Well, it happened three times at the Hutchcraft house. Yep, a teenager learning to drive. With all of the angst that goes with that. Not for them, but us! And three times we'd come around to that question happening again and again, "Dad, can I have the car?" I have to tell you, I had real mixed emotions about that, and I had a lot of questions about "How far are you going to go?" "How long will you be gone?" "Where are you driving?" "Who are you going with?" I was apprehensive about turning over that ton of deadly metal to a teenage son. And there's probably some reasons, right?
Now, my wife would often ask for my car, and when she did, I gave her the keys - no questions asked. Oh, I had no fear of my wife driving my car. Oh yeah, I'd seen her drive. She did real well; at least as well as I did. Probably better.
Of course, turning over the keys comes down to one bottom line issue: Can I trust you with something this big? Maybe for you right now that's the most decisive choice you have.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Bottom Line Question."
Now, our word for today from the Word of God comes from Romans 8:32. Paul comes up with this equation, "He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all - how will He not also, along with Him, graciously give us all things?" Paul's logic is petty simply here. God's already given the most expensive thing He could give. He gave His Son for you and me. Now, if He would give His Son, you can have confidence to come to Him with any need, because you could trust Him with anything.
That statement actually answers the bottom line question about being a follower of Jesus Christ. After all the smoke clears away, you can sum up your choices in the Christian life in four words - can Jesus be trusted? That's what it all comes down to. That's really the bottom line question for you if you've never given yourself to Jesus, "Can He be trusted?"
It may well be that right now your hand's pretty tightly clenched around one very important part of your life that you've not been able to release to His lordship and His leadership. You know you need to, you just can't. Within the last couple of days I remember when I had a young woman say, "Ron, I love the Lord with all my heart. I'd go anywhere He asks me to go, but I cannot give Him Don." This guy was that important to her.
What's your Don right now? Oh, you've opened up many areas to His control, but this one, this last one, this bottom line one is particularly scary. This relationship, or maybe your career, your location, your dream. And the issue is, "Who's going to get the keys?" See, if you can't let it go, then it's become an idol.
Remember the question, "Can Jesus be trusted even with this?" One guy answered that for himself in a conference I was at a while back. He said, "Ron, I can give the Lord everything but one thing - basketball. It's my identity, it's my future." At the end of the week he came back and said, "Ron, I've given Him everything. I've given Him basketball." I said, "Whoa! How did you decide to do that?" He said, "I just settled it. If He loved me enough to die for me, He would never do me wrong." Well, in the Bible's words, if "He delivered up His Son for all of us," won't He give us all the other things? Yes, He can be trusted with it.
Here's the scene: Your hand is tightly closed. His hand is open saying, "Trust Me with it." Aren't you tired of this battle? Trade in the struggle of resisting Christ for the peace of trusting Christ. Your hands are too shaky to hold something that important.
And maybe for all your religion and Christianity you've had; all the Christian things you've been involved in, maybe you have never actually put your life, your soul, your eternity, and your sin in the hands of Jesus. And today He says, "Come to Me and I will give you rest." He died for you. You can trust Him. It's time to give you to Him. Say, "Jesus, I'm Yours."
Get to our website today and see there the information I think will help this be your "Jesus day." That site is ANewStory.com. Because you can put whatever matters most to you in the hands of Jesus. In fact, His hands are the only hands that can be trusted.