A Message from the Preacher
Read Tom's 2 Cents this week! This is where he shares verses that have stuck out to him recently and stories he wants to share with his congregation. Let him know what you think on Facebook!
Tom's 2 Cents
Read what is on Tom's mind for this week! He shares insights and stories that resonate with himself and others. View his past 2 Cents on Facebook!
What's Tom Thinking
This recent weather has me singing an old childhood rhyme, after spending time mopping up my basement and bemoaning if I’m ever going to be able to mow my soggy lawn before it becomes a hay field.
It’s a familiar one:
Rain, rain go away,
Come again another day,
Daddy wants to play
Rain, rain go away.
Now to get the full impact of the whole rhyme you only need to repeat it four more times replacing Daddy, with Mommy, Brother, Sister, and The Family. It definitely isn’t very profound and there seems to be a lot of playing going on in this family or at least the desire to play instead of paying attention to the rain.
I can’t help but wonder if the people in Noah’s day were singing a similar tune as they only thought of playing (that’s what I imagine every thought being evil amounted to) while Noah was busy about the work of the Lord, building an ark that would save those willing to trust in God.
Some have speculated that Noah was also tasked with warning the people to repent from their wicked ways during the approximately 120 years it took him to build Das Boot (IYKYK). In any case, Noah was alert, listening, and obedient to the Lord while the world around him was not. The result was that only Noah and his family “eight in all” were saved from the consequences of a wicked and perverse generation.
I fear that we are in an age when we are playing while it rains, ignoring the warnings of a loving but just God who will soon set all things right and make this whole earth clean again, maybe not through water but through a purifying fire that will reveal only the things that remain. If that’s the case then those who are paying attention need not only to trust in our Ark (Jesus) but warn all we can with compassion and urgency.
The good news is that God’s flood of mercy, found in Jesus Christ, is the remedy for His wrath and is available to all who will trust and obey. Christ’s blood is the flood of God’s grace that washes my sins away when I respond to God’s free offer of forgiveness and redemption and trust in His divine plan to make that happen.
It’s time for the church to quit playing and stop trying to make people feel warm and cozy and start getting serious about warning the lost concerning the consequences of unrepentant sin. To speak openly and honestly about sin and the result of life without God isn’t bigoted or narrow-minded, it’s what someone who loves their neighbor as they love themselves does so that they can be filled with peace and hope.
Don’t we owe it to the ones we love to do so? I think so. Consider the following song titled Flood by Jars of Clay:
But if I can't swim after 40 days
And my mind is crushed by the crashing waves
Lift me up so high that I cannot fall
Lift me up when I'm falling,
Lift me up I'm weak and I'm dying
Lift me up I need you to hold me,
Lift me up and keep me from drowning again.
That sounds like the mission of the church, don’t you think?
Grace & Peace
Preacher Tom
For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive in the Spirit. After being made alive, he went and made a proclamation to the imprisoned spirits— to those who were disobedient long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built. In it only a few people, eight in all, were saved through water, and this water symbolizes baptism that now saves you also—not the removal of dirt from the body but the pledge of a clear conscience toward God. It saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at God’s right hand—with angels, authorities and powers in submission to him. (1 Peter 3:18-22 NIV)
Solsberry Christian Church
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