When I was at the Naval Academy in Annapolis, playing basketball many years ago, there was a saying in the locker room, \u201cFatigue makes cowards of us all.\u201d What does that mean? It means that if you\u2019re not in shape and you\u2019re tired and your legs aren\u2019t strong, you\u2019re not going defend or shoot properly. You\u2019re going to be falling over, and your balance won\u2019t be right, or if you have to get low and guard someone, you\u2019re going to just cheat and wave at the ball and not stay in front of your man.<\/p>\n
You take a shortcut. You don\u2019t do what you should do. Why? You\u2019re tired, fatigued. It\u2019s true in the spiritual realm too. I was down in Mississippi recently, and someone told me about a need. \u201cYou know, the warden and inmates would love for you to come down with the Brooklyn Tabernacle singers and hold an outdoor rally.\u201d All 2,300 inmates, including the death row. When we went down, I talked to one of them, and these guys were in the same cell twenty years, one hour outside a day.<\/p>\n
Before Christmas, though, I found out about something more practical that they needed. The prison chaplains came to me and said, \u201cYou want to help the inmates, you could bring down boxes with a toothbrush, toothpaste, a bar of soap and deodorant in each one. Pastor Jim, that would mean so much.\u201d<\/p>\n
Now I felt like I had a thousand things on my mind and the needs of the church, but God put it on my heart, \u201cJust because you\u2019re busy preparing sermons and devotionals and all of that, don\u2019t give up. You have a chance to do good, so do good! Don\u2019t give up and say, \u2018Let someone else do it.\u2019\u201d So, I started looking into it. An organization, who had heard about my research, called me and said, \u201cHey, we\u2019ve got 2,300 toothbrushes, tubes of toothpaste, bars of soap and deodorant.\u201d Isn\u2019t that God being so good? <\/p>\n
\u201cAnd let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up\u201d (Galatians 6:9, ESV).<\/em> In other words, let\u2019s not get tired or fatigued. You could do something good today. Call somebody, encourage somebody! <\/p>\n