The 80/20 Rule

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The 80/20 rule is known as the Pareto principle and is applied in Pareto analysis. It was first used in macroeconomics to describe the distribution of wealth in Italy in the early 20th century. It was introduced in 1906 by Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto, who is best known for the concepts of Pareto efficiency.

 

Pareto noticed that 20% of the pea pods in his garden were responsible for 80% of the peas. Pareto expanded this principle to macroeconomics by showing that 80% of the wealth in Italy was owned by 20% of the population.

 

In the 1940s, Dr. Joseph Juran, a prominent figure in the field of operations management, applied the 80/20 rule to quality control for business production.

 

He demonstrated that 80% of product defects were caused by 20% of the problems in production methods. By focusing on and reducing the 20% of production problems, a business could increase the overall quality of its products.

 

The Pareto principle has been so well documented, in so many aspects of business, that it is held as almost a 'natural law'. By applying the Pareto principle to the Ten Commandments, where we have 2 out of 10 Commandments stated in the affirmative, we have an important insight: doing these 2 commandments will generate most of your results.

 

This gives us clear guidance. Don't put most of your effort into the don'ts, trying to stop yourself from doing them. You are trying to create a vacuum, and nature abhors a vacuum. Spend most of your time doing the do's, filling your life with them, and you'll get the positive results. Increase the light to chase away more of the darkness!

 

We can also refer to these two Commandments as our roots and destiny.

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Our Roots and Destiny

 

The first affirmative commandment is Sabbath living. It’s about God's timelessness - always was, always is, and always will be – the Creator. What's more, He is ready to deliver us from sin’s slavery and make law-abiding possible, the 2 sides of the Sabbath coin. Our grounding in Him allows law-abiding citizenship. This is our spiritual origin.

 

The second affirmative commandment is Parenting: God's timeliness - always present, directing, teaching, rescuing. He gives us wings, so we can live prophetic lives, maturing into our spiritual destiny.

 

These 2 positive commandments witness truth to our lives and through our lives. They establish us in both the timelessness and timeliness of God. As members of His family, they give us roots and wings, stability and flexibility, through origin and destiny.

 

“Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He was come from God and went to God…”

 

In John 13:3 (when Jesus washed the disciples' feet) the story opens by stating Jesus' security in His origin and destiny. It allowed Him to step out of His current role into a totally opposite role, as a slave, to prophesy through His actions the true nature of how His Body functions. The 'origin and destiny' opening show us He did this by resting in His Father's creating and parenting, to create a new view of liberty for his disciples.

 

His example shows us that to effectively wash the world's dirt from our fellow disciple's feet, as we meet, we too need to be in the affirmative commandments. We need to be truly at Rest in His Parenting us, and each other, through us. It is the active gifts of the Spirit that produce the living fruit of the Spirit. These two commandments need to be passionately pursued by our hearts, to increase our community's Rest in His parenting skills.

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