The Brand New Fire Truck
Once there was a small farming and fishing
community that grew slowly over the years, for it was ringed in by the
mountains on the one side and the great river on the other. And as it slowly
grew folks began to start businesses, and it became a small town with buildings
side by side.
Now the people had a faithful mayor, and
one day he looked out over the town and said, “We must have a fire truck in
case there is a fire in our town.” So he began conducting bake sales and other
community activities to raise money to build a fire station and to buy a new
fire truck. Finally the day came when he went out and purchased a beautiful
fire truck and presented it to the people, instructing them that they must take
very good care of it for it was the only one of its kind.
And so the mayor appointed a few good folk
as firemen to occupy the fire station which was situated on a gradual slope
over looking the town. So the firemen did occupy that fire station with the
shiny new and well equipped truck, they carefully wound the new hoses and day
after day they would take soft cloth and polish the chrome and brass, the
gauges sparkled, the red paint glowed and even the brass end of the hoses
glowed like freshly smelted gold.
One fateful day in the back corner of a
store, the store owner carelessly threw oily rags in a barrel, and spontaneous
combustion caused the store to catch fire, and the fire began to sweep through
the building picking up its speed as it went. Now this fire was merciless as it
consumed every thing in its path, leaping to the next building leaving nothing
but useless ash and gnarled and twisted metal behind.
And so the alarm sounded and the cry went
out “The city is burning, the city is burning”! The appointed firemen heard the
cry as they scrubbed and polished from their place in the fire station, but
they said to one another, “We have been appointed to take care of this truck,”
and so they went on carefully polishing every detail.
Finally the smoke billowed over the city
and the cries of pain and anguish and torture rose up with the black smoke as
the city burned, the fire growled and leapt and blazed as it consumed every
thing in its path, while the appointed firemen polished and shined the fire
truck.
Are we also sitting in our comfortable
churches, polishing our stuff, while the fire of unbelief destroys our
communities? Are we doing what we can to spread the gospel to those around us?
Or are we so consumed with what is in our building that we neglect what is
going on outside? Romans
