Paper Towel Dispenser

 

At cardiac rehab in the men’s locker room, there are two lavatories with paper towel dispensers on each end.  I use the one near the door because … well, it’s near the door, and I’m lazy (the other lavatory takes two extra steps, a total of four, coming and going).  Two weeks ago, I noticed that the paper towel was not winding out as far as it had been.  A problem with the automatic dispenser.  Then last week, it was even shorter.  So, Monday, it only rolled out two inches!  Not even worth using.  So, I had to waste four steps to go to the farther lavatory and the farther paper towel dispenser.  I’m not a paper towel mechanic, but I think that the battery is going out of the paper towel dispenser.  Hey, I know some church-goers who are just like our faulty paper towel dispenser.  Their decline is incremental.  First, they miss a service once in a while.  Then they stop going on Wednesday evenings.  Then they skip a Sunday night here and there.  Pretty soon, it’s only Sunday mornings … when it’s convenient.  The same thing happens with their giving.  And their Bible reading and prayer in the mornings suffer the same declension.  Hey, it’s easy to cool off and become complacent!  The church at Laodicea had the same problem.  Jesus Christ said in Revelation 3:15-17, “I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth. Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked.”  Hey, can I make an application?  Wake up and get with it!  Don’t be satisfied with just lukewarm Christianity!  God hates it and you hate it!  It is as useless as a two-inch piece of paper towel on dripping wet hands!  Repent and get back to where you want to be with the dear Lord!  You’ll be glad that you did!