I know a guy who throws away the batteries in the TV remote control whenever he checks into a hotel.I know a guy who cut the internet service out of his home.I know a young lady who will hug everyone in the world except for her fiancé.  She won’t even hold hands with him until they’re married.I know a man who refuses to look up when in line at the grocery store – he just stares at the ground and barely makes eye contact with the cashier because he wants to avoid seeing the trashy tabloids by the register.

Are these people insane?  What’s wrong with them?  I mean, I understand they’re trying to remain pure and avoid temptation, but it seems a bit extreme doesn’t it?

What they’re doing is what we’re all called to do in a sense.  I’m not talking about what they did specifically, but rather the way they approached their problem.  These people all have something that many of us lack today: a WHATEVER IT TAKES mentality.

A WHATEVER IT TAKES mentality means exactly what it sounds like.  It means that I’ll do “whatever it takes” to get the job done.  Sometimes I won’t need to go to such extreme measures; but sometimes I will.  The question is: how far are you willing to go to get the job done?

For example, recently I tore a ligament in my right wrist playing basketball (I say recently but it’s been about 10 weeks now).  Originally neither I nor my doctor realized it was a ligament tear – we thought it was just a bad sprain.  So when it first happened, the doctor told me “to rest it for a few weeks and see if it gets better.”  The prescription was just rest.

But that didn’t work.  So we had to increase the prescription.

The next step was to get treatment from a friend of mine who specializes in sports medicine and did something called PRP therapy (don’t ask me what it is; all I remember was a BIGGGGGG needle going into the side of my wrist).

But if that doesn’t work, then I’ll get a higher dosage of the same treatment.  And if that doesn’t work, then I’ll go to physical therapy.  And if none of those things works, then I’ll be forced to do something which I really really don’t want to do which is surgery.  Obviously, that isn’t my first choice, but if that’s what it takes, then I’ll do it.  I need my wrist and I’m willing to do whatever it takes to fix it – even if that means surgery.  WHATEVER IT TAKES!

That’s the kind of attitude that’s missing today.  Too many have lost that fighting spirit when it comes to the hard battles of life – especially the spiritual life.

• Are you willing to do whatever it takes to fix your marriage and become the husband/wife that you know you need to be?  Or will you quit after just saying you tried your best?

• Are you willing to do whatever it takes to get out of debt or get into shape – even if that means cutting out some of the comforts you’ve gotten used to? 

• Are you willing to do whatever it takes to live pure in the midst of a very impure world?  I know it won’t be easy and there’s a lot of temptation out there, but you are going to lie down and quit, or stand up and fight?

Too many of us “feel bad” about our sin/problem and wish it would go away, but when it comes down to it, we aren’t willing to do “whatever it takes.”  We aren’t willing to make the tough decisions to increase the dosage in our war against sin.

WHATEVER IT TAKES.

“If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell.  And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell.”  (Matthew 5:29-30)

WOW!  Now that’s what it means to do whatever it takes.  Jesus wasn’t messing around here.  He didn’t beat around the bush.  He said it plain and simple: you have a problem and you need to attack that problem and you must be willing to do whatever it takes to defeat it.

And while the cost of doing so might be high, the consequences of not doing so are even higher.

For discussion: what does having a WHATEVER IT TAKES mentality mean to you?