Action and Inaction

"No captain can do very wrong if he places his Ship alongside that of an enemy." - Admiral Lord Nelson

"But be doers of the Word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves." - James 1:22

How often do we spend time wondering what to do instead of doing?

It seems to me that we spend a great deal of time as a society, indeed as a civilization, planning instead of doing. Planning is easy - it takes effort and resources, but it requires no decisions and no commitments up to the final point of making a choice.

Acting is hard. It means actually taking action, committing to a course and in some means, not committing to others. It means doing something rather than doing nothing.

For myself, how often have I spent planning what I will do, or should do, rather than doing? How often have I had the intention to do something great for God, when God really wants is for us to do something? "If you love me, keep my commandments" Christ says in John 14:15 - but keeping is again a form of doing rather than just hearing and pondering.

Life is short - indeed, shorter than any of us knows, and the Enemy of our souls would like nothing better than for us to spend our time thinking and considering and planning - anything but doing and keeping.

What to do? In some cases, the very simplest thing of all. With Nelson's quote, a captain in the British Navy, if he could do nothing else in battle, could at least move alongside an enemy to attack. In our work lives, we can at least do the one thing at hand. In our spiritual lives, we can at least work to do good to one person in the name of Christ.

A place to end? Not at all - there is always more that can be done and that, to the extent we are able, we should do more (time, once gone, cannot be recalled). But a very very good place to start.