December 11

The Christmas Carol and the coming Dark Ages.

In Charles Dickens story, “The Christmas Carol”, the spirit of Christmas Present is drawing near to the end of his visitation. Scrooge observes that there are strange movements in the folds of the spirit’s robe. When the spirit opens his robe he reveals two hideous children. Scrooge is startled by their sighting and inquires, “Are they yours?” “They are Man’s” said the Spirit, looking down upon them. “And they cling to me, appealing from their fathers. This boy is Ignorance. This girl is Want. Beware of both of them but most of all beware of this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom.”

Ignorance is on the march in our culture. The reason he is advancing so quickly is because the truth is disappearing.

The prophet Amos said in chapter 8, "The days are coming," declares the Sovereign Lord,
"when I will send a famine through the land-- not a famine of food or a thirst for water,
but a famine of hearing the words of the Lord.”

We are living during this famine. All around us we see the lives of people crashing and burning. We have become a nation of people walking in ignorance. Ironically, the Bible will still be the best selling book this year. The problem is people aren’t reading the Bible. They read emails, blogs, devotionals and newspapers but very few are reading the Word.

This will sound a bit dramatic but the hope for the USA does not lie in the President, the Congress, the Courts, Wall Street but our hope lies in the church. When you break it down even further, the reality is, the only hope for our country lies in you!! If every Christ follower would become radically committed to reading and obeying the truth of God’s Word, ignorance would be defeated.

The challenge is to stop the advance of the enemy “Ignorance” by being a champion of Bible reading in 2011.