…let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up…”

I’m in the process of buying a software business.  It’s a great service and as we look at what we need to do first it is not what most would think.  The first thing we need to do is to strip it down.  What does that mean?  Well, it like building an airplane.  The designers of an airplane build it out with all kinds of great features and amenities, but at some point all of those get weighed against the size of the engine and the thrust available to allow the plane to get off the air, and stay in the air. Because the engines are what they are, there is only thing to do, start stripping away the features until everything comes in balance.  The same has to happen to this service I am looking to purchase. The same has to happen to all of our businesses. It’s not easy as we can get very attached to features and before long they can become sacred cows.  Last week Bill Gates apologized for every letting Control-Alt-Delete get built and put in their routine.  He knows now that they should have stripped the feature down to one button. What are we hanging on to that needs to be stripped down?

We each have traits and ways of being that when pushed to name them we would say they are identifiers of who we are.  The question we must always be asking ourselves is whether or not those “features” are ones that are strengthening us in our relationship with Jesus, or holding us back.  Like the plane that can’t take flight, or the software that is too feature-rich and sluggish, we have to have the courage to strip down these areas of our lives so we can bound forward for Him.

Reference: Hebrews 12:1 (New Living Translation)