Diligence is Intentional

February 1 2024

In Proverbs 27:18 (MSG) the text says “if you care for your orchard, you’ll enjoy its fruit; if you honor your boss, you’ll be honored. An orchard is a garden or area of land devoted to the cultivation of trees or fruit. Many people in our society today have decided to plant a garden so they can grow their own vegetables and fruit. They are not happy with the quality of the produce they find in stores. Hence, they take it upon themselves to grow their own.

A garden may look easy, but a lot of effort is involved to ensure whatever is planted is healthy and thrives. For example, every garden has to be watered if rain is scarce. The right amount of sunlight is needed as well as fertilization and herbicide treatment. If a plant becomes diseased, a portion of the garden may have to be destroyed in order to protect the healthy plants. That’s caring for the orchard.

In the end, the person who planted the garden will be able to enjoy its produce. And there is nothing more pleasing to the palate than eating something you planted and cared for yourself.

The “B” part of that verse says if you honor your boss, you will be honored. In other words, if you do a good job and make your boss look good, you will be compensated for your faithfulness. How many people go to work each day with the attitude, I am going to make my boss look good today. Typically, we go to do our work, meet the basic requirements and then go home. Subsequently we expect our paychecks at the predetermined intervals.

But what if our mindset was to make our boss look good by exceeding standards, introducing new ideas that will increase quality and improve workflow efficiency. As a result of our witty inventions, our boss is honored for making the overall operation more efficient and saving the company money. Our boss will reward us for making him/her look good and we will become a valuable and favored employee. By rewarded, I mean we will receive above average pay increases, promotions, bonuses and title changes. Our value as an employee will soar and we will receive recognition and more challenging and intriguing work assignments.

At the core of the above-mentioned verse is diligence. In each scenario, we see hard work, discipline, perseverance and intentionally putting forth the effort to make sure that whatever the object of focus, it ends up being the best. When you are diligent at anything, there is a reward for all your effort. Although diligence can be painstaking, the reward is greater than energy spent.

Here are a few benefits of diligence.

Diligent people become the leaders in organizations.
Whatever is produced through diligence will be of benefit not only to the individual who is diligent, but to those around him/her.
Diligent people inspire others to become diligent.
Diligence produces handsome rewards and recognition.
Diligence produces faithfulness and discipline.

Tomorrow is a good day to start being diligent. Be diligent in seeking the Lord and watch how your life changes. You will draw close to Him and He will draw close to you. You will walk in a new level of confidence and peace. It takes effort, but the reward is more than worth it.