Do everything as unto the Lord

Thanksgiving Day I was raking the leaves in my front yard for the annual Thanksgiving Day croquet match. Since we have become serious about this, this was the 3rd Annual Harris Thanksgiving Day Croquet Tournament. My son, my only son, my son whom I love, Jacob won for the second year in a row. My son-in-law, David Lemont, says one more year and Jacob will be able to call it a dynasty. Jake will not win next year, take that to the bank!

I digress from my thoughts while raking. The skies were threatening rain, and it looked like we might not be able to get the game in and I was in a hurry, then this verse came to mind.
"Whatever you do, do your work heartily, as for the Lord rather than, for men" Col 3:23

Now don't get me wrong, I don't think the Lord would have minded a few leaves on the court. He would certainly have wanted us to enjoy the game together. A good time of fellowship and good humor are not to be sacrificed to the perfection of a croquet court. It did start me thinking though about why so often the things we do are not done with an eye towards whom we are doing them for. God says we should do them as if we were doing them for Him. In reality, most of the time, I fear we do our work for ourselves. Even then it can be pretty shabby. Why is that?

The thing that made me hurry through the leave raking was poor use of my time. I was in a hurry because I didn't start sooner. I had tried to squeeze too much into too little time. I had not managed my time very well. There wasn't time to do what I had to do, "as for the Lord." Oh there would have been time; it wasn't that every minute of Thursday had been consumed in fruitful activities. I just spent it on other things.

What would happen if we planned our lives around this verse, and what would it take? Certainly the quality of our work would go up by leaps and bounds. I'm equally certain as the quality went up, the quantity would go down. In a culture where more is better, I wonder how that would go over.

just plodding along...