Mensa Otabil - Excelling
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Welcome to a brand new week. This week, we are looking at the subject of excellence, focusing on how to excel in our service to God and in our work. I trust that your life will improve and become better as you serve the Lord and labor in your field. We start with Proverbs chapter 31, verse 29: «Many daughters have done well, but you excel them all.» God expects excellence from us; He wants us to reach the highest and go the farthest in all that we do. For everything we are committed to, God wants us to go beyond the average, go beyond what is good, and excel in it.
Proverbs chapter 31 talks about a virtuous woman. This statement is made about a virtuous woman; the language is from the husband of the virtuous woman, praising the work of his wife. However, the lessons learned here go beyond a virtuous woman or a woman to men and to everyone, because the principles are the same: we can go and do things that are excellent. It starts by comparing the virtuous woman to other women, indicating that many daughters have done well. The first thing we see here is the importance of doing well. There is virtue in doing things well; it is very worthy for each one of us in our service to God to serve Him well, and in our work to also do our work well.
Now, when we say that somebody has done their work well, it means they have done what is expected of them. If you told them to do something up to three and they did up to three, that is well done. They’ve done very well; it’s good to do things well, better than those who are told to do things up to three but do only up to two or one and a half. While it’s good to do things well, the passage indicates a step beyond just doing things well. Many times, all we aim for in life is to do things well, and people are happy when they accomplish this. Of course, there are many who do things poorly. The text states, «Many have done well, but you excel them all,» which means there are people who exceed merely doing things well, and that’s where God wants us to be. He wants us to excel; He wants our service for Him to excel, and He wants our labor in our work to excel.
For whatever we are committed to doing, we should not aim just at doing well; we want to go beyond that. To achieve this, three things are important: we must fully commit our hearts to what we do. What does that mean? It means that we have to be passionate about what we do; we can’t do things half-heartedly or absent-mindedly. Our hearts must be in it. So, the first commitment is to commit your heart and be passionate about it.
Number two, we need to commit our thoughts to what we do. This means we must be intentional and mentally resourceful. Many times, people do things absent-mindedly and passively, without engaging their minds. They don’t think about what they’re doing and don’t explore different angles; they just pick the easiest way of doing it. We have to commit our thoughts to our actions.
Finally, we must commit our strength to what we do. This means we have to provide energy, stamina, and staying power because everything we do requires a lot of endurance and energy. As we aim for excellence, these commitments — commitment of heart, commitment of thought, and commitment of strength-are essential. I believe that each one of us can surpass the levels we’ve worked to and achieve excellence.
Let’s pray. Sit with me. Heavenly Father, You are an excellent God. I choose to be excellent in all that I do. In Jesus' name, amen and amen. Well, I’ll follow up with you tomorrow. I’m Pastor Mensa Otabil. Shalom, peace, and life to you.