Safe?

Tell me what your idea of safe is? My parents told me once that, instead of out of love that they became Christians, they said that they were scared out of Hell. When I heard that, I told myself that of course I wasn’t scared out of Hell! That was several years ago, and, like so many other questions in my life, I only left it off at the question part, “Was I scared out of Hell?”, and didn’t look for an answer. I was too scared to find one.

But more recently, I’ve been thinking of that question and wondering why it made me so uncomfortable. Was it because I should have been saved by my oh-so-wonderful love for Jesus? But thinking it over, I don’t think so. I think “scared out of Hell” isn’t a bad thing. My problem was that I wasn’t going very much farther then that sentiment. I was scared out of Hell, but I was only on the border of Heaven.

How many of us live like this—just on the border of Heaven? I don’t know how many people have played the game of “Sorry”, but there’s this part in the game where there are five spaces which are called the “safety zone”, and then if you moved to the next space in, you were “home”. When I was very little, and this game was practically the only game I knew, my siblings and I would call that “safety zone” the dying place or (something like that), and “home” we would call “Heaven”. If you went into the safe zone, you would be safe from any traitorous opponents who wanted to send you back to the beginning, and therefore lessening your chances of wining. But that safety zone is a lot like our lives, isn’t it? We’re just barley safe, but still close enough to be moved backwards by a ruthless card.

And that’s why I felt so uncomfortable about when I thought of that question, “Was I scared out of Hell?” My motivations weren’t wrong at the beginning, but they were wrong immediately afterwards. I needed to then, and still ever increasingly need to change my motivations. My first motives were selfish, but now I need to make my motives into selfless ones. I need to run into the arms of Christ, and I need to run farther and farther into His Kingdom. I need to become more and more His, and less and less that person who was scared out of Hell!

Friends, please push on! Get farther into the “safety zone” of God’s love. Don’t stay on the outskirts, just barley saved. And go out to those people out there—those people who are, so far, on the outside, already starting to feel the clawing grip of Hell. Tell them about how wonderfully safe they can be in the arms of our Savior! We have very little time, because the game is coming to a close, and some of the pieces are left sitting out in the open. They need to know, and we are the only ones who can tell them.

 

Shalom