B-A-C
Loyal
- Joined
- Dec 18, 2008
- Messages
- 12,058
It was Super Bowl Sunday, 2014. The Seattle Seahawks were in it. For anyone living in the Pacific Northwest, that was not a small thing. The game was on. The stakes were real. And all day long I had been asking my wife the same question.
"Do you need me to take out the trash?"
All day long, the answer was the same. "No."
Fine. Good. No problem.
Fourth quarter. Score tied. The Seahawks on the line. Ten minutes left in the game — maybe less. The kind of football that makes grown men forget to breathe.
That's when she needed the trash taken out.
I won't pretend the temptation wasn't real. Everything in me wanted to say, "Can it wait ten minutes?" The game was right there. The moment was right there.
But something stopped me. A recognition, almost instinctive — this is a test. Maybe she didn't even consciously plan it that way. But it was a test nonetheless. And here was the thing that cut through clearly:
"This test will be gone in ten minutes. If I don't pass it now, I can never pass it."
Taking out the trash after the game proves nothing. Taking out the trash during the fourth quarter of the Super Bowl, when it costs something — that proves everything. Not that I love my wife. I already love my wife. But it reveals how much, and compared to what.
I took out the trash.
✦
The Test Reveals the Hierarchy of Your Loves
Jesus said something that sounds almost harsh until you understand what He meant: "Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me." He wasn't telling His followers not to love their families. He was saying that when the moment forces a choice — when the fourth quarter arrives and you cannot have both — what does your choice reveal about what you love most?
That's what the trash was really about. Not the trash. The hierarchy. The Seahawks were not more important than my wife. The moment of choosing, under pressure, when it cost something — that was the only moment that could prove it.
Easy obedience proves very little. Costly obedience reveals everything.
The Moment Has an Expiration
This is the part we tend to forget. We imagine that the opportunities God places in front of us will wait for us. That we can help that person tomorrow. That we can make that phone call next week. That we can address that wrong after the season settles down.
But the test only exists in the conditions that create it. Change the conditions and the test disappears. That particular person in that particular need at that particular moment — gone. You cannot retroactively pass a test that has already expired.
Matthew 25 is sobering precisely here. The sheep fed the hungry, clothed the naked, visited the prisoner. The goats — they didn't do terrible things. They simply did nothing. And when they were asked why, the honest answer was probably: I thought there would be more time.
"Pass the test now. While the test is still available."
Grace Is Not an Excuse for Inaction
There is a version of Christian teaching that has quietly turned grace into permission to do nothing. Ephesians 2:8-9 becomes the whole gospel — saved by grace through faith, not of works — and verse 10 gets left on the table: "created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them."
The works were always part of the design. Not to earn anything. Not to prove anything to God, who already knows. But because love, when it is genuine, looks for somewhere to put itself. It doesn't wait to be asked twice. It takes out the trash in the fourth quarter.
Inactivity was never the Christian calling. Not now. Not in eternity — where Scripture speaks of ruling and reigning, of cities entrusted to faithful servants, of authority proportional to faithfulness. Even in Eden before the fall, Adam had a job. Work is not a curse. The curse made work hard. The work itself was always part of what it means to bear the image of a God who, as Jesus said, "is working until now."
What the Test Is Really Asking
My wife didn't need me to take out the trash to confirm I was a good husband. She already knew whether I was a good husband. What the fourth quarter revealed was the answer to a deeper question: when it costs you something, what do you choose?
That is the question every test is really asking. Not "will you perform the action?" but "what does this choice reveal about who you are and what you love?"
And the window is always closing.
The trash will still be there after the game.
But the test will not.
Pass it now — while it's still available.
The fruitless tree gets cut down. The one talent servant gets thrown out. The goats hear "depart from me." And in every single case the tragedy isn't spectacular rebellion. It's the quiet accumulation of passed moments. Tests that came and went. Windows that opened and closed. Opportunities that expired while someone waited for a better time.
And the most sobering part —
They all thought there was more time.
The servant buried the talent expecting to dig it up later. The goats presumably intended to get around to helping someone eventually. The fruitless tree had already survived three years of patience. Tomorrow was always available.
Until it wasn't.
James 4:14 — "you do not know what tomorrow will bring." Not a suggestion to be mildly more urgent. A statement of hard fact. The window you are looking at right now is the only window you can be certain exists.
And one day — for each of us — the final test closes. Not with drama necessarily. Just quietly. The last opportunity to feed someone, visit someone, forgive someone, speak truth to someone, take out the trash for someone.
Gone.
