False Alarms and Idiot Lights



By Greg Laurie

Our smoke alarm went off the other night at 4:00 A.M. I jumped out of bed and was ready to take action. Turns out the unit malfunctioned. (Why does it always go off at 4:00 A.M. and not P.M.?)

Because of incidents like this, we tend to tune out alarms. Who even looks when a car alarm goes off in a parking structure? We assume it's just someone trying to find their car.

One alarm you do not want to ignore is the fuel light in your car. If you do, you will come to a complete stop. You can't run on fumes.

Many marriages today are "running on empty." They have not taken hold of the power that's available; they're not operating by the principles given in the User's Manual. Remember, God invented marriage. And there is a right and wrong way to do it.

Happy, strong, and lasting marriages don't happen by accident. Marriage is something that to be good and fulfilling takes the right ingredients. It is the result of effort on the part of the partners involved.

Marriage is not so much finding the right person as it is being the right person. But all of this is to be done with God's help. A strong and happy marriage is the result of obedience to God and His Word and laying aside this world's distorted "take it or leave it" concept of marriage.

If we want to have the closest thing to "heaven on earth" apart from Christ's return—if we want a marriage and family that succeeds, we must do it as He tells us to.

It's all in the "User's Manual of Life," the Bible.