WARNING!
WARNING!
I know this will make me seem ancient to
some
but I’m remembering a mechanical character on an old, very old, black and white
TV program. When I was a kid there was a popular program called “Lost in
Space!” It featured the Robinson family, a syrup sweet family with a precocious
little lad called Will and a stowaway scientist whose name now escapes me. It
also featured a robot; I think his name was “Roby,” who was more intelligent
than them all. Roby’s main function seemed to be flailing his arms about
shouting “warning, warning!” He seemed to be the babysitter for young Will and
so more often than not he would be shouting: “Warning, warning Will Robinson!”
Oh how I wish we had Roby the robot with us today to flail his arms about,
twirl his antennae, and shout “warning!”
Jeremiah was called “the weeping
prophet”
and I think it was because his task seemed to him so futile. His listeners were
incorrigible sinners and Jeremiah took his job very seriously. This was a sure
formula for frustration. Listen to him complain!
Jer
6:10
10
To whom shall I speak, and give warning, that they may
hear? behold, their ear is uncircumcised, and they cannot
hearken: behold, the word of the LORD is unto them a reproach; they have no
delight in it.
The Amplified Bible helps our
understanding somewhat by putting it this way: “their ears are uncircumcised
[never brought into covenant with God or consecrated to His service].”
Ezekiel had a similar problem as we read:
“And thou shalt speak my words unto them, whether they will hear, or whether
they will forbear: for they are most rebellious.” Ezek 2:7
In the midst of a highly
politicized national “revival” I still observe many people who will not heed
warnings because “they have no delight in it.”
The
Winter 1991 issue
of the University of Pacific Review offers a chilling description of the
1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster:
There
were two electrical engineers in the control room that night, and the best
thing that could be said for what they were doing is they were "playing
around" with the machine. They were performing what the Soviets later
described as an unauthorized experiment. They were trying to see how long a
turbine would "free wheel" when they took the power off it.
Now,
taking the power off that kind of a nuclear reactor is a difficult, dangerous
thing to do, because these reactors are very unstable in their lower ranges. In
order to get the reactor down to that kind of power, where they could perform
the test they were interested in performing, they had to override manually six
separate computer-driven alarm systems.
One
by one the computers would come up and say, "Stop! Dangerous! Go
no further!" And one by one, rather than shutting off the
experiment, they shut off the alarms and kept going. You know the results:
nuclear fallout that was recorded all around the world, from the largest
industrial accident ever to occur in the world.
The
instructions and warnings in Scripture are just as clear. We ignore them at our
own peril, and tragically, at the peril of innocent others.
n
Attributed
to Tom Tripp in Fresh Illustrations for Preaching & Teaching
(Baker), from the editors of Leadership.
Col
1:28
28
Whom we preach, warning every man, and teaching every man
in all wisdom; that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus:
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