God Motivation and Holy Moses

"If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead" (Luke 16:31).  As Jesus was wrapping up a story to prove an important point, He made these Abraham's words to a rich man in eternal torment who wanted his destitute neighbor (now with Abe in Paradise) to go back and warn his loved ones about the realities of life after death.  It's a hard story to hear in a lot of ways.  Here you have this guy who was self-centered through life now wanting to bless others, but the message is, "Too bad; it's too late."  We might take pity on this man in anguish and want to say to Abraham, "Come on, at least just pull some strings up there and give it a try--dead guy coming to life...probably pretty effective."  But the message of Jesus is that it doesn't work that way.  And the message of history is that just because there are signs and evidences in front of people's eyes, they won't give their allegiance to the God who made them and then put the signs in place.  Pharaoh didn't give Him honor as God proved Himself time and again in Egypt.  The vast majority of Israelites in the wilderness didn't believe though the miracles performed before their eyes were beyond spectacular.  The same was true for those who saw the great things Jesus did, and the same is true today.  The call has always been, "Put your faith in God.  Trust in the Messiah."  If seeing somebody rise from the dead were enough to turn everyone's hearts in this direction, everyone would be saved by now (or at least would have been saved during the times when such miracles had happened).  But that didn't happen when Elisha raised a widow's son.  It didn't happen when Jesus "woke up" Lazarus, it didn't happen when the rocks were split at Jesus' death and corpses got their life back, it didn't happen when Jesus Himself, through His own power, gave life back to his rotting body.  The heart of trust must come through one's own inner death and resurrection.  A God motivated heart must be born in faith that Jesus is the needed Savior to rescue us from our sin of disbelief.  Cry out in faith to the Rescuer and quit waiting for another spectacle.