Too Much Reading: Part 2

Billy and Sam had read so much that they could easily read half a dozen books at a time. Not just all at once, of course. They would start reading one book and then stop and read part of another. Soon books with book markers were all over. When Mother took away one book because they weren’t really working, then they would get another. They could not be counted on to do anything at all to help out. What a shame and disgrace!

Then Billy got saved. Jesus took away the old Billy heart, and gave him a brand new heart. He was a very different Billy then. He did not want to do anything that was wrong anymore. He began to read his Bible. He began to read many other good books.

Now Billy had the habit of getting out of his work. And when he got saved, even though he no longer wanted to get out of his work, he still had to break the habit. He stopped hiding books and tried to do his chores. But he still didn’t work enough.

Billy told the Lord that he wanted to live a worthwhile life that would please Him. He wanted to live really close to God. He was thinking that he wanted to know more about how to please God. Suddenly, God talked to him in his heart. It happened just as he was walking in the kitchen. God said, “You don’t need to know more! You just need to live up to what you already know!”

This thought made Billy stop. It was like being hit on the head with a big piece of firewood. Billy realized that it was true. He thought, “What do I know that I should do?” And quick as a flash of lightning, the answer came to him. “You have to be asked several times to take out the trash before you do it. You need to do it without even being asked.”

After that, Billy began to change. He had already changed inside in his inward desire, and now he began to change on the outside, too. For this is how salvation works. It changes how you think and feel inside, and then these changes begin to show in your life. Daddy, Mother, and Sam noticed that Billy did his chores without even being asked. Sam began to realize that he needed to be different, too.

“Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.”* (2 Corinthians 5:17)