The 11-year-old cousins finished their homework and then went outside and headed over to the woods. As they passed the trash barrel where Ann’s dad burned trash, Ann looked into it and said, “Hey, look at this can of spray paint my Dad threw away.”
“Let me see it,” said Andy. He pulled off the cap, shook it and began spraying the weeds along the path, but the paint didn’t come out very well. He got tired of trying to make it spray, so he dropped it on the ground. About then their friend Karl came along.
“Hi,” said Karl. “Whatcha doin’?”
“Nothin’ much,” said Ann and Andy.
Karl put his hand into his pocket and pulled out matches. “Look what I’ve got. Wanna light a fire?”
“Sure,” said Andy.
Soon they had a fire burning, and the can with its warning, “DANGER - EXTREMELY FLAMMABLE,” was getting blacker and blacker in the fire.
Suddenly there was a loud “POP!” and just as suddenly Andy and Ann were covered with flaming paint.
“You’re all black!” cried Ann, as she wildly tried to brush off the flaming paint that was clinging to her face.
“So are you!” a terrified Andy answered.
Karl ran to help them, yelling, “Go home! . . . You better go home!”
“No, I can’t,” wailed Ann. “I’ll get in trouble!”
Do you ever feel too sinful to come to God? Don’t feel that way. He already knows all the bad things you’ve done, but He still loves you and wants you to come to Him for forgiveness. “In whom [Jesus] we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace” (Ephesians 1:77In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace; (Ephesians 1:7)).
Both Andy and Ann knew they had gotten some burns. Andy grabbed Ann by the arm. “We’ve gotta go home! . . . We gotta get help!” and he started pulling her toward the house.
There’s no other way for you and me, either. We must come to the Lord Jesus Christ, “for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved” (Acts 4:1212Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved. (Acts 4:12)).
The burns took quite a while to heal, but by the Lord’s kindness, Andy and Ann had no major scars. A few days later Ann said, “At least I learned my lesson -not to play with fire.”
But what about YOU? Are you playing with the fire that never shall be put out? If you are, remember the rich man in Luke 16 who “in hell . . . [lifted] up his eyes, being in torments,” and thank God for the Lord Jesus “who His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed” (1 Peter 2:2424Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed. (1 Peter 2:24)).
ML-02/25/2007