Would someone please turn that off?!

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I was enjoying a cup of coffee and getting some writing done at the local Starbucks when I noticed the police officer in line, waiting to place her order.

Suddenly, a car alarm went off …

… I continued to write, and the police officer remained in line, patiently waiting to order her cup of coffee.

When car alarms first came out, the reaction to hearing them was very different! Everyone would run to the nearest window to check on their car, for fear someone was breaking into their vehicle.

Today, car alarms are more often responded to as loud annoyances.

Kind of like the words of warning from the Word of God.

We’ve reduced God’s revelation to us through His Word to a collection of interesting stories, but have taken out of them the prodding to urgent and real response. They’ve become so familiar they are no longer startling to us. For example, we read this:

“For you know quite well that the day of the Lord’s return will come unexpectedly, like a thief in the night. When people are saying, ‘Everything is peaceful and secure,’ then disaster will fall on them as suddenly as a pregnant woman’s labor pains begin. And there will be no escape,” 1 Thessalonians 5:2-3.

These words from the Apostle Paul, given by inspiration from the Holy Spirit, drip with urgency and warning. But we’ve heard it before, haven’t we? Yet, today keeps turning into tomorrow, which turns into next month. We’ll get around to “God stuff” soon enough, we say to ourselves.

But we don’t.

So we settle into sermons that have turned into stories that no longer demand urgent, immediate response. We call for contemplation rather than conversion, for relevance instead of repentance, for dialogues rather than decisions.

We fail to understand that a life of contemplation alone is a life of inaction.

It is not enough to simply contemplate the things of God, we are called to respond to them. Now! Today! With a sense of urgency!

Because your life with regard to Christ is an urgent matter. Satan is a real enemy to you, a thief who is attempting to break into your life and do what he has always done …

“The thief’s purpose is to steal and kill and destroy …” John 10:10a

The alarm Jesus sounds isn’t just an annoying sound, it is for the safety of your soul.

“The thief’s purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life,” John 10:10.

The alarm is sounding. Are you responding, or waiting on your coffee?

Scotty