Prerequisites are often necessary, but usually unwanted.

The whole premise of a prerequisite is that you can’t do what you want to do until you do something else. 

When you were in school you had prerequisite classes that needed to be taken so that you could take a course that would get you to graduation. 

… Oh, and didn’t it bug you when the prerequisite wasn’t offered that semester. So you had to further delay taking the course you really needed or wanted to take? 

Well, prerequisites are not just found in school, and the ones found in life are also not that enjoyable.

A prerequisite keeps you from getting to what you really want. It’s like a roadblock that stands in the way of you enjoying something you are looking forward to.

In life a prerequisite can be anything that forces you to do something you don’t really want to do or take the time to do, in order to get to that thing you really want to do. 

For example, suppose you were really looking forward to going on a vacation. It’s the day you are leaving; you are packed and ready to go. 

But you can’t just leave; you still have a meeting you have to attend. You also know this meeting will generate some work for you and some of that work will have to be completed before you take off on your vacation. 

That is a life prerequisite.

You don’t want to go to the meeting and you don’t want to have to do any more work. Your head is already on vacation, but you are stuck. 

Your mother used to pull the prerequisite card on you when you were a kid: “Johnny, you can’t go out to play until you clean your room.”

Prerequisites never come at a good time; they are always in the way.

I’m bugged by one right now. 

I’m editing a video for a friend. I’ve been working on it for some time and I’d like to finish it. 

But lately I’ve noticed that my computer is running a little sluggish. There is no way I can edit video when just switching between a word processor and an excel sheet slows everything down.

I realized I don’t have much room left on my hard drive. So, in order to be able to edit my video, I need to free up some space on my hard drive.

That’s my prerequisite. 

I don’t want to take the time. I just want to get at what I want to do. But I’m stuck trying to find hidden files on my computer that I can obliterate.

I wish there was a program that would just do it all for me, that all I would need to do as a prerequisite is press the enter button.

Here’s the thing: There is a prerequisite to get into heaven and it is to have faith in Jesus Christ. That sounds easy, but placing your faith in Christ means it will impact your whole life, your thinking and your actions. So many people just want to do what they want and not deal with that prerequisite … so they never do deal with it. Like in every other area of life, you have to bend your will to the prerequisite or you will never get what you really want. Don’t keep putting it off. 

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What have you put off doing that you need to do now? Leave your comments and questions below.

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