Monday, October 2, 2006
Sister is a dog. I did not say my sister was a dog, actually she's my sister-in-law, and she's an angel! But my friend Curtis has a dog named Sister, which leads to some fairly amusing sentences. When I first met Curtis and Sister, she lived in this big fenced-in area outside the house. But Curtis got a nice doghouse for Sister and went to work making it a nice winter home for her. He installed two inches of insulation, he put in a new floor, he even put a water bed heater under the floor and then some zip-loc bags with water for the heater to heat. Sister basically has a warm home with her own waterbed. But for the first couple of weeks after her home was completed, she wouldn't go in it! Curtis was away for the weekend and he asked a friend to check on Sister. Well, one of those days was a day a powerful nor-eastern hit our area, and I mean, we're talking drenching rain. And when Curtis' friend visited Sister, there was that dog running around outside the doghouse in the wind and the pouring rain, still refusing to go in the home that had been provided for her!
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Running in the Rain."
Curtis said, "You know, it's been frustrating. Here I lovingly prepared a warm, safe place, but she insists on staying outside in the cold and the rain." That frustration is probably one that Jesus knows very well.
Our word for today from the Word of God comes from Luke 19:41, "As Jesus approached Jerusalem and saw the city, He wept over it and said, 'If you had only known on this day what would bring you peace, but now it is hidden from your eyes. You did not recognize the time of God's coming to you.'" This kind of grieving in the heart of Jesus is not limited to that one time and that one place. It happens every time another person keeps running in the rain when they could be living in the safety and the warmth that He has provided.
Jesus makes very clear what He wants to give us and what the result will be of our responding to Him. He talks about "what would bring you peace." And peace is what's at stake in what we do with Jesus; personal peace, peace with God, peace for all eternity. Jesus may actually have shed some tears over you. So many times, He has given you the opportunity to come into the wonderful peace of a personal relationship with Him, but you have refused to enter.
The result? You're alone out in the storm, feeling unnecessary loneliness because you're living outside of His never-leaving love, unnecessary stress because you're trying to handle life without His peace, unnecessary pain because you're trying to carry the load without His great strength, and unnecessary emptiness because you're trying to make life make sense without the One who gave you your life. And Jesus is saying, "If you only knew what I can do for you."
The spiritual shelter Jesus invites you to has been very lovingly prepared for you; very expensively prepared for you. There was no way into a God-relationship as long as the death penalty for our sin stood between us and God. We're spiritual orphans in this world; we're separated from our Father because of our sin. But the Bible says, speaking of the suffering and the crucifixion of God's Son, "He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities." All that because of how much Jesus loves you, and the result of this incredible love - "the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him."
That peace that perhaps has eluded you your whole life can finally be yours when you give yourself to the One who gave His life for you on the cross. If you've never done that, if you want to, would you tell Him that today? Say, "Jesus, I'm Yours." And we'd love to offer to you the same help and support many others have taken advantage of at our website to do just this: begin a relationship with Jesus Christ. The website is yoursforlife.net. Or you can call and get a copy of my little booklet about this called "Yours For Life." The number is 877-741-1200.
You don't need to run alone in the rain anymore. You know which way home is. Isn't it time you moved inside the safety and the peace of the arms of Jesus Christ?