"An Idle Mind Is The Devil's Workshop"

Many years ago, my grandmother taught me that "an idle mind is the devil's workshop." What is meant by that statement can best be illustrated with what I learned this morning from my cell phone company representative here in El Paso.

During the Thanksgiving holiday, someone had broken a window out of the front part of their building which houses all of their cell phones and other digital items. The police were called and a break-in report was filed. The cell phone representative told me that as far as she could tell, there was nothing stolen, which was indeed amazing.

Seemingly, someone didn't have anything more profitable to do with their time than to reek havoc upon someone else's property. They were simply bored with nothing to occupy their mind. They were performing the work of the Devil.

Our Lord once observed some folks who were standing around idle in the marketplace with nothing profitable to do (Matthew 20:1-6). He ask them why they were standing around doing nothing. They told him that no man was willing to hire them.

The Lord told them, "You also go into the vineyard, and whatever is right you will receive" (Matthew 20:7).

The bottom line is this: The Lord doesn't like idleness of any kind. He wants us as His children to be productive in His kingdom (John 15:1-8; cf. Philippians 1:9-11).

Beloved, folks who are non-productive while physically able to work, are instruments of the Devil, and as such, will experience God's judgment in the light of their non-productivity (Matthew 25:24-30).

—Mike Riley, Gospel Snippets