Your request to learn Excel is a practical one, and such skills have their place. But take care: do not fall into the sickness of those who are forever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. Just as in the arts we fix a definite time for learning, so here too. Do not approach this tool as a student who never intends to finish the course and put it to work. If you are ever learning, it is a certain proof you have learned nothing. So begin with a firm purpose.
Consider the nature of the skill you seek. The wisdom of this world, which teaches such programs, has its use but can become foolishness if it trusts entirely to itself. There is a wisdom that seems great to the world, able to calculate and sort, yet it terminates here and profits its possessors nothing for the age to come. The world’s wisdom cannot overcome sin; it cannot teach you almsgiving or humility. Do not seek after Excel as the world does, to store up earthly treasure or to trust in cleverly arranged numbers. That is a wisdom which is coming to nought.
Learn this tool, then, as you would learn any art from a true trainer. If you wished to be a wrestler, you would not look to the praise of fishmongers or herb-sellers, but only to your trainer. Fix your eyes on God, who best knows all things and practices true skill without limit. Use Excel, if you must, as a servant, not a master, testing your motives by His standards. If those outside deride your faith while admiring your spreadsheet skill, your duty is to deride their praise with your Trainer.
But here is the deeper truth: you do not need eloquence or technological skill to do the work of the Kingdom. If you see a friend going into sin, your Excel chart cannot hold him back, nor will a pivot table shame him into repentance. You, yourself, simple words spoken in love, can grasp him as he goes astray. You who are in spiritual health are needed for the cure. That is a skill infinitely more practical.
So learn Excel little by little, for great disciplines are built this way, by slow addition. Yet do not let the tool master you. The foolishness of God is wiser than all such programs, and Christ Himself is made unto us wisdom. As soon as you have grasped a part of this software, cease being only a learner and become a doer. Then, when you have finished learning, teach others without pride, lest you remain ever learning and stranded in spiritual childhood. Use it as a servant, never forgetting that a life of faith is not a life spent formatting cells, but a life lived in the power of God.