March 26, 2008

Not just penciled in

"Just in terms of allocation of time resources, religion is not very efficient. There's a lot more I could be doing on a Sunday morning."
- Bill Gates

When I saw this quote, several things crossed my mind. The first was that I have to agree with the fact that yes, there is a lot more that you can do with your time instead of go to church on a Sunday morning. You can walk your dog, check your email, read the paper or just sleep in. However, none of those things will serve you very well after you die. It's pretty important that you have a relationship with God...you know, there's this whole thing where if you're saved, you go to Heaven and if you don't, you don't. I think that receiving eternal salvation is more important than walking your dog, and that developing a relationship with the God who loves you is a bit more pressing than figuring out what 37 down is in the crossword puzzle.

The second thing that crossed my mind was the fact that God isn't supposed to be efficient. He was not trying to fit into our schedules, and he doesn't really care if he messes up your plans. He doesn't exist to fit into your plans, but rather, you exist to fit into his.

I'm not saying that I am always in church when I should be, or that there haven't been many Sundays when I've wished the entire time that I was in church that I was somewhere else. Because I haven't, and there have been. Nevertheless, I realize that on a Sunday morning, there is nowhere I should be but in church with other Christians, allowing God to see that he is more important than efficiency.

Not knowing the context of this quote, I'm going to have to say that it features a pretty bleak outlook on life in general. After all, when all you have to live for is keeping up with your schedule and crossing things off of your list, when your life goal is efficiency, your life, well, sucks.

I may not have a massive fortune, and people all over the world may not respect and revere me, but at least my life isn't so full of other things and times, meetings to attend and contracts to sign that I feel the need to always be efficient, even on a Sunday morning, even to the extent of blocking God out of my life because he didn't call my secretary for an appointment.




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