The random thoughts of a Christian parrot
My good friend Einstein, (the African Grey) told me a story last week which I’d like to share with you.
A man went into a pet shop to buy a parrot. The shop owner pointed to three identical-looking parrots sitting in a row on a perch. They’d come from a local firm of lawyers which was in the process of downsizing to a smaller building.
He said: “The one on the left costs £500.00.”
“Why is it so expensive?” asked the customer. The owner replied: “This parrot knows how to do legal research.”
The customer then asked about the next parrot in the line, and was told that it would cost £1,000.00, because it could do everything that the first parrot could, plus knew how to write briefs that would win any legal case.
So the increasingly startled customer enquired about the third parrot, and was told that it had a price-tag of £4,000.00. So he asked: “What can it do then?” To which the owner replied: “I’ve never seen him do anything, but the other two call him Senior Partner.”
Our world isn’t always very fair, is it? Some of us can work terribly hard but don’t always get our just desserts. Others cruise through life, -rather like the third parrot, -and yet they somehow come out on top of the pile. At least, from a worldly perspective. So it is just as well that Heaven is the complete opposite.
Jesus reminds us that in Heaven, “….the last will be first, and the first will be last.” (Matthew 20:16).
So who do we really work for? For our boss? For the organization that employs us? Or for God?
The Book of Colossians answers this rather well:
“Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as though you were working for the Lord and not for men. Remember that the Lord will give you as a reward what he has kept for his people. For Christ is the real Master you serve.” Colossians 3:23-24