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"No Excuses"
By Dr. Mickey Anders
First Christian Church
Pikeville, Kentucky
January 28, 2001
Text: Jeremiah 1:4-10
Donna Rice Hughes is a born-again Christian, a family woman who works with a nonprofit organization opposed to pornography on the Internet. She recently wrote a book entitled Kids Online: Protecting Your Children in Cyberspace.
But back in 1984, she was just Donna Rice - single and living life in the fast lane in Miami. That's when she met Senator Gary Hart and someone snapped a picture of her sitting on his lap aboard a boat named "Monkey Business." That photo would eventually bring down Gary Hart's presidential campaign, and led to some serious life-evaluation by Rice.
Hers is a story of repentance and reconciliation. She has built a positive life by overcoming her youthful indiscretions. She is now an outstanding Christian witness. In a 1996 article in Christianity Today (http://www.christianitytoday.com/tcw/6w5/), Rice spoke eloquently of her regret concerning a number of personal failures back then. She gave a vivid witness to her deep personal faith in Jesus Christ.
One of the biggest mistakes she made during her fifteen minutes of fame was her decision to become the advertising symbol for a new brand of jeans with the provocative name "No Excuses." I believe that commercial did more to inaccurately portray her as a home-wrecking bimbo than the "Monkey Business" photograph did. In that context, her "no excuses" line conveyed an in-your-face kind of attitude about sin. It almost said "no regrets" or "no repentance," which was far from the truth about Donna Rice. In fact, that commercial reminds me of Jeremiah 8:12: "They acted shamefully, they committed abomination; yet they were not at all ashamed, they did not know how to blush."
Well, Donna Rice really did know how to blush. She was filled with great pain over the public humiliation and scandal associated with Gary Hart. But I was surprised to find that she never mentioned her "No Excuses" campaign in the interview with Christianity Today.
The Bible is filled with people who make excuses, and there, it is usually God who speaks the line, "No Excuses." In the Bible most people are found making excuses for avoiding the Divine call. In fact, we can find a whole pile of alibis there. People find all sorts of creative excuses for not serving God. And God always seems to respond with a no-nonsense, no-excuses mandate. For God, those who excuse themselves actually accuse themselves.
In Luke 14, Jesus told a wonderful parable about excuse-making. He says that someone gave a great dinner and invited many guests, but they all began to make excuses. "The first said to him, ' I have bought a piece of land, and I must go out and see it; please accept my regrets.' Another said, 'I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I am going to try them out; please accept my regrets.' Another said, 'I have just been married and therefore I cannot come.'" Then the master said to the slave, Go out into the roads and lanes, and compel people to come in, so that my house may be filled." When there's a job to be done, God takes "no excuses."
Jonah was another Hebrew Prophet who is a model of reluctance. When God called him to preach in the Assyrian capital, Ninevah, Jonah took a fast boat in the opposite direction. A man of few words, he didn't even bother to argue with God. He just sailed off into the horizon. Since Jonah used no words, God replied with action rather than words. The storm arose threatening the lives of all those on the boat with Jonah. God didn't have to speak for Jonah to get the message. He admitted to the sailors, "… I know it is because of me that this great storm has come upon you." So reluctantly the sailors pitched Jonah overboard. But the Lord provided a large fish to swallow up Jonah. When there's a job to be done, God takes "no excuses."
When the word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time, he marched into the city of Ninevah, delivered his one-line sermon (Jonah 3:4) and left. Thanks to God, Jonah was successful in spite of himself.
In Exodus 3-5, we read about Moses and the burning bush. God speaks to him and says, "The cry of the Israelites has now come to me; I have also seen how the Egyptians oppress them. So come, I will send you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt." It didn't take Moses long to know that would not be an easy job. Moses was quick on his feet. In fact, he produced five rapid-fire excuses, trying every way he could to avoid the call of God.
For his first excuse he asked, "Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh?" But God replied, "I will be with you."
His second excuse was, "If I come to the Israelites and say to them, 'The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,' and they ask me, 'What is his name?' what shall I say to them?" And God said, "I am who I am."
Thirdly, Moses said, "But suppose they do not believe me or listen to me?" And God gave him a magical staff that became a snake.
Fourth, Moses said to the Lord, "O my Lord, I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor even now… I am slow of speech and slow of tongue." And God said, "Who gives speech to mortals? …I will be with your mouth and teach you what you are to speak."
Finally, Moses said, "O my Lord, please send someone else." And God gave his brother Aaron to be his mouth for him. And finally, Moses relented. What choice did he have? When God wants you to do a job, he takes "no excuses."
In our text for today, it is Jeremiah who makes his excuse for avoiding God's call. In verse 6, he says, "Ah, Lord God! (one of his favorite ways of addressing God) Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy."
