DANGER AHEAD

For what seems like hours, I stood in the middle of I-75 in Toledo, Ohio waving my arms in the air and shouting. Actually, it was closer to 30 minutes, but for those 30 minutes, time seemed to stand still. To the hundreds of passengers in the cars, trucks and buses that moved to avoid hitting me, I must have looked like a raving lunatic. Drenched from the rain - waving my yellow raincoat in the air instead of wearing it.... What a crazy sight it must have been.

Our entire family was packed into our SUV as we made our way back to Michigan from a visit with family in Indiana. It was one of those dark wet nights when driving was difficult at best, dangerous at worst. We had already stopped once earlier to help a stranded young motorist along the Toll Road. As we neared the Michigan border, we rounded a long blind curve in the Interstate roadway. A large concrete barrier wall on was on the left and a continuous steel guardrail followed the right side of the road, but the dividing lines on the pavement were lost beneath the water and darkness of the night.

Suddenly, I noticed stationary running lights of a semi-rig high above and immediately ahead in the middle lane of three. I began to brake... hard... and moved quickly to the right. Fortunately, at that moment there was no traffic preventing me from making such a sudden shift of lanes. Then, just in front of the semi tractor, I saw it: a mini-van, filled with people, had lost control on the wet pavement, slammed into the concrete barrier, carreening then into the traffic lanes, coming to rest sideways in the middle lane with no lights on. The only thing standing, for the moment, between the mini van and certain death were the lights of the big-rig parked in the middle traffic lane between the van and oncoming traffic.

I turned on my emergency flashers and pulled off on the narrow shoulder next to the guardrail. I ran back with my son-in-law, Jimmie, and discovered a terrified but unhurt family in the van. I could hear the rush of unsuspecting traffic coming upon us. Jimmie began to help the children out of the only working door. I left him behind as I began to run as hard as I could and as far back toward oncoming traffic as I could. Removing the most visible thing I had, my bright yellow parka, I began waving it as a warning at buses, trucks and cars coming at me at freeway speeds. But all, it seemed, to ignore my frantic warning. I was standing in the middle of the freeway, risking my own safety, but my warning was not being taken seriously. Drivers, unknowledgable and unable to see the danger looming directly ahead, sped past me as if they had no concern for my strange warning.

Likewise, this is true in the spiritual realm. Being absolutely certain of the dangers that lie ahead, Christians should be willing to do as much as possible to warn those who, being unaware of the life or death peril ahead, are racing toward the impending doom of a Christless eternity. Fortunately, everyone on the Interstate that night escaped uninjured. However, the outcome will not be the same for those who ignore the warning of the Scriptures. The Bible is very clear about this matter. One need look no further than perhaps the most memorized and widely known verse in the entire Bible: John 3:16. The truth is there; those who reject Jesus Christ will perish. It is our job to do everything we can to warn those who are heading into peril, to call out into the darkness of the spiritual night, “Jesus saves!”