ALARM!

Every morning I get up at 5:30 AM to run on the treadmill and exercise. When the alarm goes off I get up, put my contacts in, and get ready to hit the treadmill. This morning, like most mornings in our house, I heard multiple alarms going off between the time I woke up and the time I was out the door headed to the garage. (My favorite is "Sharp Dressed Man" by ZZ Top that one of my boys uses as his alarm on his phone!) Now there are three other people who live in my house and I counted at least five times when I heard alarms going off. My youngest son is like me, the alarm goes off and he is up and at it. My oldest son and my wife are cut from the same cloth. They unashamedly set multiple alarms to "wake them up" before they actually get out of the bed.

As I listened to another alarm going off this morning for someone who had no intentions of getting out of bed at that time, I thought about how this practice of setting multiple alarms or hitting the snooze button works in some people's spiritual lives. There are many people in this world who profess faith in Christ but do not take seriously the "alarms" we read about in God's Word. What has happened is they have conditioned themselves to ignore the prompting of the Holy Spirit in their life. When He (the Holy Spirit) convicts them of their sin they simply hit the snooze button. When He urges them to worship God with other believers they push the snooze button. What happens is they eventually quit hearing the alarms all together. They end up growing cold towards God and the faith they at one time professed had changed their life. Don't believe me? Look around any given church on a Sunday morning and you'll notice on average that half the church (those who are members on the roll) is not there for worship. Why? Some are sick or out of town, but the vast majority of the ones who are not there have simply grown cold towards their faith and it is no longer a priority in their life.

There are others in this world who have never put their faith in Christ and ignore the alarms of God as well. They hear friends inviting them to church or inviting them to put their faith in Christ. What do they do when those alarms are sounding? They push the snooze button. Some think, "There will be time for that sort of stuff later." Others believe, "I've done good things so I will get in to heaven." There are a host of excuses people will give for hitting the snooze button on God's alarms of faith in their life. We aren't promised tomorrow. There is only one Way to heaven and that is through Jesus Christ (John 14:6). All the other excuses people give don't hold up against the truths of God's Word. In the end, each person must make their own decision for Christ and believers must be faithful to still be the alarms sounding in their lives as to the truth of the Gospel.

Today I encourage you to wake up to the spiritual alarms sounding in your life. This means recognizing the alarm for what it is and then responding to it. It means getting into action and doing whatever God is compelling you to do. If it is taking seriously the faith you once held dear, then do it. Start back to church, get involved in the life of the church, spend time in prayer and studying God's Word. If it is surrendering your life to God's call to salvation, then stop making excuses and follow Him. His grace is greater than anything you have ever done and it is powerful enough to see you through your darkest days. Give your life to Him so He can transform your life. Whatever the spiritual alarm is going off in your life, quit hitting the snooze button and wake up to the alarm that is sounding!


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