Quick Word: Stop Stealing

Wophs, didn't get around to recording for this week so Rhema will play a repeat.  The following then, though old, is a newbie to you!

(You can normally catch my quick word every Tuesday morning, just after six, on New Zealand's Rhema).

I imagine that you don’t think of yourself as a thief.  I can’t envisage that my average reader robs houses on the weekend or shoplifts a chocolate bar every time they go into a dairy.  Maybe you do, but more likely you are a bit like me – you feel so guilty when you realise you never paid for that stamp you put on the letter you posted at work, that you’d never make it as a career criminal.

In Ephesians, Paul talks about stealing.  He says: “If you are a thief, quit stealing. Instead, use your hands for good hard work, and then give generously to others in need.”

If we don’t all go around stealing, then at first this verse seems to have nothing to say to us. But there is more then one way to be a thief.  And I think many of us, including me, can take from people everyday.

We take their self-esteem.  We tell them they are useless or stupid or are never going to make it.  We take their future.  We tell them God can’t use people like them, that we’ve seen their kind and never seen anything good come from them.  We take their integrity.  We ask them to gossip with us, to cheat with us, to lie a little, moan a lot.

In New Zealand, especially, we can rob people of their achievements.  We talk them down, pull them down, use a sarcastic voice to say our congratulations.

Why do we do it?  Because it’s our human nature I guess.  And Paul knew this.  So – instead of stealing, he asks us to give generously.  You see, we have an awesome opportunity every time we talk to someone to leave a little bit of Christ with them.  Instead of taking people’s self-esteem we can lift it – be the one in the room that says ‘good job!’ or ‘I really like what you’ve done.’  Instead of taking their future we can offer the future God has already given us – we can say you are forgiven, you are free to be different then everything that has gone before you and to live a full life here and forever.  Instead of taking people’s integrity we can protect it. 

You can be a thief of people or a giver.  Which do you want to be today?