"Lurking" Through Life

I cannot imagine by now anyone not being familiar with the term, "lurking" . Years ago before the advent of its use on the internet, to say that someone was "lurking" meant that they were probably hiding in the shrubbery and up to no good. I wonder if I were to ask a group of modern fourth graders what was meant by the sentence;" The man was lurking in the bushes." if they'd immediately picture a guy with a laptop checking out a forum without posting?

The thought came to me last night that often, people spend their Christian lives "lurking". They're comfortable watching other people actively walking the walk and talking the talk yet not doing either of those things themselves. Who will get up and get dressed and go out and visit the sick? Who will make it a point to stop in and see people who are in prisons? Who will take the clothes out of their own closet and give them to the poor? Who will volunteer at the local food bank or soup kitchen? Who will take the excess from their garden and give it away to those without food? Who will donate time, money or services directly to their local homeless shelter? Who will help a homeless person find a job or teach them a skill, or give them a place to live?
To think that by dropping a few coins into a basket on Sunday makes us all active participants in a Christian life is an interesting thought indeed. "Here is my money, now someone else does all of those things." Jesus didn't tell us to pay someone to do those things FOR us. Quite the contrary. Jesus was clear on the matter. He said that if we refuse do such things, He will not know us.
Matthew 25:31-44

Many of us are guilty of spending our Christian lives "lurking". We get fired up in fits and starts, following through on being an active follower of Christ, but only when it suits us to do so. Rather than wait for an opportunity to come our way to spur us to stop lurking and "do" , we need to look for opportunities as if they were the most precious things on earth..because striving to serve Christ IS the most precious thing on earth.