The sluggard says, “There is a lion outside!
I shall be killed in the streets!”
Sadly, more often than not, I play the role of the sluggard. While I haven't outright claimed there were lions in the street, I do have a bad habit of exaggerating the difficulty of something to get out of doing it. How many times have I put off reading the Bible or praying or speaking a word of encouragement to someone because "there's a lion out there". Or in reality "I don't have the time" or "they don't want to talk to me".
When something seems too hard, I need to remember that it's probably because I'm exaggerating the difficulty. The fact of the matter is, however, that with God on my side even real lions shouldn't terrify me. I should remember the story of David in I Samuel 17:34-35:
But David said to Saul, "Your servant has been keeping his father's sheep. When a lion or a bear came and carried off a sheep from the flock, 35 I went after it, struck it and rescued the sheep from its mouth. When it turned on me, I seized it by its hair, struck it and killed it.
Or Sampson in Judges 14: 5-6
Samson went down to Timnah together with his father and mother. As they approached the vineyards of Timnah, suddenly a young lion came roaring toward him. 6 The Spirit of the LORD came upon him in power so that he tore the lion apart with his bare hands as he might have torn a young goat.
Or Daniel in Daniel 6:19-22:
Clearly our God is a god who can defeat lions, so even sluggards have no excuse.19 At the first light of dawn, the king got up and hurried to the lions' den. 20 When he came near the den, he called to Daniel in an anguished voice, "Daniel, servant of the living God, has your God, whom you serve continually, been able to rescue you from the lions?"
21 Daniel answered, "O king, live forever! 22 My God sent his angel, and he shut the mouths of the lions. They have not hurt me, because I was found innocent in his sight. Nor have I ever done any wrong before you, O king."
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