Dogs and Watchmen/womenOur dogs are napping more. Doing so means they are neglecting one of their two responsibilities they have. They are still doing a fine job greeting people, everyone is greeted with one dog squeaking like a toy and the other giving a hearty lick. But it’s the second task they’re slacking on. I can tell, the deer are chomping on stuff and in places they never have before, while our two well fed canines are snoozing their lives away. If it is true that one human year equals seven dog years then a two hour nap by my watch is a fourteen hour dog nap. Wow, I had no idea how bad that slacking thing has actually become until I just did the above math. These dogs are not just slacking a bit they are taking total advantage of the situation. The way this is going pretty soon they will install a bell so they can ring for us to feed them in bed.Don’t you wish you only had two responsibilities, you only had to watch over two things? Sometimes it seems like too much, all the things to watch over, to take care of, to be responsible for. I wonder if Ezekiel felt like that? When his wife got sick and died God told him to refrain from any outward, public acts of mourning (chapter 24). I bet he had to watch himself on that. Then God told him to be careful because God had appointed him, assigned him as a spiritual watchman for his countrymen, and that God would hold him responsible if he failed to warn people regarding their accountability to God, that they needed to change their ways while there was time or else suffer the judgment of God.And the word of the LORD came to me, saying, "Son of man, speak to the sons of your people and say to them, 'If I bring a sword upon a land, and the people of the land take one man from among them and make him their watchman,and he sees the sword coming upon the land and blows on the trumpet and warns the people, then he who hears the sound of the trumpet and does not take warning, and a sword comes and takes him away, his blood will be on his own head. He heard the sound of the trumpet but did not take warning; his blood will be on himself. But had he taken warning, he would have delivered his life. But if the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet and the people are not warned, and a sword comes and takes a person from them, he is taken away in his iniquity; but his blood I will require from the watchman's hand.'Now as for you, son of man, I have appointed you a watchman for the house of Israel; so you will hear a message from My mouth and give them warning from Me. When I say to the wicked, 'O wicked man, you will surely die,' and you do not speak to warn the wicked from his way, that wicked man shall die in his iniquity, but his blood I will require from your hand. But if you on your part warn a wicked man to turn from his way and he does not turn from his way, he will die in his iniquity, but you have delivered your life” Ezekiel 33:1-9 (NASB).Now Ezekiel’s contemporaries could have cared less, his warnings went in one ear and out the other (read the end of the chapter). His warnings fell on deaf ears. At what point do you begin to be tempted to slack off when no one’s paying attention? But regardless of the responses of those around him they needed to be warned, as do the people around us, our family members, our neighbors, friends, class mates, coworkers, employees, and acquaintances. Those we love, those we don’t care for, and even our enemies need to know that now is the time to repent, not later, the judgment of God is on its way. This is what Jesus told people everywhere, "The kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news!" Mark 1:15 (NIV), and it is what he told his followers to do, “So the disciples went out, telling everyone they met to repent of their sins and turn to God” Mark 6:12 (NLT).Followers of Jesus Christ are watchmen and women, may those who he has assigned us to find us faithfully “blowing the trumpet.”To God be all glory, love you Pastor Hans