On
the corner of Park Row and Beekman Street, New York City, where
Horace Greeley’s Statue now stands, stood a man offering $20 gold
pieces for $1 each. All day he kept up loudly announcing his wares,
but of the thousands that passed him, most paid no attention and
others either laughed or scowled at him.
About
15 minutes before six o’clock, when he was about to quit, a woman
timidly approached him and, after carefully investigating the gold
piece, by biting it and testing its sound, but throwing it on the
pavement, she reluctantly paid the dollar and pocketed the golden
double eagle. Ten minutes later, just as the man was about to go
home, the woman reappeared accompanied by two friends and between
them they purchased the rest of the man’s stock, worth $160, for $8
in bills.
The
next and for several following mornings, the street was crowded for
blocks with the same woman in the lead waiting for the vender of gold
coins, but he never appeared again.
This
story is known to be true and Horace Greeley is responsible for the
incident in demonstration of his theory that most poverty is due to
the fact that the general public refuses to believe even in the face
of overwhelming evidence and there is the point.
Is
that a perfect example of many people in America today? Many who come
to church would probably fall into this category. But God does not
call us to unbelief He calls us to believe. Faith and unbelief can
not live together they do not mix.
Try
doing this sometime. Take an empty 2-Liter bottle, and fill it up
half way with just plain water, and the other half fill up with
vegetable oil. Then try shaking that bottle up and mixing those two
things together. What’s going to happen? Well, you can shake that
bottle all day, but as soon as you stop shaking it, the oil and the
water are going to separate from each other in a matter of minutes,
if not seconds. Why? Back in 11th Grade Chemistry Class you learned
that oil and water are “polar opposites” of each other. These two
substances have a totally different chemical make-up from each other,
which makes it impossible for them to mix together. Polar opposites
just don’t mix.
what
we’re going to focus on this morning are the polar opposites in
this story. We are going to study the characters and see a number of
things that just don’t mix very well inside a person: 1. Faith &
Unbelief 2. Humility & Pride.
When
you are tempted to doubt God’s promises, remember that 2-Liter
bottle with oil and water not mixing. Neither can your doubt mix with
faith! Get rid of it, and have a simple, strong trust that God is
going to work everything out. Remember that 2-Liter bottle when you
are tempted to think of yourself as an important person. Pride sure
doesn’t mix very well with humility.
