Last night I went to a church in Watts to deliver a carload of balls and art sets that will be handed out to the children for Christmas.

The first time I ever visited Watts was two years ago as part of a 5-day/4-night mission trip. That's a whole other story. Needless to say, at that time, I was terrified of the idea of going to Watts. Visiting Watts was literally on my Top 10 List of Things I Don't Want to Do. Jumping out of an airplane, being burned to death, and drowning to death were also in that same top 10. On our team's last night in Watts we walked through the neighborhood to get to a local restaurant that had food to die for - pun intended. As our team of mostly white people walked the streets, I felt kind of like we were a militia in a foreign land and the enemy was lurking behind any one of the windows on either side of us. I thought for sure that at any moment we would be fired upon and would have to duck or run for cover.

The sluggard says, "There is a lion outside!" or, "I will be murdered in the streets!" (Proverbs 22:13 NIV)

This statement immediately raises an important question for some of us: "What is a 'sluggard'?" Fortunately, dictionary.com provides a quick answer:

sluggard (n.): a person who is habitually inactive or lazy

From this, we can infer at least two things: 1) Lazy people use extraordinary excuses to justify their laziness. 2) Justifiable fear can cause otherwise active people to become inactive.

I have seen this played out in a great number of ways. I have seen perfectly healthy men justify not looking for work. I have seen women justify not leaving their abusive husband or boyfriend. I have seen addicts justify their habits. In this article, I'd like to focus on this passage as it pertains to doing the work of God. The following is an Aesop's fable entitled "The Son and the Painted Lion".

There was a timid old man who was afraid of his only son's passion for hunting, for the son was full of courage. In a dream he saw that his son would be killed by a lion. Dreading that the dream would come true, the father built a dwelling for his son of great magnificence, set in a high place where he could keep his eye on him. In order to distract and please him, he had commissioned for his chamber paintings of every kind of animal, and among these was a lion. But looking at all these did not distract the young man from his boredom.

One day, he approached the painting and cursed the lion in it:
'You damned beast, it's because of you and my father's lying dream that I am cooped up here in this prison for women. What can I do to you?'

And, as he said this, he struck his fist against the wall to blind the lion. But a splinter got lodged under his fingernail and he could not get it out. This became greatly inflamed, brought on a fever and swelled up to an enormous size. The fever raged so fiercely that the young man died of it.

The lion, even though it was only a painted one, had indeed killed the young man, just as his father had foreseen.

The financial institutions are failing. The governments are raising taxes and making questionable compromises. Both public and private educational systems are being clobbered. Unemployment and debt are skyrocketing. The moral fabric of society has been almost completely replaced by political correctness and "hope".

Where then shall we seek refuge in this chaos? I heard this story years ago:

There once was a farm where there lived a hen and her chicks. One night a fire broke out in the barn where the hen and her chicks were at. As the fire spread, the smoke thickened, and the heat increased, the mother hen frantically called her chicks to her. She said, "Hurry! Come here my little ones! Take refuge under my wings and I will protect you." So that is what the chicks did; they hid under the wings of their mother.