The late Harold Wilson, former Prime Minister and leader of the U.K. Labour Party, said, "A week is a long time in politics". This must have been so for the Eurozone leaders when they met in Brussels to find a solution to the Euro crisis. Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, said, "If the Euro fails, Europe fails." There is an inevitability to her words, which may have prompted her fellow national leaders to pull back from the brink of total collapse. They agreed on a bailout plan initially for Greece but also for other tottering countries, such as Spain, Portugal, Italy and Ireland, which also had major debt problems. Many newspaper financial commentators were sceptical about whether this plan would be implemented in time; they had heard euphemisms before, but now they wanted to hear words that would work. One lady said that they were kicking the can down the road. We understand her words to mean that, at some point in time, someone has got to pick the can up. Though battered and damaged, it had to be addressed; there was no point in kicking it further down 'Debt Avenue'.
When I worked as a travelling preacher in Cornwall, the locals would say that if it rained for two weeks, there would be floods, and if it didn't rain for two weeks, there would be a drought! It was inevitable! It always puzzled me why an area with so much rainfall could not conserve it in reservoirs for the tourists that often triple the county's population when the sun shines.
Management of the earth's resources is vital, as the world's population is around 8.3 billion, and over one-half of them live in poverty without access to clean water. Every human being depends on water; our bodies are approximately 60% water, and we cannot survive for many days without it. In many places in Africa they have to go to where clean water is available, fill their cans, place the vessel on their heads, and carry it home, sometimes over a great distance. Share Africa is a Christian charity that helps village communities in various ways, including by paying for books and children's education. They also put wells in villages so they can pump water into a storage tank for families to draw water from, saving them a long walk to the river. Other charities do similar things and are commendable for the hard work they do.
Why should you seriously consider this post?
If you jump off a cliff with nothing to control your rate of descent, you will, according to gravity, go downwards, accelerating at 32 feet per second squared. You will inevitably hit the ground, be severely hurt or die.
If you hold a live power line in your hand with bared wiring you will suffer a shock that will kill you.
If you hold a gun to your head with a chamber full of bullets and squeeze the trigger, you will die.
You do not need me to illustrate life-threatening incidents; it is common sense to avoid them.
What's the point?
Hopefully I am not insulting your intelligence. It is obvious that fatal things must be avoided in this life; so what about the next? We need to think seriously about our lives, our relationship with God or lack of it. Please don't just dismiss it as 'religion' or folklore. The life, person, death and resurrection of Jesus scream and demand serious consideration. There is too much at stake to ignore it and the facts demand we take the claims of Christianity seriously. Ignoring or insulting your creator is ultimately the most dangerous thing a human being can do. Why?
Well, the Bible teaches that the person who believes that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, that he died for their wrongdoing (beliefs, behaviour etc) and accepts His offer of forgiveness, reconciliation and eternal life will spend their eternity in Heaven. Whereas the same book states that an unbeliever will be in Hell. Not because God is vindictive or hateful but simply because heaven is His home, He has the rights of access and He will not allow heaven to be destroyed and damaged in the same way as we have done His creation, earth. Morally we are defective (by what we do, say, think etc) and this has a corrupting influence on everything. So perfect conditions demand that nothing corrupting or damaging is permitted access.
At this point you might be enraged but if you have stuck with it thus far let me finish.
1. It is not that God doesn't want you to have a better future, He can't let you in as you are for the reasons stated above,
2. The reality is that God knows that we don't have ability to reform ourselves. We have a universal problem with devastating consequences. Everything in the world is on a downward spiral. The second law of thermodynamics states that heat always flows naturally from hot things to cold things and things in the universe naturally become messier and more disordered over time. I'll leave you to research the consequences in the natural world but this principle applies in the moral world as well. The Bible states 'sin, when it is finished brings forth death,' 1 John 1. 15 and 'all have sinned and come short of the glory of God, Rom. 3. 23,
3. The initiative has been taken by heaven - 'the Father sent the Son (Jesus) to be the Saviour of the world,' 1 John 4. 14,
4. The total cost to rescue you and give you new life has been paid for you - 'In whom (the Lord Jesus) we have redemption (the payment for our sin) through his blood (His death on the cross), the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace,' Eph. 1. 7,
5. The option to benefit is open to all - 'whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved,' Romans 10.13,
6. All an individual needs to do is - Come, call, receive, believe, trust,
7. The outcome is guaranteed. The promise of salvation is explicit - 'shall be saved,' 'has passed from death to life,' 'shall not be lost' etc.
'He that believes on the Son has everlasting life: and he that believes not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abides on him,' John 3. 36.
That is conclusive, isn't it? These are not my words; they are God's words, and we should sit up and take notice. It is futile to play the 'good-works-card' to deceive oneself into thinking, 'I'm all right; I've never done anyone any harm; I always pay my way and never steal anything from anybody.' I'm all right, I can carry on living as I do, and when it comes to the end, if there is a Heaven, then I will go there because God would never send me to Hell.
Is the direction your life is taking leading to an inevitable outcome?
Jesus said,
'Therefore whosoever hears these sayings of mine, and does them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock. And every one that hears these sayings of mine, and does not to them, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it.'
If a person builds their life on the shifting sands of men's philosophies, their life will catastrophically fall; it is inevitable. The person who is standing on the Rock, 'Christ Jesus', will never flounder but will stand for all eternity.
The soul that stands on the Rock, Christ Jesus, is saved and satisfied; both are inevitable. Why? Because He said so!
God bless.
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