July 13, 2023
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So, as you get close to the time of the wedding, you know, you've got to make the list of who you're going to invite and who you're not going to invite. So, almost every bride and groom with a lot of counsel from the parents, end up with two lists. Here's the people that make the cut and they're going to get invited, and these people...what they don't know won't hurt them probably. Then, oh, there of course were my friends at school. We had a missionary aviation course. It was very challenging. And for two years, the guys had to take all the base curriculum not knowing if they would make the cut to be able to go into the airport and then begin to really get the flight training. And many of my friends were standing there on the day they posted the list. Boy, I'll tell you what, that was a big day to find out which list you were on. I had a lot of friends that were crushed, and a lot of friends who were celebrating the rest of the day. It's amazing how many times life comes down to which list you're on.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "God's Two Lists."
For some reason, the examples I just mentioned, take me back to a real disaster that riveted the world over a century ago. An unspeakable tragedy, out of the blue. It was a ship that disappeared. Yeah, you know. It was the Titanic with 2,200 people aboard. The scope of the loss defied anything anyone could conceive.
And there, in Liverpool, families were waiting to learn the fate of someone they loved. As news filtered back from the disaster, White Star Lines notified the next of kin by posting the name of each identified passenger on a board outside their office with two lists: "Those known to be saved" and "Those known to be lost." Two groups. Only two. When they had set sail, they were first class, second class, third class and crew. Now they were saved or lost.
As I've been exposed to God's heart as expressed in the Bible, I've realized that's how He views all of us. Whatever group we're in - ethnically, politically, religiously, socially - He sees each of us being in one of two groups: saved or lost.
Here's how the Bible says it. It's in our word for today from the Word of God in 1 John 5:11-12. "God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son." Now, it's not in Christianity. It's not in any religion. It's in His Son, Jesus. It goes on to say, "And he who has the Son has life. He who does not have the Son of God does not have life."
That's because His Son did what had to be done for a sinner like me to ever go to God's heaven. God's really clear about the penalty for my cosmic defiance of my Creator's rule of my life. It says, "The wages of sin is death" (Romans 6:23). That's not your heart stopping. No, that's eternal separation from the source of all life, all love, and everything good in the universe - eternal separation from God - lost forever.
Except for the hope in that statement, "God has given us eternal life." And that's in the person of His Son, Jesus, who, again according to God's Book, "carried our sins in His own body on the tree" (1 Peter 2:24). So what was happening on that cross was the payment for your sin and mine - the only One God could ever accept. Why did He do that? Because it says, "He came into the world to save sinners" (1 Timothy 1:15) like me. Like you.
I was once "known to be lost." But the greatest miracle of my life is that I'm now "known to be saved" because God sent a Rescuer, and I grabbed His outstretched hand. Which may be reaching out to where you are right now. Grab His hand and say, "Jesus, you're my only hope. I'm yours."
If you want to know how to do that and make sure you belong to Him? Would you go to our website? That is what it's there for. It's ANewStory.com. Check it out. This could be your day to be rescued by the Savior who gave His life to save you so you would be known to be saved.