Читать книгу Beyond the Horizon - Harry A. Renfree - Страница 36

January 30

A choir competing in a music festival was singing flat. The accompanist soon became aware of it and, at a suitable point, transposed to a key or semitone lower. Unfortunately, the tendency continued, and the accompanist changed the key no less than three times. As the piece came to a close, the choir hoped for the best in the judgment of their piece. Saying nothing, the adjudicator simply went to the piano and played the chord that the choir ought to have been singing, a tone and a half higher.

Where are we singing? Flat? Perhaps too sharp? These are questions to be asked not only by musicians, but also by each one of us from time to time—for it’s not always easy to stay on key. And on the score of life, close doesn’t count.

There’s a notion abroad in our day that when God, as the Great Adjudicator, judges our lives, He counts all the good things and then all the bad things. If the good outnumber the bad, we’re in; if the bad are more than the good, we don’t make it.

I’m afraid that philosophy is off–key. Why? Because that way of looking on life and eternity indicates our belief that everything depends on us and that there is no need of God. We make the choice as to whether we go flat, sharp, or stay on key. That very temptation caused our first parents to fall and to fail in the Garden of Eden. Said the Tempter to Eve concerning the forbidden fruit: “For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God” (Genesis 3:5). The two ate; they sinned and were cast from the Garden because they thought they didn’t need God to tell them how to live—how to keep their lives on key.

The Apostle Paul looks at this situation in Romans 3:23 when he writes: “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Then he adds this wonderful promise in verse 24. “And [all] are justified [or made just] freely by his [God’s] grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.” We cannot “earn” our way to Heaven by the “brownie points” that we accumulate. Our salvation is by the forgiveness of God . . . the free grace of God through the redemption of His Son on the cross. Then our good works are of vital importance because they glorify God and not ourselves.

The importance of being on the right key in life cannot really be overemphasized.