Today’s Reading: Acts 2:40 (NKJV)
40 And with many other words he testified and exhorted them, saying, “Be saved from this perverse generation.”
Good morning!
Everyone likes to reminisce on “the good old days,” when life was not quite so fast-paced. My mother often says of her childhood, “We were poor and didn’t even know it!” She grew up in the backwoods of Mississippi. Her dad was a cotton picker, and they lived off the land. Very few supplies were purchased from the town grocer, as money was scarce during the Great Depression. They threw absolutely nothing away – everything got recycled for the greater good. Even potato sacks were reused as undergarments! Doesn’t that sound comfy? My mom used to tell about one of her cousins getting slain in the Holy Ghost at church one hot summer’s night and rolling around on the floor in her potato sack underwear. Now, that’s a story for another day, but I can tell you my mother grew up actually seeing Holy Rollers in church!
It’s amazing in the differences between my mother’s childhood and my childhood. Mom’s favorite mode of transportation was on the back of a mule, the same animal that helped till the soil for spring planting. My favorite mode of transportation as a child was a Schwinn High Flyer Bicycle, painted bright red with white and blue streamers on each handle bar. My children loved their prized roller blades and skate boards. They were pretty good at maneuvering the subdivisions where we lived on wheels. My grandchildren prefer to ride the trails on Wii bicycles hooked to video games inside the comfort of their own home. My eight year old grandson Jett is a master at racing video games. He can maneuver the many obstacles, winning each round and advancing from level to level with ease. Some of the games he plays make me dizzy just watching him. It seems, as far as generational tendencies go, our need for speed has ramped way up over the last eighty or so years.
Unfortunately, our continual need for speed has escalated the sinful perversions of this generation. It is easy to sit back and read our Scriptures, pointing to the cultural and historical issues of their day while saying to ourselves, “We are not like them at all.” Do you really think that? Somehow, we have fooled ourselves into believing because we are more technologically and socially advanced, that we do not face the same sins that plagued the people in Jerusalem on the day the Holy Spirit came. It is just not true. We may have grown up in a sheltered environment, unaware or unmoved by the atrocities happening around us, but believe me, the ravages of sin is as prevalent today as it was when my mother was a child, and for every generation before and after her. There are no good old days to reminisce about, when it comes to humanity’s sinful nature, and the path of destruction it leaves along the highways of life. Which road are you racing on?
Peter cried out to the people that day with conviction of truth. You have a choice. You don’t have to live in the sins that are eating you alive. You can take a different path and be saved from this perverse generation! Jesus has done the work needed to save you from your sin. You don’t have to live life in the fast lane with no where to turn to at the edge of the cliff. You have a choice to make right now. Cry out to Jesus today, and be saved. In Christ alone, you will find the way to step off the sin cycle. And when you ask Jesus to come and live in your heart, it may very well change the course of direction in the lives of your family and friends for many generations to follow. Please come to Jesus Christ today, and begin to experience real life like you have never known before.
Grace and peace,
Deb Spaulding
Faith UMC - St. Charles, MO
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