“Accountable Living” is October 19’s entry from Dr. David Jeremiah’s ‘Turning Points with God: 365 Daily Devotions’ (2014).
"Everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required;
and to whom much has been committed, of him they will ask the more."
Luke 12:48
Every parent has had a conversation with a child similar to this:
“Billy, do you remember when we talked about not crossing the street by yourself?” “Yes.”
“So when you crossed the street by yourself, you knew you weren’t supposed to?” “Yes.”
The conversation centers on two things: knowledge and accountability. What we know makes us accountable for our actions.
Jesus had a similar conversation, in Luke 10:25-37, with a Jewish man who was interested in inheriting eternal life. He knew the Law said to love God and one’s neighbor, but he wasn’t sure he wanted to love all his neighbors. So Jesus told him a story about a Samaritan who did love his neighbor unconditionally and told the Jewish man he ought to imitate the Samaritan’s way of showing sacrificial love for others.
Jesus’ point was this: since you know the Law says to love your neighbor (Leviticus 19:18), you are responsible to do it. Our knowledge makes us accountable for what we know we should do but choose not to do.
Knowing the will of God is a weighty responsibility. We are accountable for everything before God (Luke 12:42-48), but especially for what we know.
To end, a quote from Matthew Henry, “Knowledge therefore is vain and fruitless, which is not reduced to practice.”
