Ron Hutchcraft Ministries - The Life-or-Death Verb - #4830

Friday, July 15, 2005

Pete came to me with a very unusual request when we were freshmen in college together. He asked me who I thought were the five best girls to date in our class. Just call me Dr. Love. I gave him my top five list; four of whom I had been out with in my mad "date them all" freshman rush. There was one I hadn't dated - a beautiful, perky brunette. Well, after I gave Pete that list, I began to ask myself an obvious question. Why hadn't I dated that brunette? So I did, and I did again, and again, and I still am. By the time we graduated, we were engaged to be married. Pete was a New Englander. He was a man of few words, and he wrote only six words next to his picture in our senior yearbook, "You believe in your product. Pete." Yes, I did. That beautiful girl and I got married one week later.

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Life-or-Death Verb."

My friend summed it up pretty well. I really believed in this special girl. Not just intellectually, but with everything I had. Believe, as in committing your whole life to her. When it comes to God, to where we spend the next hundred billion years, believe is the deciding action word. It's the life-or-death verb. Not in the official or intellectual sense like, "Pete, I believe this girl is a great catch." No, like, "I'm trusting my life to her."

Our word for today from the Word of God comes from Acts 16:30-31 . A man asks the great missionary Paul this timeless question, "What must I do to be saved?" The answer is clear and unmistakable, "Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved." Obviously, saved is a life-or-death word. Just ask the people who were saved from that bombed out Federal Building in Oklahoma City or Ground Zero in New York, or someone who was saved by an emergency medical team. If the rescuer saves you, you live. If he doesn't, you die.

The kind of saving the Bible talks about is being rescued from the death penalty that we're all under with God. Why? The Bible says, "All of us have wandered away like sheep; we have turned each one to his own way." That's my way instead of God's way - ultimate rebellion against the ultimate authority - the one who gave me my life - to live for Him. The death we suffer in this life is trying to live without God's love and His peace; without His purpose for our days. And if we still die away from Him, the penalty is what Jesus called hell.

But that's where believing in Jesus comes in, because He is the only Rescuer; the only Savior that can keep you from dying spiritually because He died on the cross to bear all the guilt and the penalty of the sins that you've committed. That's how much He loves you. But you have to "believe in the Lord Jesus" if you're going to be saved.

You say, "I believe in Jesus." Well, with your head or you heart, too? The Bible says in Romans 10:10 , "It is with your heart that you believe and are justified." That's made right with God. Believe, like committing yourself in total trust to the one who died in your place. Here is a question on which your eternity can hang. Has there ever been a time in your life when you told Jesus, "I'm putting all my hopes in you and what you did on that cross to rescue me from my sin." If there's never been a time like that, you are not saved. You are in eternal danger. But that could change. That could change in the next few minutes if you would reach out to this Savior that you've known about but you've never really known.

If you want to know Him for sure, then I would like to send you my little booklet about beginning with Him called Yours For Life. If you want it, just visit us at our website yoursforlife.net. Or if you'd like to call, call 1-877-741-1200.

One day I walked into a church not married and I walked out married because I really believe in someone that day. You need a day like that - a day to commit yourself to the One who loves you the most - Jesus Christ. A day like today.