When I was a teenager, the students in our high school were called together and each given a sugar cube with pink syrup on it. It was serum that had been developed by Dr. Jonas Salk to keep us from getting polio in a time of a polio epidemic all across our country. Now, did we turn up our noses and say, "I don't really think I want to avoid polio this way. I'm going to wait until another means is made possible?" That would be crazy. That's the sense in which we have to see what God has done for us in Christ.

Suppose I were to offer you a wonderful new home, fully furnished with everything you could ever want--on one condition. You must use this key to get in the front door. In a sense, that's what God has done for us in Christ. He has provided for all people. If we are faithful to the Great Commission to carry the message of Christ to the world, he has provided to all people the opportunity to come to know him, to live with him now and in heaven for ever and ever.