Good Old-Fashioned Follow Through

When God created the world and mankind, he wanted to have a lasting relationship with his creation. Because mankind sinned in the garden of Eden, God had to implement a plan that would bridge the gap between Him and his creation. That plan was his son, Jesus, coming into the world. Most know the rest of the story. Jesus was born to a virgin mother, grew up, taught a message of redemption, allowed his life to be taken horrifically, arose from the grave and ascended to heaven.

Every part of the plan had to play out exactly a certain way or there would not have been anything to bridge the gap between God and mankind. The bible gives us insight into what Jesus was feeling in the garden of Gethsemane when he prayed to God, "Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done." Jesus followed through on his father's plan because he knew that anything less would prevent all of mankind from being able to have a redeemed relationship with God, which would ultimately lead to eternal damnation for all.

In the past when a couple of people would shake hands on something, that meant that they were committing to following through on whatever they had agreed upon. Folks giving their word actually meant something. When somebody said they were going to do something, they followed through with it barring some earth shattering phenomena that prevented them from doing so. On the extremely rare occasion that a person was unable to follow through, they would exhaust all avenues to make sure their commitment was covered. After all, it was their integrity at stake and they were people of integrity. They understood that by not following through on their commitments, they were in essence saying to those to whom they had committed that they were not as important as other things in their lives.  Although it is true that people could have situations come up that alter their plans, those should be the rare exception and not the rule.

Unfortunately we all have to deal with those people who seem to like to add their names to sign up sheets, but the likelihood of their following through is only slightly better than the likelihood of winning the Publishers Clearing House sweepstakes. As a father, I am teaching my sons to follow through on their commitments and to not commit to anything that they are not willing to follow through on. Good old fashioned follow through shouldn't just be a practice of yester-years, but also a practice of the here and now. I will do my part by making sure that I follow through on what I commit to and teach my boys to do the same. As for those who keep volunteering but don't follow through, try practicing a little integrity and start following through or just don't volunteer. It is much better for organizations to know they are going to have a shortfall in volunteers so they know how to plan instead of believing they are going to have volunteers and then have to scramble to try to fill the gaps.