SLOTHFULNESS. . . of a second degree.(By Gbile Akanni)

The slothful man roasteth not that which he took in hunting: but the substance of a diligent man is precious.(Proverbs 12: 27)

To be slothful is not to roast what you have hunted down. A man can still be the Slothful even after rising from home, with sharpened weapons, traveling to the bush, seeking and pursuing game until he finds one, then pulling the bow with all his strength to fire an arrow that fells the animal . . . if he stops at that point, if he stops short of roasting what he has taken in hunting.
To be diligent therefore is to maximize the gains of your exploit.
Slothfulness is not mere ordinary laziness, it is a 2nd level degree of it.
Slothfulness is to be "hardwork-ing" without the "ing" at the end.
It is to do; maybe even do well; but not to do excellently because we didn't finish all.
Mr Slothful labours to hunt but does not labour to roast.
Mr Slothful labours to hunt but does not do what it takes to secure his prey.
Mr Slothful labours to take it in hunting but fails to secure it in roasting.

He fails to do what it takes to bring maximum profit from his previous effort.
He fails to do more labour to ensure his previous labour does not go to waste.
To be slothful is not to finish what we have started.
To be slothful is not to tidy up issues and projects.
To be slothful is lacking the habit of seeing things to their logical conclusion.
To be slothful is allowing grounds we have gained to slip back out of our hands because we did not do what is required to permanently hold it as ours.

To be slothful is not to hold things in place long enough to reap the gains of previous labour.
The Slothful is not tenacious.
The Slothful is not persevering
The Slothful is not given to concluding.
The Slothful is not a finisher.
The Slothful does not endure till the end.
The Slothful is never conclusive even of good issues.
He initiates a brilliant idea, plans and executes it to the first public acclaim but does not follow on to wrap it up when the ovation is gone. He thinks simply of the first point of exhilarating success but does not think of the quiet years of enduring labour to produce a grand success.

Lord! How many times I have been simply slothful. How many times I have allowed issues laden with promise, deliver a first dividend but eventually dissipate in my heart or in my hands.

How many times I have labored to study and receive revelation but will not be diligent as to pen it to paper. How many a brilliant inspiration died with the excitement of the moment. How many intended articles died a localized letter to a disciple or friend! How many a book-worthy flow of thoughts were only captured as a small write-up. How many thoughts and meditations that could have flowed to bless a generation died with my first sharing of them with a supposed "large audience". How many an idea, successful by all standards, but cut shut for lack of consistency and lack of a following through. May the Lord forgive me and deliver me from this scourge of slothfulness. When you have delivered me from outright laziness, never let me go until I am free from this second degree slothfulness.

Lord! make me a finisher. Lord! grant me a knack of finishing the juice before discarding the orange. Help me be diligent - help me be tenacious, to hold on, to continue, to discover what is next, to arrive at all possible conclusions before I rest my oars. And Lord, please deliver me from those heart leakages that takes the wind out of my sail before I arrive at the harbor of divine approval........
If my five talents can gain another complete five, Lord give me no satisfaction in bringing home a nine and a half. If I can go an extra mile to establish the superiority of the Gospel, permit me not to only stop at arriving at such milestones that men have required in order to applaud my efforts. Deliver me from the exhilaration of hunting, so I can settle to the quiet labour of securing a prey by roasting. Give me eyes set on the finished roast, rather than eyes set on the fresh hunt.

Expand my capacity and proficiency to include roasting on top of my hunting.
Expand my vocabulary and mindset to include roasting in my dictionary of hunting.

And if I must drop the "S" of slothfulness from my dictionary, then I must need certainly court several other "S"s that will deliver my hunt from rot.

As I strive to bring you profit in the kingdom, Lord Help me . . . .
to See and to Sight,
to Stalk with accurate Stealth,
to Shoot with Sharpness,
to Ship home in a personal Sack.
but then . . .
to Sit, Still and Settled
to Sort into Sizes and Shapes,
to Slice and Shred,
to Salt and Season,
to Singe with fire
until it becomes a part of my Soup or Someone else's.

Only then can I claim not to be a Slothful Only then can I claim to be delivered!
Into Thine hand Oh Lord!