Making Excuses

1. Making Excuses Then He said to him, “A certain man gave a great supper and invited many, and sent his servant at supper time to say to those who were invited, ‘Come, for all things are now ready.’ But they all with one accord began to make excuses. The first said to him, ‘I have bought a piece of ground, and I must go and see it. I ask you to have me excused.’ And another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I am going to test them. I ask you to have me excused.’ Still another said, ‘I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come’ (Lk. 14:16-24).

2. Making Excuses • Many times excuses are just LIES in disguise. • Something we make up for not doing what we don’t want to do. • Adam was the 1st excuse maker – “The woman that you gave me…” (Gen. 3:12). • Notice: God is at fault for giving man a wife. • Many of our excuses end up laying the blame for our failures at the feet of God.

3. Excuses • “I just can’t understand the Bible.” • "And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free" (Jn. 8:32). • Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is (Eph. 5:17). • True answer: • “I don’t want to understand the Bible.” • “I understand and I don’t want to obey.” • “I understand and I’m not going to obey.”

4. Excuses • “We can’t understand the Bible alike.” • Now I plead with you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly joined together in the same mindand in the same judgment(1 Cor. 1:10). • True answer: • “I’m not changing churches.” • “I’m not leaving the church of my parents.” • “I’m not going to offend my friends and family.”

5. Excuses • “I can’t teach Bible class.” • For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God; and you have come to need milk and not solid food (Heb.5:12). • True answer: • “I’m not going to put forth the time and effort to learn how to teach.” • “I’m too busy with my secular activities to devote time to study and teach others.”

6. Excuses • “I can’t attend every service.” • Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching (Heb.10:25). • “That just means one time a week.” • True answer: • “I don’t want to come to every service.” • “I’m not going to come and it doesn’t matter what the Bible says about it.” • There are things I’d rather do than worship God.”

7. Excuses For Lusting • “It’s nothing I haven’t seen before.” • But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart (Matt. 5:28). • True answer: • “I like looking at it and I’m going to keep looking.”

8. Excuses For Dressing Immodestly • “They are going to lust anyway.” • Then He said to the disciples, “It is impossible that no offenses should come, but woe to him through whom they do come! It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones” (Lk. 17:1-2). • True answer: • “I like others looking at me, it flatters me.”

9. Excuses • What about you? • Have you been making excuses for not obeying God? • All the excuses we make for our disobedience won’t change God’s mind at the Judgment! • For I say to you that none of those men who were invited shall taste my supper (Luke 14:24). • Then they also will answer Him, saying, “Lord, when did we see You hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to You?” Then He will answer them, saying, “Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me” (Mt.25:44-45).