Instant Access
What marvels the ads for new mobile phones offer! Access—instant access—anywhere, anytime. (Of course, there must be a phone at the other end!) But…instant? One may be able to “call home” from a moving car or plane or while hiking in the woods miles away but try a simple call to an office in the same city!
A Real Listener
You will often meet the familiar “press one, press two” set of choices, followed by a long and tiresome explanation of what a great company it is, interrupted by a different voice insisting, “Your call is important to us; please hold.”
Contrast that with the clear promise in the Word of God: “Before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear” (Isaiah 65:24). Incredible! “Before they call,” the answer is on its way. Then “while they are yet speaking,” He hears. There is no “voice mail”—nothing between the listening God and the praying soul. Truly, “My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts” (Isaiah 55:8-9).
Caller ID
Then there is Caller ID. A glance at the ringing phone and one knows whether to pick it up and say, “Hi!” or, if the number is strange to you, just ignore the call. God has Caller ID, too. He says of His own, “I know them…” and their calls reach Him at once. But there are others to whom He will one day sadly say, “I know you not.…Depart from Me.”
Activation
And then your new cell phone must be “activated.” It is not enough to have the phone and to know all about its use—what buttons to push, what procedures to follow—you must have it “activated.” That is somewhat equivalent to “connection” for wired phones. Otherwise, the phone will be just dead and useless.
That is most important and so easy! The Lord Jesus paid the “activation fee” when He gave His life on the cross of Calvary. Now one simply has to accept—believe and receive—His sacrifice personally, that is, for yourself: for “as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on His name” (John 1:12). The activation—the connection—the power—is now the right of every believer, with all the everlasting benefits that accompany it.
“Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ: by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory of God” (Romans 5:1-2).
“Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved” (Acts 16:31).
