating potato chips and watching TV? Do you think our faith would be rewarded? Would we look out the window and see the grain bin emptied and the truck filled with grain? Not likely. Faith without works is dead. On the other hand, do you think we would get very far with only works and no faith? No! As I mentioned in "I Believe," we would never get started in the first place if we didn't believe it could be done and that God would give us enough strength to do it. Pray and do! Do your best and trust God with the rest!