Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

If anyone loudly blesses their neighbor early in the morning, it will be taken as a curse.

• Proverbs 27:14

Go to the ant, you sluggard; consider its ways and be wise!

• Proverbs 6:6

How long will you lie there, you sluggard? When will you get up from your sleep?

• Proverbs 6:9

Through laziness, the rafters sag; because of idle hands, the house leaks.’”

• Ecclesiastes 10:18

“His master replied, ‘You wicked, lazy servant! So you knew that I harvest where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered seed? Well then, you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so that when I returned I would have received it back with interest.

• Matthew 25:26-27

One of Crete’s own prophets has said it: “Cretans are always liars, evil brutes, lazy gluttons.”

• Titus 1:12

We do not want you to become lazy, but to imitate those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised.

• Hebrews 6:12

Boilerplate

I’m Harold Dykstra.  I’m retired, but I go to food bank distributions all over Tracy and talk to people that need someone who will listen to their story.  My time is well spent.  A police lieutenant suggested that I write down the conversations that I had with an angel.  I did not know she was an angel at the time.  The angel, for a little over a year, indwelled a life-sized posable action figure my children bought me, so that I would not be perceived as travelling alone.  And in a way, she was training me for what I do while talking to the needy.  She probed my heart to find out what I believed and how I express love for others.  She changed my life.  Since she was a doll that had come to life, we came up with the term ‘other living.’  She was not a human, an animal, or even a plant, but she was definitely living, and very vibrant.  Oh, excuse me, angels have no gender, but the angel indwelled a doll named Bountiful Babs.  After seeing the angel in that form for over a year, I cannot see her in my mind in any other form.

This Week’s Question

In the last episode, Babs was concerned about my confidence, and my lack thereof in talking to strangers about Jesus.  But on this Saturday morning, she was being more like a drill sergeant.

I was sound asleep when my bed started shaking and this pretty voice started saying, “Up, up, up!  We have to be at the church in an hour.  You need to hit the shower!  Ha!  I’m a poet!”

I grumbled, “Yeah, and you didn’t even know it.”

Babs asked, “What does that mean?”

I moaned, putting the covers over my head, “hour – shower, poet – know it.  Just let me sleep a few minutes more.  The church is across the street.   Besides, Proverbs 27:14!”

Babs huffed, “I do not need a geography lesson, I need you in the shower to fully wake up.  We can have a nice breakfast downstairs and then walk across the street.  Now, move mister!  Consider the ant and be wise, you sluggard.  Or if you like the new revised standard version, lazybones.  I kind of like that one.”  She started giggling, “Some use slacker, but I like the Young’s Literal Version – you slothful one!”

I groaned, “I’m up!  I’m up!  I don’t need Proverbs 6:6 in twenty different translations!”  I got out of bed and she pulled me by the sleeve of my T-Shirt into the shower.  Babs turned on the water and then left as I yelped from the cold water.  I stood there with the water running until the water got warmer.  I had not even gotten my underwear off.

Babs then knocked on the door.  “Harold, you were so sleepy, you didn’t even get a change of clothes.  Don’t flash me.  I’ll put your change of clothes next to the sink.  Now hurry.  I want a leisurely breakfast.  I take my time eating.”

I grumbled, “You take your time visiting with everyone in the breakfast area.  If they’ve been here more than a day, you know their names and their birthdays.”

Babs sighed, “Harold, if you love someone, wouldn’t you know their birthday?”  With that, she was gone.

We had a nice breakfast.  She visited with the other guests.  We walked across the street.  She helped with the canned goods.  I sat in the waiting area and talked to people that wanted to talk about their troubles.  I prayed with each of them.  Don’t ask what church or the denomination.  That was the job for Babs when we were at one hotel for a few days.  This time, we decided to stay where we were and then drive to the new location after church the next day.

But with that volunteer work done, that afternoon we were free to do whatever we liked.  I took her sightseeing in the local area.  And when we got back to the hotel, she wanted a Bible study on being lazy.  Hey!  I just had a problem waking up this one day, but she wanted to stop that in me before I developed the habit, but it seemed all that I wanted to do after my wife passed away was to sleep.  I haven’t a clue why.  I rarely dream about her.  I do on occasion, but it is rare.

Babs had done her searches for verses and picked out a few of them.  And she wanted my comments on each.  We were in our usual places, regardless of the hotel.  She had the comfy chair with the ottoman, and I had the desk chair rolled over to the small table where we had our Bibles.

Babs started, “You brought up Proverbs 27:14.  I like that one, but when you have to get up, you have to get up!  And I used Proverbs 6:6 to get you out of bed.  I probably should have used Proverbs 6:9 since it asks the sluggard when he is going to get out of bed.  But I didn’t want you to answer with some silly time like mid-afternoon.”

I huffed, “I wouldn’t do that.  I would have said, ‘tomorrow, in time for church.’”

Babs growled, “Harold, you should be called lazybones.  By the way, ‘Sluggard’ is in the NIV fourteen times, all of them in the Proverbs.  And lazybones is not in the NIV at all.  I am disappointed.  I like lazybones.  Laziness is a different story.  Laziness is in the NIV three times, twice in Proverbs and in Ecclesiastes 10:18.  What does it mean about rafters sagging and house leaking?”

