Friday, November 20, 2009
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Amy Carmichael was one of India's most heroic missionaries, and a woman whose life continues to inspire many people today. She has written some inspiring words, but none more inspiring than her account of a scene she saw in her mind one sleepless night as she agonized over the people around her who didn't know Christ. She saw herself standing on the edge of a sheer cliff that dropped off into this dark and seemingly bottomless space. She described the people who were moving steadily toward that edge. She saw a blind woman plunge over the cliff with a baby in her arms and a child holding onto her dress. Streams of people began to come from all directions; all of them blind.
There were terrible screams as they suddenly found themselves plunging into that awful darkness. There were, thankfully, a few sentinels along the edge, but the gaps between them were pretty far apart. And while the sentinels were able to save a few, most people were plummeting unwarned into that oblivion. In Amy Carmichael's words, "Over and over the people fell, like a waterfall of souls." She went on to say, "Then I saw a little picture of peace, a group of people under some trees, with their backs turned toward that gulf." When she investigated what had them so occupied that they were ignoring the carnage just beyond their circle, she found them playing with the grass and the flowers. They were busy...making daisy chains.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Daisy Chains."
It's an awful picture, isn't it? One I cannot get out of my mind. And, honestly, I hope it's a picture you will not soon forget, because somewhere in that tragic vision is you and me. If you've never put your total trust in Jesus Christ and His cross to rescue you from your sins, you are the blind man or woman headed for that spiritual destruction. Not because it's what God wants, but because you've never opened your heart to the Savior who died so you don't have to. And none of us knows how soon we'll reach the edge.
Or maybe your place in the picture is standing as one of those sentinels, trying to stop as many people as possible from going over the edge into a Christless eternity. You're actively praying for opportunities to tell people about Jesus. You're seizing every possible opportunity to give them the life-saving message about Him. Because of you, some of those folks will be rescued by Jesus. They'll be in heaven with you, and that will be the ultimate legacy of your life.
But sadly, too many of us are in that group sitting in the grass, doing nothing about those around us who are moving steadily toward an awful eternity. We're real busy making our daisy chains. Listen to God's warning in Amos 6:1, our word for today from the Word of God. "Woe to you who are complacent in Zion." Complacent in God's place; going to heaven but not caring much about those who aren't - making daisy chains. You're so immersed in your work, your family, your activities, even your church that you're missing the reason God has placed you where you are - to help some of the folks there be in heaven with you some day! To be sure, God must draw them to Himself, but His chosen deliverer of how to know Him is you. He won't be sending an angel to tell them what Jesus did for them on the cross. He's left that with you. You are their chance.
Maybe there's a gap in the rescue line because you haven't taken your place as God's rescuer of the people around you. God's command from Proverbs 24:11 is: "Rescue those being led away to death...If you say, 'But we knew nothing about this,' does not He who weighs the heart perceive it?...Will He not repay each person according to what he has done?"
If you may be the one who has been heading toward that destruction over the edge and you've never let Jesus rescue you from that destruction, He took all that for you. Go to our website, and we'd be glad to help you there begin your relationship with Him - YoursForLife.net.
But if you know Jesus, how can you be content making your oh-so important daisy chains when every day someone is plunging over the edge into an unthinkable eternity?