And we will either stand having passed the tests that were available to us —
Or we will stand knowing exactly which moments we chose the Seahawks over.
The test is open right now.
That's the only thing any of us can say with certainty.
"Do you need me to take out the trash?"
All day long, the answer was the same. "No."
Fine. Good. No problem.
Fourth quarter. Score tied. The Seahawks on the line. Ten minutes left in the game — maybe less. The kind of football that makes grown men forget to breathe.
That's when she needed the trash taken out.
I won't pretend the temptation wasn't real. Everything in me wanted to say, "Can it wait ten minutes?" The game was right there. The moment was right there.
But something stopped me. A recognition, almost instinctive — this is a test. Maybe she didn't even consciously plan it that way. But it was a test nonetheless. And here was the thing that cut through clearly:
"This test will be gone in ten minutes. If I don't pass it now, I can never pass it."
Taking out the trash after the game proves nothing. Taking out the trash during the fourth quarter of the Super Bowl, when it costs something — that proves everything. Not that I love my wife. I already love my wife. But it reveals how much, and compared to what.
I took out the trash.
✦
The Test Reveals the Hierarchy of Your Loves
Jesus said something that sounds almost harsh until you understand what He meant: "Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me." He wasn't telling His followers not to love their families. He was saying that when the moment forces a choice — when the fourth quarter arrives and you cannot have both — what does your choice reveal about what you love most?
That's what the trash was really about. Not the trash. The hierarchy. The Seahawks were not more important than my wife. The moment of choosing, under pressure, when it cost something — that was the only moment that could prove it.
Easy obedience proves very little. Costly obedience reveals everything.
The Moment Has an Expiration
This is the part we tend to forget. We imagine that the opportunities God places in front of us will wait for us. That we can help that person tomorrow. That we can make that phone call next week. That we can address that wrong after the season settles down.
But the test only exists in the conditions that create it. Change the conditions and the test disappears. That particular person in that particular need at that particular moment — gone. You cannot retroactively pass a test that has already expired.
Matthew 25 is sobering precisely here. The sheep fed the hungry, clothed the naked, visited the prisoner. The goats — they didn't do terrible things. They simply did nothing. And when they were asked why, the honest answer was probably: I thought there would be more time.
"Pass the test now. While the test is still available."
Grace Is Not an Excuse for Inaction
There is a version of Christian teaching that has quietly turned grace into permission to do nothing. Ephesians 2:8-9 becomes the whole gospel — saved by grace through faith, not of works — and verse 10 gets left on the table: "created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them."
The works were always part of the design. Not to earn anything. Not to prove anything to God, who already knows. But because love, when it is genuine, looks for somewhere to put itself. It doesn't wait to be asked twice. It takes out the trash in the fourth quarter.
Inactivity was never the Christian calling. Not now. Not in eternity — where Scripture speaks of ruling and reigning, of cities entrusted to faithful servants, of authority proportional to faithfulness. Even in Eden before the fall, Adam had a job. Work is not a curse. The curse made work hard. The work itself was always part of what it means to bear the image of a God who, as Jesus said, "is working until now."
What the Test Is Really Asking
My wife didn't need me to take out the trash to confirm I was a good husband. She already knew whether I was a good husband. What the fourth quarter revealed was the answer to a deeper question: when it costs you something, what do you choose?
That is the question every test is really asking. Not "will you perform the action?" but "what does this choice reveal about who you are and what you love?"
And the window is always closing.
The trash will still be there after the game.
But the test will not.
Pass it now — while it's still available.
The fruitless tree gets cut down. The one talent servant gets thrown out. The goats hear "depart from me." And in every single case the tragedy isn't spectacular rebellion. It's the quiet accumulation of passed moments. Tests that came and went. Windows that opened and closed. Opportunities that expired while someone waited for a better time.
And the most sobering part —
They all thought there was more time.
The servant buried the talent expecting to dig it up later. The goats presumably intended to get around to helping someone eventually. The fruitless tree had already survived three years of patience. Tomorrow was always available.
Until it wasn't.
James 4:14 — "you do not know what tomorrow will bring." Not a suggestion to be mildly more urgent. A statement of hard fact. The window you are looking at right now is the only window you can be certain exists.
And one day — for each of us — the final test closes. Not with drama necessarily. Just quietly. The last opportunity to feed someone, visit someone, forgive someone, speak truth to someone, take out the trash for someone.
Gone.
And we will either stand having passed the tests that were available to us —
Or we will stand knowing exactly which moments we chose the Seahawks over.
The test is open right now.
That's the only thing any of us can say with certainty.