I sighed, “We often stay in hotels with flat roofs.  They have rafters, but usually a roof has a shape like a triangle.  That way, the snow with fall off the roof when it melts a little and the rain drains off.  What makes the shape of the roof, even flat roofs is the rafters.  If the rafters sag too much, water will puddle.  And if the rafters sag, there will probably be a break in the roof integrity, the seal to keep the water out.”

Babs had now figured it out, “So, it isn’t the house that leaks, but the roof that leaks into the house.  So, if you are lazy and you don’t maintain your house, the roof will sag and then leak.  Now, it makes sense.  I was wondering how a house could leak.  A water pitcher can leak, but a house?”

I moaned, “Is this more of your comedy routine?  What else do you have?”

Babs said, “There are a few references to ‘lazy.’  The first two are said by Pharoah about the Israelites.  He says that they are lazy, so he demands that they get their own straw to make bricks.  I have heard people talk about making bricks without straw.  Why do you need straw in a brick in the first place?”

I asked, “Have you ever seen a brick up close?  Sometimes, you see things that look like a fossil of grass or grain.  They put a little straw in the brick to hold the clay together while it is being formed.  But then, the clay has to be fired.  They will stack these clay rectangular things in rows and put a combination of fuels between the rows.  I am talking about in places like India where they still make bricks the way they did in the time of Moses.  The fuel has to be just right to form a brick out of the clay rectangles.  They use cow dung, sticks and straw in just the right proportions to have the bricks evenly heated.”

Babs scrunched her nose. “How do you know that?”

I replied, “I had a friend who spent a month observing brick making while riding in a vehicle to and from work in India.  He was fascinated.  Part of his job was to observe how other people did things, so he studied brick making in detail.”

Babs asked, “They pay him to watch other people work?  Now that is being lazy.”

I laughed, “Now, let’s not be judgmental, Babs.  This friend observed how people did things so that he could teach them how to do it better or more consistently.  He looked at two factors: quality and productivity.  He kept a lot of people in business by helping them in the way they did things.  But you had to pay him to do the observations before you got the benefits.  But what does the Scriptures say about being lazy?”

Babs sighed, “Well, Pharoah was so out of step with reality.  He only saw slaves that wanted a day off.  So, he called them lazy.  There was more in the Proverbs.  But then there is the Parable of Talents or the bags of gold in Matthew 25.  One servant turns five bags of gold into ten.  One servant turns two bags of gold into four.  But then the servant who was given one bag buried it.  He was called lazy.”

Babs continued, “But then in Titus 1, Paul has left Titus on the isle of Crete to witness to those people.  He says that the Cretans are lazy gluttons.  These days, that would be terrible to make such a prejudiced statement, but Paul had observed that on Crete, and he was arming Titus with that knowledge so that Titus could serve those people better.”

I asked, “Anything else?”

Babs said, “I think Hebrews sums it up nicely.  ‘We do not want you to become lazy, but to imitate those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised.’ “

I asked, “And why have you been focused on laziness today?  Yes, I had a hard time getting up this morning, but usually after a hard week of sales calls, my wife would let me sleep in.  We could take a late departure and get to our new destination late on Saturday.  I just needed the rest this morning.”

Babs shrugged, “I had made the schedule based on what we had agreed upon.  If we could work around it, I would find some volunteer work in the community where we stayed.  But I fear that one day, maybe not too far away, you will not want to get out of bed for any reason at all.  Eight hours of sleep won’t be good enough for you.  You will want twelve hours of sleep.  But you have a special gift, Harold.  You can talk to people easily.  They open up to you.  And you can show them God’s love.  But if you stay in bed, you will die in that bed.”

I got up and kissed her on the forehead.  “Thank you, Babs.  You always have my best at heart.  And I hope someday, when you are no longer here to shove me out of bed, that I will remember this conversation.  You are a wonderful teacher.”

Babs shrugged and scrunched her nose again, “But I thought you were the teacher.”

I chuckled, “No, Babs, we teach each other.”

Credits

All these conversations remind me of my conversations with my wife.  We would talk about anything and everything.  And most of the time, it sounded like a discussion in a Sunday school class.

My wife and I were easy to awaken.  It must have been the military years.  She could be ready, with make-up, in less time than most women could brush their teeth.

As for knowing people’s birthdays, my wife said what Babs said.  If you love someone, you would know their birthday, but my wife could recite hundreds of birthdays.  She might have had memory loss in her last years, but she still did not forget someone’s birthday.

I observed brick making in India over the course of a month.  And yes, I have been paid to watch other people work, to train them on what mistakes they should avoid and be more efficient, but also to ensure safety is a part of everything that they do.  As other people would tease me, I would say, “Watching other people work wears me out, but if I can make their work more efficient and safer, I can watch other people work all day long.”

After my wife passed away, I would have some days when I awoke at four in the morning.  I just got up and started writing.  But then, maybe a day or two later, I would sleep for ten, eleven, and once twelve hours.  But now that the grief process is behind me, the initial phase I suppose, I sleep roughly eight hours, maybe 3 hours of deep sleep, but it often takes me fifteen minutes or longer to actually get out of bed.  I need Babs to do her drill sergeant routine.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.