Rom 13:11 And do this, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep; for now our salvation is nearer than when we first believed.

I accepted Christ as my savior in 1975.
When I got into the church later that year, I learned Jesus is coming back.
Summer revivals and Bible studies all said the same thing – Jesus is coming back.
Over the past 47 years, I have preached and heard many more messages about the return of Christ.
It hasn’t happened yet!
But that day is closer today than it was 47 years ago.
So it is high time, more precisely, the hour to wake out of sleep and get busy.
When this hour is over it becomes a new hour to get busy.
And another.
And another.
The church needs to get busy and stay busy until our Salvation arrives – Jesus Christ.

Eph 2:13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

In my, DNA is the history of my family for hundreds and thousands of years.
Characteristics and traits have been watered down as it mixed with other characteristics and traits.
One thing that wasn’t watered down is my ability to sin and pass it on to my children and grandchildren.
What God formed – me, sin deformed.
However, Jesus has restored me.
I found it interesting, in doing this research, that blood has no nucleus, like your other cells, and, therefore, has no DNA.
You can donate an organ to someone and their body may reject it because the genetic material is different.
But if you donate your blood to someone of the same acceptable blood type, their body will accept it because there is no genetic difference.
With that said, Jesus saved us by His blood.
1 John 1:7 …and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin.
Although He also gave His body, without shedding of blood there is no remission [of sin]. Heb 9:22
What sin has done to me, the blood of Jesus has undone!

Ps 51:5 Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin my mother conceived me.

All those ancestors that passed down all my physical traits also passed down to me a serious deformity – sin.
My entire family is composed of nothing but sinners.
The Swedes, the English, the Swiss, and the Irish were all sinners.
Including in my DNA is the ability to steal, lie, covet, or take God’s name in vain.
Those were the easy ones for me.
I’m sure my genes contain my abilities to kill, worship false idols, or be an atheist.
Even though God formed me, sin has deformed me and created all kinds of undesirable characteristics in me.
But something changed my genetic need to sin.
Jesus!

Isa 44:24 Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, and He who formed you from the womb:

I am formed by God.
The Psalmist and the prophet both agree that God forms each and every one of us.
You will ask, “why are some people deformed?”
That’s a question I’ll answer in my next Morning Thought.
My dad and mom each donated their own chromosomes to create a unique cell.
That cell divided and divided and divided.
Different cells formed from the one becoming bones, organs, muscles, hair, nerves, and blood.
Before any of this began, God already knew me.
He knew my eye and hair color.
He knew my weight and height.
He knew all about me.
He knew I needed salvation and Christ died for me before I knew I needed Him.

Ps 139:1-2 O Lord, You have searched me and known me. You know my sitting down and my rising up; You understand my thought afar off.

I had the privilege growing up of being close to both sets of grandparents.
When my parents worked I would find myself spending the day with either grandmother.
We often took trips to see my great-grandparents, my grandmother’s parents on my mom’s side.
There was (and still is) a couple of family reunions every year and I met great uncles and aunts, cousins, cousins, and cousins.
I remember my grandmother telling me who was who and my relation to them.
It was quite confusing and times because so many are double kin to me.
For instance, my grandmother’s grandmother is the sister of my grandfather’s grandfather.
This is not a unique example; the entire family is made up of relationships like this.
I only understand it when I look at the family tree.
Yet, God has searched me and known me.
He knew all my days and all those before me.
Relatives I cannot find, He already knows about and saw all their days.
While others can look back and say they are related to a signer of the Declaration or kin to European royalty, I can think of nothing better for my descendants to say of me than I was a good Christian man.

Psalm 139:16 Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they all were written, The days fashioned for me, When as yet there were none of them.

My daughter sent me a DNA kit for Christmas and I recently received the results.
The website reported that my family roots lie in Scandinavia, the British Isles, and a portion of western Europe.
This is correct.
My dad’s family are immigrants from Sweden.
My mom’s family is from all the other places.
Just last night I was searching on Ancestry and discovered that one of the Wise’s was knighted.
Wise was my grandmother’s maiden name.
Years ago I also found a duke.
Ancestral roots and discoveries are fun but God already knew who I was and where I came from before I was formed.
He already knew the number of hair on my head, or the lack thereof, before my head ever appeared in this world.
And regardless of having a distant ancestor that was knighted or a duke, I am pleased to report I know a Lord and King as my personal savior.

