I Wonder Where Noah Kept the Termites and the Beavers?

By Gobel Brockman


There are many questions that seemingly have no answer:

Why does 'slim chance' and 'fat chance' mean the same thing?
Why does 'sour cream' have an expiration date?
What disease did 'cured ham' suffer from to begin with?

I had one of these questions posed to me several years ago by a man who went from being a seminary student to an atheist. He took every chance he could to challenge my faith. One night he asked me, "Do you believe God's all-powerful?" I told him I did. He then asked, "Well, can God make a rock so big he can't move it?" Hmmmm....hadn't heard that one before. At that moment I didn't know what to say, so I said nothing. (Man, there's a sermon there, but I'll save that one for later.) It wasn't until a couple of days later that this thought came to me:

"Can God make a rock so big He can't move it?" He already has - The human heart. 

He made it, but it seems no matter what He does to bless people or get their attention, He just can't seem to move some people. I believe it goes back to the Garden of Eden. Even surrounded by all of the beauty and provision that God provided him, Adam still chose to go his own way. Mankind has been like that ever since. We go through life driving nice cars, wearing decent clothes, watching our TVs with hundreds of channels to choose from, playing on our computers while drinking our lattes, all the while giving no thought to the God Who gave us life, and the God we will answer to when He decides that our time on this earth is over. I think one of our biggest problems is a failure to see our own frailty. Sour cream does indeed have an expiration date - and so do we. For all of our pride and arrogance, we need to remember that we are nothing but dust that God has breathed life into. I always like to use this illustration to remind us all that we're not as all-important and all-powerful as we think we are:

     "One of these days, you're going to die. They're going to dress you up real nice and put you in a fancy box. The minister's going to give a nice speech about you. Then people are going to walk by you laying in that fancy box and say all kinds of nice things to you that they won't say to you while you're alive. Then they're going to take you and that fancy box to the graveyard and bury you. Then they're going back to the fellowship hall to eat fried chicken and potato salad."

That may be blunt, but it's also true. Let's get to the point: God made you. He made you to have fellowship with Him and to worship Him. He has given you life and breath. He has also made the way through Jesus Christ that we might have fellowship with Him. In spite of man's arrogance and disbelief, when He says our time is up, no amount of money or pride will buy us another minute. We have the opportunity NOW to know Jesus and to live with Him day by day. Let us enjoy His blessings and follow His ways.

Don't be a rock God can't move.