Now or Later
By Grant Gaines
Starting in the late 1960’s a psychologist from Stanford University named Walter Mischel began conducting an interesting set of experiments designed to study deferred gratification. In these studies, children were offered a choice of between one marshmallow immediately or two marshmallows if they were able to wait for a short period of time-usually only 15 minutes. This experiment became commonly known as the Marshmallow Test (surprise, surprise!).
As the children grew up, Mischel and his team or researchers continued to follow these kids and found that the, “…children who were able to wait longer for the preferred rewards tended to have better life outcomes, as measured by SAT scores, educational attainment, body mass index (BMI), and other life measures1”
While this study is certainly enlightening and interesting, its findings are nothing new or different from what we have been taught from the Bible for centuries. In fact, deferred gratification is basically the mantra for us who are Christians as we temporarily give up the pleasures of this world to inherent a prize that far outweighs them all. We believe that sin may have its momentary pleasures but the end result is devastation and death. So rather than indulging in those sins, we wait patiently as we trust that God’s ways lead us to an incredibly and incomprehensibly joyous life (John 10:10).
Joshua 7 is a great example of this idea of deferred gratification.
The Israelites had just crossed into the Promised Land and were about to fight against the city of Jericho when the Lord commanded them, “But keep away from the devoted things, so that you will not bring about your own destruction by taking any of them. Otherwise you will make the camp of Israel liable to destruction and bring trouble on it” (Joshua 6:18, NIV). As God promised, the Israelites routed Jericho and were eagerly preparing to continue the conquest of the Promised Land.
But shortly after the initial victory against Jericho, the Israelites ran into a major speedbump when the tiny city of Ai defeated the Israelites and even, “…chased [them] form the city gate as far as the stone quarries and struck them down on the slopes. At this the hearts of the people melted and became like water” (Joshua 7:5, NIV).
After the defeat, Joshua and the elders wisely prayed, mourned, and fasted as they presented their concerns to God. It didn’t take long for the Lord to respond to their cries and reveal to them that, “…the Israelites acted unfaithfully in regard to the devoted things; Achan…took some of them [causing] the LORD’s anger [to] burn against Israel” (Joshua 7:1, NIV).
Achan wanted his plunder and he wanted it now! He didn’t want to wait for Joshua to give him the thumbs up, he didn’t want to wait for the Israelites to take the whole Promised Land, and he certainly didn’t want to wait for the Lord to deliver what He had promised. So Achan took the “marshmallow” and therefore forfeited a lot of blessing for both himself and the Israelites.
Not only did Achan cost the Israelites the battle, but he also cost himself and his family their very lives as they were quickly stoned for Achan’s wrongdoing (Joshua 7:25-26).
It’s hard not to read Achan’s story without seeing ourselves in his shoes and begin to ask some difficult questions like: “How often do I act like Achan?” “How often do I take the “marshmallow” of pleasure right now rather than waiting for the exceedingly greater promise?” And as we ponder these questions it’s difficult not to realize that our culture as a whole is pretty much defined by taking the marshmallow now rather than displaying some self-control.
No wonder 66% of CHRISTIAN men look at porn2. No wonder a staggering 97% of secular Americans and 80% of CHRISTIANS have sex before marriage3. No wonder 65% of high school students drink alcohol before the age of 214-because we’re unwilling to surpass a momentary pleasure for an eternal reward.
CS Lewis said it like this, “It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”
We are too easily satisfied playing in the mud, we are too easily tempted to grab the marshmallow, and we are too quick to pass up on the promise of tomorrow for the thrill of today.
Are you grabbing the marshmallow or are you deferring gratification as you trust in God to give you, “…exceedingly more than you can ask or imagine” (Ephesians 3:20, NIV)?
1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_marshmallow_experiment
2 http://www.christianpost.com/news/nearly-two-thirds-of-christian-men-view-porn-monthly-they-are-watching-it-at-same-rate-as-secular-men-says-study-125471/
3 http://waitingtillmarriage.org/4-cool-statistics-about-abstinence-in-the-usa/
4 http://www.camy.org/factsheets/sheets/Prevalence_of_Underage_Drinking.html
Comments? Questions? Suggestions?
©Grant Gaines 2013
