Flame or Flicker

Although I do not get to go often, I love to camp.  To pitch a tent , to light a lantern, to know that the skunks and raccoon are around, but you can't see them, to light a fire feed it with fuel to keep it burning, to smell the smoke of the wood, to relax by the roaring fire, that's a good time to me.  However, more than once, I have tried to light a fire and I get little more than a flicker.  This happened when I tried to teach myself at first, also the wood may be green or wet, the matches were damp, or I had no paper to start the fire.

Well now I generally take my own wood (when I can) and paper, I even take cheat sticks.  I am prepared not to have a flick, but a flame.

Read 2 Chronicles 30:8-9

Billy Graham said, "We've lost sight of the fact that some things are always right and some things are always wrong.  We've lost our reference point.  We don't have any moral philosophy to undergird our way of life in this country, and our way of life is in serious jeopardy and serious danger unless something happens.  And that something must be a spiritual revival."

There are two ways we can live. 

We can:

I.                    Live in the Past (8a)

A.                Know the Truth, (but Refuse to Follow)

Acts 7:51-53

B.                 Know what Right (but Do What is Easier)

Exodus 32:1-6

Mark Twain said, AAlways do right. This will gratify most people, and astonish the rest.@

An English one‑liner that has always amused me is:  "A gentleman is one who uses the butter knife when he is alone."  In other words, it's what someone does when no one's watching that indicates the true person.

Or we can:

II.                 Live in the Lord (8b-9)

A.                Instructions for Living

1.                  Yield (Submit)

2.                  Enter (Come into)

3.                  Serve (To Work for the LORD)

Ulrich Zwingli, "You are a tool in the hands of God. He demands your service, not your rest. Yet, how fortunate you are that he lets you take part in his work."

B.                 Reward

1.                  Compassion (Grace and Mercy from the Lord)

2.                  Loyal (God will be Loyal to the one who returns to Him with their whole heart)

Here is a good searching question for a man to ask himself as he reviews his past life: Have I written in the snow? Will my life‑work endure the lapse of years and the fret of change? Has there been anything immortal in it, which will survive the speedy wreck of all sublunary things? The boys inscribe their names in capitals in the snow, and in the mornings thaw the writing disappears. Will it be so with my work, or will the characters that I have carved outlast the brazen tablets of history? Have I written in the snow?