Recently, the Lord reminded me of something I hadn’t thought about since I was child. This memory shaped much of what I want to write today. As a boy, I used to listen to a cassette tape (there’s a dated reference; does anyone remember those?); it was on the book of Psalms. It was basically a dialogue between two characters: a guy named Bill, who was trying to attach a song to each of the 150 Psalms in the Bible. Bill’s friend, Sue, was listening to the songs he had so far, and was offering her reactions.
Near the end of the tape, Bill commented on something
regarding Sue’s faith (although I don’t recall this detail), but whatever it
was, it prompted a strong reaction in her.
“What do you mean?” Sue cried
out. “I go to church. I read my Bible. I just happen to be a Christian.” “Well, you don’t “just happen” to be a
Christian,” Bill replied, calmly. “It’s
like getting married. You don’t “just
happen” to get married. You have to say
“I do””. “Are you proposing to me?” Sue asked.
Earlier this month, I had to say goodbye to my faithful
Dodge Neon. It had been so helpful in
getting me from point A to point B for many years, but I made the decision that
it wasn’t worth trying to repair it; instead it was time to begin looking for a
new car. For a little over a week, I was
car-less. But ultimately, I was finally
able to drive home a used (but new to me) Toyota Corolla – on Good Friday of
all days.
I had to come to the place where I was not going to “shop
around” anymore. I could have chosen
other options. I could have opted to
just take the bus everywhere from now on.
I could have chosen to keep looking at other available cars. But there came a time where I had to make a
commitment, “yes, this car is the one for me.”
I bring this up as an illustration of what Bill from the cassette was
getting at.
In a sense, becoming a Christian is like getting married;
Bill was right. Because you make an
irrevocable commitment, a wholehearted surrender to the God of the universe,
whose name is Jesus. I once heard a
guest preacher declare that when he came to Christ in faith, he did so with the
attitude of, “Lord Jesus, if you’re not the way to Heaven, then I’m not going,
because I trust in You completely.”
Furthermore, I can’t gloss over Sue’s description of what
it means to be Christian. She thought it
was about doing good things. But notice she
never mentioned putting her faith and trust in the Christ of Christianity. It’s not about checking off religious boxes. It’s not about going to church on Easter and
Christmas; it’s not about giving a portion of your money away to charitable causes;
it’s not about reading a chapter a day in the Bible.
As good as all of those things are, the first step is to
believe in Jesus. The Bible says, “Yet
to all who received Him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right
to become children of God” (John 1:12). I
wonder if someone reading this has realized that you’ve never made the decision
to say “I do” if you will, to Jesus. If
that’s the case, I pray you would do it today.
Kevin
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