If Jeremiah had any inkling of what God was really calling him to do, his excuse-making was entirely understandable. For Jeremiah would have one of the toughest jobs of all the Hebrew prophets. He had to preach an unpopular message to a people who really, really did not want to hear what he had to say. He warned the king not to revolt against Babylon, but the revolt broke out anyway. He was charged with desertion to the enemy, they jailed him in a pit-house and later threw him into a cistern where he almost died. Jeremiah would not have an easy life as a prophet; it is no wonder he made excuses.
Jeremiah watched Judah sink into a political and spiritual decline from which it would never recover. By the end of his career, Judah was no more, Jerusalem was destroyed, and he was left to follow the remaining Judeans into exile in Egypt. He witnessed more than his share of plucking up and tearing down.
But Jeremiah also brought a positive message of hope. He shares God's offer to replant the nation. We find this message of the hope of restoration woven throughout Jeremiah's otherwise grim book. In chapter 24, God promises to bring obedient exiles back from Babylon and restore them. In chapter 31, he promises that just as God has plucked up and broken down Israel and Judah, he will later build and plant them. In chapter 42, God promises those few remaining in Judah that if they will stay, he will build them up and not pull them down.
When there's a job to be done, God takes "no excuses." God responded to Jeremiah by saying, "Do not say, 'I am only a boy'; for you shall go to all to whom I send you, and you shall speak whatever I command you. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you to deliver you." Then the Lord touched Jeremiah's mouth and added, "Now I have put my words in your mouth. See, today I appoint you over nations and over kingdoms, to pluck up and to pull down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant."
Those last phrases are the themes of the book of Jeremiah. In fact, one of the most notable scholars on Jeremiah, Dr. Walter Brueggemen, Professor of Old Testament at Columbia Theological Seminary, made those phrases the titles of his books - To Pluck Up, Tear Down: Jeremiah 1-24, and To Build, To Plant: Jeremiah 26-52.
If God had accepted Jeremiah's excuses, we would never have so many insightful stories like that comparing God to the potter at his wheel. We would never have wonderful verses like these:
"I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah… I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. (31:31-34)
"Ah Lord God! It is you who made the heavens and the earth by your great power and by our outstretched arm! Nothing is to hard for you." (32:17)
"Call to me and I will answer you, and will tell you great and hidden things that you have not known." (33:3)
God accepted no excuses, and made Jeremiah one of the great prophets.
It is very apparent from all these stories that ours is a "No Excuses" kind of God. But the question for us is: Are we excuse-makers?
God is still calling people to respond. Perhaps today God is calling you to be or to do something. Perhaps God is calling you serve the Church in some special way. Perhaps God is calling you to commit your life, to rededicate your life, or to be baptized. Perhaps God is calling you to a deeper discipleship, to read your Bible and pray more faithfully. I don't know what it is that God is calling you to do today, but I wonder if you are making excuses to God.
Have you found yourself in this excuse-making stories?
Like the people in Jesus' parable, have you ever put your possessions
before God's invitation?
Have you ever put your family before God's call?
Like Jonah, have you ever run from God? Perhaps in the opposite
direction?
Like Moses, have you ever asked, "Who am I?"
Have you ever protested that you can't speak in public?
Have you ever said, "Please God, send someone else?"
Like Jeremiah, have you ever claimed that you were too young, or perhaps
too old, to respond to God?
Have you ever tried to make an excuse to God?
At times, we all try to make our excuses before God, but deep in our hearts we know they are just that - excuses. When there's a job to be done, God takes "no excuses."
The encouraging message comes in finding what God did with those excuse-makers in the Bible. God gives great assurance to those Biblical characters who overcome their excuses and accept God's call. God promises to give the right words to say. God promises to be with them. God promises to give them aids to help them accomplish the work.
And God used them mightily. Just think of Moses - the excuse-maker, the mighty deliverer of Exodus. Just think of Jonah, who ran from God, but his preaching led to the repentance of a city. Just think of Jeremiah, who, in spite of his difficulties, proclaimed a message of hope for the people in a time of need.
I close with another wonderful phrase I've discovered in reading the Bible lately. In our Disciple Bible Study, we have read the books of Esther and Jonah. Both these books use the phrase, "Who knows?" In Esther, Modecai says, "Who knows? Perhaps you have come to royal dignity for just such a time as this?" In Jonah, the king of Ninevah responds to Jonah's preaching by saying, "Who knows? God may relent and change his mind; he may turn from his fierce anger, so that we do not perish."
And I say to you, "Who knows? If we can get past our excuses, God may be calling us to be like Moses, or Jonah, or Jeremiah."
We may not wear the jeans that Donna Rice advertised, but we can make it our logo, our watchword in relation to God - NO EXCUSES!