Civilization is a failure because the human race is a failure. ''By one man sin entered into the world and death by sin''; ''All have sinned''; ''In Adam all die.'' Just as nature's loveliest landscape is deceptive, so is all our effort to make earth's wreck look like the Garden of Eden. I sat in a little Southern city on a beautiful morning looking across the placid surface of a tranquil lake. It was one of those rare days in June when, if ever, come perfect days, when earth seems in perfect tune and all nature in accord. But my peaceful meditation was jarred when I perceived that the waters reflected a hospital that stood on the other side. That spoke of sickness and pain and death. No matter how we dress up our cities and beautify our dwelling places, we must have hospitals and morgues and police stations, all the paraphernalia of a ruined race.
But two thousand years ago there came to earth One who said, ''My Kingdom is not of this world.'' He stood condemned on that occasion, and it appeared that He had failed. But it was haughty Pilate who failed. The old Adam has failed, but the second Adam came down in all the wreckage of our race and became the firstborn of a new race. And as many as receive Him, to them God gives the power to become the sons of God. There is a new commonwealth of those whose citizenship is in heaven, pilgrims and strangers looking for a city. One of these days there will be the manifestation of these sons of God. We are coming into our own! Every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus
Christ is Lord. One thing I am sure of, there is coming a day when every skeptic will agree with me and every unbeliever admit that my message is true, but it will be too late for them. I can afford to wait but they cannot. If you are sitting in the seat of the scornful it is high time to get into the new race by the new birth, and move out of ruin into redemption. –Vance Havner, Hearts Afire, Pgs. 97-98
No comments:
Post a Comment