Tuesday, September 4, 2012
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Our local high school team won the state championship in football one year, and the coach gave at least one reason in the newspaper. He said, "We have mastered the two-minute offense. In other words, you have to know how to do the "hurry up" offense and get a lot done in a short time in order to be a championship team, like when there's only two minutes left in the first half or the end of the game.
In fact, I watched this happen in a game for the conference championship. They were ahead 13-6, and the other team was gaining momentum. There was about a minute and 30 seconds left in the first half. A minute and a half later our team went to the locker room up by 26-6! They'd scored twice. They knew how to go for broke when there wasn't much time. That's actually not a bad idea for all of us.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Going For Broke With Two Minutes Left."
Our word for today from the Word of God comes from the words of Jesus in John 9:4. "As long as it is day, we must do the work of Him who sent me. Night is coming when no one can work." Notice Jesus says the word "must" here. "We must work the works of Him who sent me." And the must; the imperative, the "I don't have any choice" comes from knowing what time it is. It's like somebody trying to gather in the harvest and night is coming. You know the harvest is going to rot and you don't say, "Well, maybe today, maybe tomorrow." We've got to do it now because time is running out.
Now, short time brings out the best in a football team - that two-minute offense. And it brings out the best in a follower of Christ. I think we might be living in two-minute warning time right now. You know, as we look at our world right now, it looks increasingly like the kind that Jesus said He would return to. Historic stirrings in the Middle East, the power of Russia - the biblical king of the north many believe, is growing. Natural disasters; a lot of them are unprecedented in their severity and their frequency. Israel, of course the center of world attention. This is no time to be a casual Christian.
See, time is short for other reasons: our freedom to proclaim the Gospel of Christ in our own culture - that's a fragile freedom. And the people around you? Well, they turn so hard so fast. Have you noticed? You may be their only window to get to heaven, and if you don't reach them, they may never know, and they may never go. Night is coming, and who knows how long this window is going to be open.
See, when you set goals and you think about your priorities, would you take a look at God's clock? You know, it could be late in His plan for planet earth, don't you think? And it's certainly late in the lives of the people around you, and late and lazy don't go together. It's time to, well as they say in football, throw the bomb, go public for Christ. Have that long postponed conversation about your Jesus.
Don't wait any more. Time's going to run out - to fix that broken relationship; to get involved in the work of God's Kingdom. To deal with that hidden sin, and most of all, to live so there will be some people in heaven with you. The Bible talks about this urgency when it says, "Redeem the time," "buy up the time" because the days are evil. And think of the urgency in a verse that says, "Snatch others from the fire and save them."
You know, we talk about every year A.D. being the year of our Lord. Let's go for victory to make this that kind of a time; going for broke with two minutes on the clock.