Last evening on America’s Got Talent a young man played the piano. It must have been brilliant because he garnered enough votes to move on to the semifinals. The amazing thing was no one could hear him play. A dancer inadvertently kicked a cable loose and the piano went silent amidst the accompanying cacophony. Never-the-less thousands of people voted for him. There must be a multitude of people with gigantic sympathetic hearts.
As we watched him play it was evident he was pouring out a tremendous amount of energy. Perhaps people voted for his effort. I thought of our voices crying out to a lost world that Jesus is coming again and longs to save all. However, often our voices are crowded out by the noises of modernity. There are so many pressures and pleasures to distract. There are so many competing messages. There are so many counterfeit messages designed to confuse. Whenever our common enemy sees one of us nearing the eternal prize he pulls out centuries old heresies to distract and to take away the glorious simplicity of God’s call to us.
John the Baptist’s message was a voice crying out in a wilderness. So in these last days the wonder of God’s love is often drowned out by an incomprehensible dissonance. Our message is so plain a child can understand and yet so vast it will take us an eternity to grasp the enormity of the love that reached down to us. We are loved. Jesus offers us life. It is a gift. The result of receiving it transforms our lives. We live to serve not to be saved but because we are saved. Duty, obedience, trustworthiness, honesty, patience, kindness become the natural fruit of our grateful hearts.
Written by Roger Bothwell on August 20, 2009
Spring of Life Ministry, PO Box 124, St. Helena, CA 94574