Rev 20:15 And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire.

All week we’ve taken a look at those things God personally wrote.
An overview shows His holy Law, His judgment, and His grace and mercy.
One final writing is found in Revelation, although you can find reference to it throughout the Bible.
It is the Book of Life!
I am not sure if names are written in the book at the time of salvation or if all names are written within those pages and blotted out when a person does not accept Jesus as savior.
There is no need to debate it.
It is the Book of Life and Jesus is the way, the truth, and the Life!
If you do not accept Jesus as your savior, your name is not going to be found in the Book.
How ironic it is that with all that grace and mercy available there will still be those that will refuse to accept it, die, be judged, and be cast into the lake of fire.
Don’t be one of those!
There is still time and room for your name to be written in the Book of Life.

John 8:6 But Jesus stooped down and wrote on the ground with His finger, as though He did not hear.

Quite ironic that one day the scribes and Pharisees tempt Jesus with the Law that He wrote.
It happened early one morning as He was teaching when they brought a woman whom they caught in the very act of adultery.
They pressed Him to decide on whether she should be stoned or not according to the Law.
That’s when He stooped down and wrote in the dirt.
They kept on pressing and pressing until He looked up and said, “He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first.” John 8:7
One by one the accusers dropped their stones and left.
John 8:10-11
When Jesus had raised Himself up and saw no one but the woman, He said to her, “Woman, where are those accusers of yours? Has no one condemned you?”
She said, “No one, Lord.”
And Jesus said to her, “Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more.” John 8:10-11
It’s not known exactly what He wrote in the dirt but it certainly indicates His grace and mercy.
Although the Law holds true and it will judge all people, His grace and mercy is true too and can save all people.

Dan 5:5 In the same hour the fingers of a man’s hand appeared and wrote opposite the lampstand on the plaster of the wall of the king’s palace; and the king saw the part of the hand that wrote.

I have seen lots of writing on walls and the side of buildings, on railroad cars; and on highway overpasses.
However, that was graffiti and most of that writing was from teens or gangs.
When a hand appeared in Belshazzar’s court, it was the finger of God writing a message.
The Babylonian king had used the holy cups and utensils from the looted Temple and drank from them while toasting and praising the gods of Babylon.
The message written is one we need to remember today.
God’s first writing, delivered to Moses, was His holy Law.
This second writing gave Belshazzar a message of judgment and reminds us there is a holy judgment for all.
Judgment is a central theme of the Bible.
Hebrews 9:27 says, “It is appointed unto men to die once and after this the judgment.”
Other verses fortify the idea like “we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ” and reference to the Great White Throne judgment in Revelation.
I do hope you see the handwriting on the wall and accept Jesus as your savior!

Ex 31:18 And when He had made an end of speaking with him on Mount Sinai, He gave Moses two tablets of the Testimony, tablets of stone, written with the finger of God.

I remember our third-grade teacher whispered something to the kid on the front row.
That kid turned around and whispered to the one behind her.
The process was repeated from chair to chair and row to row until all of us knew what the teacher had said to the first student.
However, what the last person said was not what the first person heard.
It was nothing like it – not even close!
The teacher’s phrase was altered by all of us kids because either one of us misunderstood what was said or exchanged a word while trying to keep the meaning.
This is what happens with word of mouth.
God did not want any misunderstanding so He wrote down the Ten Commandments on two stone tablets and gave them to Moses.
This is the first writing from God and it shows us there is a holy law.
If there is a law then there are always lawbreakers.
Everyone has broken God’s law.
If the Law is broken then there is a penalty and God has also written about that, which I will discuss this week.
Sufficient to say, I write something down when it is important.
God gave us His word through the Bible because it is important.
Don’t go by word of mouth but read it for yourself instead.