The Lesson of Love: Chapter 10 - Leaving Things Undone
By J.R. Miller
Among the memorabilia of a departed godly man, it is said: "He left nothing undone." That is more than can be said of most people. The best of us are apt to leave many things undone. We confess that we have left undone those things which we ought to have done--and we have done those things which we ought not to have done!
Perhaps we do not often think of it, however, as really sinful--not to do things. We admit that it is wrong to treat another unkindly; do we understand that it is wrong also not to show the kindness we had the opportunity to show? We know it is sinful to speak a harsh or bitter word to another; but do we always remember that it is a sin not to say the word of cheer or comfort we had the opportunity to say, and which our neighbor so much needed and longed to hear? If we must give account for idle words, we must also give account for idle silences?
"What silences we keep year after year
With those who are most near to us and dear;
We live beside each other day by day,
And speak of myriad things, but seldom say
The full sweet word that lies just in our reach,
Beneath the commonplace of common speech.
"Then out of sight and out of reach they go--
These close, familiar friends who loved us so!
And sitting in the shadow they have left,
Alone with loneliness, and sore bereft,
We think with vain regret of some fond word
That once we might have said, and they have heard."
Very much of our Lord's teaching, refers to sins of not doing. The man with the one talent was condemned, not because he used his talent in any evil way, but because he did not use it at all. The priest and the Levite did the wounded man no injury. They probably even felt kindly toward him and expressed sympathy with him. Yet the story reads as if they sinned grievously against him. They wronged him by not giving him the help and the relief he needed, and which they had been sent there expressly to give. Their passing by on the other side was a cruel wrong against him--a sin of leaving a duty undone.
In our Lords' description of the Judgment, those on the left hand are condemned, not for evil things which they had done--but for their neglect of love's duties. "For I was hungry and you gave Me nothing to eat; I was thirsty and you gave Me nothing to drink; I was a stranger and you didn't take Me in; I was naked and you didn't clothe Me, sick and in prison and you didn't take care of Me." They had not oppressed the poor, they had not robbed men, and they had not gone about wounding other. Nothing whatever is said of their sins--except that they had not done the deeds of love to those who needed such ministries. They had left undone, things which they ought to have done.
It is in this way, that many people fail most seriously in living. No grave fault can be found with their conduct, with the things they do. They are upright, true, diligent in business--but their lives are full of omissions and neglects. How was it yesterday with you? Did you see one who needed help, comfort, relief, or encouragement, and did you fail to do anything for him? Do not many of us need to pray with the saintly man who used to say, "Lord, forgive my sins, especially my sins of omission! especially my sins of omission!"
