Emergency!
Ponder: What is your duty in a global emergency?
Scripture: “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:23 NKJV).
You see the flashing red lights in your rear view mirror and hear the shrill siren. It may be a fire truck, an ambulance, or a police car. Regardless, what should you do? Pull over! Why? It’s an emergency! A house is on fire, or someone is hurt in a wreck, or a crime is in progress. Even if you are late for an appointment or want to get to the restaurant quickly, you pull over and stop to give the emergency vehicle clear passage. Your own concerns can wait; the emergency cannot.
As a Christian, you are part of God’s emergency response team. An inferno is raging! Let us save as many as we can, “snatching them out of the fire” (Jude 23 NASB). Sin has littered the streets with innumerable victims who are wounded and dying (Romans 6:23). On behalf of the Great Physician, let us bring them the healing, life-giving words of the gospel. Crime (sin) runs rampant throughout the population. Let us lovingly but firmly confront the perpetrators with God’s call to repentance. Some will believe and obey; the old man of sin will die in baptism, and a new person will come forth (Romans 6:1-13).
Oh, that every Christian might appreciate the urgency of the gospel! Souls are lost; people are launching out into eternity every day unprepared to meet God in judgment. What greater, more urgent need could there be than to take the saving gospel to those lost souls? Yet all too often we refuse to “pull over.” We are distracted by matters far less important. While we casually tend to our own comforts and desires, the emergency escalates. May God help us to take to heart the words of the song:
Rescue the perishing; care for the dying;
Snatch them in pity from sin and the grave!
Weep o’er the erring one; lift up the fallen;
Tell them of Jesus the mighty to save!
Song: “Rescue the Perishing”
Prayer: Father, we thank You for rescuing us from the greatest possible emergency, being lost in sin. Please use us to help others, and help us to be willing to be used. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
Joe Slater (Justin, TX)