by Stan Mitchell

It must not have been easy for the snails to make it to Noah's ark. Cheetahs and gazelles and practically every other creature, too, were faster than they, and they must have been in constant danger of being crushed by an elephant or hippo along the way. So how did they get on the ark?

"You know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything" (James 1:3,4).

One time Winston Churchill was asked, "What experience in school helped most to prepare you to lead Britain in her darkest hour?"

He thought about it for a moment, then replied: "It was the two years I spent in the same grade in high school"

"Did you fail?"

"No," Churchill replied, "I had two opportunities to get it right." What Great Britain needed in those dark days was not brilliance but persistence.

Of course Churchill was famous on another occasion for urging his listeners to "never, never, never give up." We invariably learn more by failing than by succeeding, if we are open to the lessons of failure, and if we don't give up.

Don't give up on your marriage; don't give up on your church; don't give up on God; don't give up on yourself!

So how did the snail make it on the ark? Simple. By persistence!

by Barry Newton

Perhaps you have read a book or heard a sermon about the God who gives second chances. Scripture is filled with stories about lives which had been ruined in one way or another only to be picked up out of the ashes by God. The hope of a second chance strikes a resonant chord. We recognize that our only hope is for a fresh start made possible by God.

But just how good is the news of a second chance? Is this really an accurate way to speak of God's grace? After all, if you could not lift up 1000 pounds before, do you really want another opportunity to prove you can do it? With a second chance, the burden and responsibility still lies upon you. If you could not live a sinless life before, how well do you think you would do with a second chance? We need God's grace to provide us with much more than another shot at failure.

Through Jesus, God sees His people as being blameless before Him, not because they were finally able to master perfection but because they receive what Jesus achieved, sinless perfection. Through Jesus' death as a perfect and sinless lamb, God extends to us what we could never achieve on our own - blamelessness! Through His grace, God has acted in a much greater way than merely giving us a second chance. Through His Son, God did it for us! Here is a message filled with real hope for the whole world.

Footnote - While Scripture is clear that we can not be good enough to merit salvation, Scripture is equally forceful in asserting that God's people have been charged to live in the light and to do the good which God has prepared for them to do. While salvation is made possible through Jesus, the servant who is lazy and does not fulfill His Master's will shall be cast out.

The life of the disciple is not "thanks for salvation, now I'll do my own thing." The Christian life is "thank you for saving me and taking me to be your servant. Now I will do my duty as an unworthy servant." What tremendous grace God has given us that we might be called the children of God! We do not deserve this.