“That we may be delivered from unreasonable and wicked men; for not all have faith. But the Lord is faithful, who will establish you and guard you from the evil one” (2 Thess. 3:2-3).

The dictionary defines unreasonable as not listening to nor accepting a reasonable opinion and the result is inappropriate and irrational behavior.

Every one of us has encountered people who have predetermined opinions that will not listen to reason. For decades after it was proven that the world was round, there were those who insisted that the world was flat and that if you would travel to the end of your sight, you would drop off the edge.

Although some scientists listened to reason and accepted the fact that the world was round, there were highly intelligent minds of the day who argued the flatness of the world until the day they died. No evidence, no proof could be offered that could convince them otherwise. They would not listen to reason.

They were unreasonable men.

Without a doubt you have encountered unreasonable people in your life. It doesn’t seem to matter what the facts are, or what the truth is, the evidence is irrelevant. In the end you cannot reason with them.

While it is true that the wisdom and reasoning of man on an earthly level profits little, we must always be reasonable so that when we hear the truth, we will understand it and know it and be set free.

So the question is: What do you do when you encounter someone who is so stubborn and locked into a mindset so deeply that they are unreasonable? Let’s take a look at what the Bible has to say.

When Jesus sent thirty-five groups of two into the cities to prepare for His arrival, He instructed them in what to say. Also He instructed His disciples that if the people of the city would not receive the message, that they were to shake the dust from their feet and move on. I think it is interesting that Jesus didn’t instruct His disciples to stay and try to convince the people, or to argue the truth until they got it. He simply said, if they won’t listen, move on. (Matt. 10:14)

Your most valuable commodity on earth is your time. Time is the currency of life. As an employee, you exchange your time for money. At the end of your pay period when you receive your paycheck, it not only represents what you can buy, but it represents so many hours of time that you exchanged.

Jesus said that Satan is a thief. (John 10:10) Satan wants to steal your time. He can fill your time with regret from the past or he can fill your time with the worries of the future. But he can also steal your time by using unreasonable people who will not change. These people tempt you to believe they can change and thus you spend hour after hour, day after day, and sometimes year after year working on a project that’s not fixable.

Of course, there are those who can be fixed, and we should be led by the Holy Spirit and do whatever is necessary to resolve their issues of life. However, too many people are led by compassion and guilt or the pride of believing that they can fix everything, when in reality they should shake the dust from their feet and move on.

So the next time you encounter an unreasonable person, pray in the spirit and seek the counsel of God. Yield not to your own understanding, but acknowledge Him and allow yourself to be guided by the Spirit. You may be the one person who can fix what everybody else thought was not fixable. But don’t allow the enemy to steal your time through unreasonable people with hardened hearts who will never change.