More of the Same

What do you do when the person you are talking with doesn’t seem to understand the point you are making? What do you do when your doctor gives you medicine designed to get you over your ailment but doesn’t seem to work right away? What do you do when your boyfriend or girlfriend doesn’t respond to your apology? What do you do when make a plan and do it but it doesn’t work?

If you are like most people you do more of what you were already doing -- more of the same. If you yell at your child to do something and s/he doesn’t do it, most yell again and louder. If a little medicine does good, twice as much must be twice as good, right?

When Elijah confronted the prophets of Baal to turn God’s people back to the Eternal, he said he would pray to the Eternal and they could pray to Baal. The one who would answer by fire would be the true God. They agreed. Elijah told them to make their sacrifice ready first as they were many and he was alone.

They made their sacrifice ready and began calling on Baal. They began in the morning and prayed and shouted all morning long. Periodically Elijah would taunt them by saying they needed to cry out louder because he might be sleeping. Or may he was on a trip far away. Or perhaps he was terribly busy.

When Baal didn’t answer when they first called out long and loud, they cried louder. They even cut and gashed their bodies to cry louder and made sacrifices to Baal but he never answered. Finally after about 4-6 hours it was time for the evening sacrifice at the altar of burnt offerings. Elijah got his sacrifice ready – wood and the ox cut in pieces. He asked some servants to fill four pitchers of water and pour the water over the wood and the sacrifice. Once. Twice. Three times. Elijah prayed for less than a minute before God answered in a stunning display of fire power! See 1 Kings 18:25-39.

The prophets of Baal did the human thing. They did more of the same. But it never dawned on them that their god, Baal, was a false god. They never changed their religion even though they saw the power of the Eternal.

In our world, men have used pesticides and antibiotics to kill various pests and different kinds of bacteria. These solutions worked well at first. But the pests and the bacteria have built resistance to them. So what have we (humans) done?

Drugs and pesticides have become stronger and stronger to the point that we have created “super bugs” or bacteria very resistant to the earlier antibiotics. So what do we do? We do more of the same? The medical establishment does not change their mind even though much evidence is available to show the PRObiotics are very helpful to strengthen the immune system and combat bad bacteria.

The makers of pesticides continue to make stronger and stronger poisons to the place where they are highly dangerous to humans. But with all the poisons roaches and ants still infest houses and restaurants.

Jesus discussed severe tragedies that happened to people in Judea. He asked his audience if they thought those people who were killed were the greatest sinners. He said, “No, but unless you repent (change your mind or course of action), you will likewise perish.” He then gave a parable of a fig tree that didn’t bear fruit. They gave it fertilizer for one more year. If it didn’t bear after that it was to be cut down. He was not going to continue doing more of the same. Will you?

There is a fine line between having stick-to-itiveness and trying to ride a dead horse. I knew a woman who was in the “wholesale” business. She was losing money every month because she couldn’t match the prices of the big stores like Wal-Mart and Costco. But every month she continued doing more of the same.

Look around in your life. Are you still trying things that don’t work just because you did it before? Doing more and more of the same but never learning or questioning the results or changing your mind.