Make the Call

As seen in the HEARTbeat and the Village Voice

“Make the Call”

            One of the greatest inventions in American history is the telephone.  The few words uttered by Alexander Graham Bell on March 7, 1876, started a new way to communicate.  Mr. Bell said, “Mr. Watson, come here, I want to see you.”  After that, the telephone began to replace the telegraph as the way to communicate from afar.

            It’s mind boggling to evaluate how far technology has come since the utterance of those few words almost one hundred and fifty years ago.  Minds began to wander and imagine what could be.  Suddenly kids read in their comic books how the great detective, Dick Tracy, communicated with other police using his two-way wristwatch-radio.  As with most things, fantasy becomes reality.  In January of 1946, Diet Smith introduced the two-way wrist radio.  It was designed to look like the one Dick Tracy used in the comic strip.

            Even today, look on someone’s hip or in their back pocket, or most certainly in the hands of a teen, and you’ll find a cell phone.  I remember someone saying a modern-day cell phone has more computing power than the first lunar lander from 1969.  Telephones, cellphones, email, text messages – it seems we find new and inventive ways to communicate with each other.  Some would say mankind has created so many different ways to make noise, quiet has been the victim.

            With communication being so easy, why is there a reason not to?  Speak the person’s name into your cell phone and it dials it for you.  Oh, how we wish we could communicate with the most important people in the world to enlist their help with problems in our lives!  Oh, but this enlistment is really that easy.

            Paul writes to the Romans and implores them to see the truth in his words.  Paul has had a life-changing experience on the road to Damascus, going there to persecute the early church, when Jesus Himself appears to him and communicates directly with Paul: “Why do you persecute me?”  Life-changing communication is scattered throughout the Bible, but one of the most famous used by pastors and evangelists alike is Romans 10:13: “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”  If you think about it, Paul is saying we all have God on speed dial whether we have given our lives to Him or not!  It doesn’t matter what you’ve done in your past, the Apostle Paul is saying God will always answer the call when you, anyone makes it.

            We do not know how many days each of us have left on this planet.  If we knew the day, wouldn’t it create a sense of urgency to prepare for your days after this life?  People say, “Oh, I have plenty of time to ‘get right’ with God.”  Time is not something we can control, nor the time when our life here on earth will end.

            Jesus said, “The thief comes to steal and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”  Christ wants to give us full lives, not take anything away.  If you want to ensure your future, and want to have a most wonderful life here on earth, I urge you, make the call!