We had a storm this afternoon. The sky threatened with dark rolling clouds that cast an eerie green hue on the landscape. The rumbling thunder increased in volume. You could hear the wall of rain coming through the trees west of us moments before it arrived on our property. The wind blew, the lightning flashed, and the thunder no longer rumbled but came in shattering cracks. All in all it was a spectacular show. Now, an hour later, the storm’s past, the sun’s out, the birds are singing, and everything wet sparkles in the sun’s light.

After writing my last letter I thought of another illustration of how impossible it is for us to get right with God on our own and how we need His help to make it happen. Imagine a luxury liner cruising the high seas with all kinds of passengers on board. A terrible storm comes up and three people are washed overboard. One is a professional swimmer, another is someone who swims recreationally on occasion, and the last person is drunk and can’t swim at all.

There is no way they can climb back on board the ship by themselves, because the vessel’s sides are smooth, angling outward and upward. The nearest land is hundreds of miles away. Although their swimming skills range from one extreme to the other, they all face the same fate: drowning. They can’t save themselves.

Their only hope is for someone on board to throw them a life preserver with a rope attached. They would be able to grab hold and be pulled up onto the deck of the ship. But there’s one catch. When the life preserver is tossed to them they have to be willing to take hold of it. The rescuers will do all the work of saving them, but they must at least cooperate to the point of grabbing hold of the life preserver.

This is the way it is with God’s rescue effort for us. God sent Jesus Christ into the world born as a human so that He could save us from the deep and stormy waters of our own sin. We can’t save ourselves, no matter how good we are. We could be the most moral person in the world and have collected a long list of good deeds, much like the professional swimmer with all of his ribbons and medals, but it isn’t enough. All three characters in my imaginary story will fall victim to the sea. Drowning will make the world-class swimmer as dead as the drunk will be. They have the same need to be saved.

No matter where we place ourselves on the great grading curve of human goodness, we’re all in the same boat -- or washed overboard from the same boat, I suppose would be more in keeping with the analogy! We all have fallen victim to our own sin. We all need saving.

God has done the work of rescuing us, but there’s one strategic part we must do. We have to reach out in faith and grab hold of Jesus, who is the life preserver God sent us. We can’t save ourselves; God has had to do that. But He can’t pull us to Himself unless we want to be rescued back into His presence. This is where humility comes in: to admit we can’t make our way back to God on our own but need Him to forgive us and draw us to Himself.

We call this message of Jesus the Gospel. The word gospel means "good news." The good news is that God has done for us what we could never do for ourselves: bring us back to Him. This is why joy is to be an obvious characteristic of people who have accepted Jesus Christ into their hearts as their savior. It’s a joy of relief that we don’t have to try to be accepted by God through our own effort or achievements. It’s also a joy of gratitude that God loved us enough to want to pay the price of sending His own Son to the cross to rescue us. And it’s the joy of being back with God. That’s all for now. I have to start the grill. We’re having chicken breasts for supper. No, they’re not closely related to the ones in the coop out in the backyard! I’ll be in touch soon.

A fellow seeker after truth,
Dave