Well, Punxsutawney Phil has once again made his appearance, and his prediction - six more weeks of winter! As I sat this morning, drinking my coffee and watching the morning news, I sat and watched with a bit of amusement as this story took precedence over all the other news of the day. Fox News cut away, right in the middle of a news story which seemed to be of much more importance than the announcement of a rodent, who, somehow, mysteriously, speaks to the one holding the magic walking cane, and he actually understands what the rodent says! Now, this is noteworthy news, to be sure.

As I watched this spectacle, and looked over the vast crowd of onlookers who had gathered for this newsworthy event, I could not help but think of how we have become such an entertainment oriented society. We fill our minds, and waste our time, with such trivial, useless junk as to watch a ground hog supposedly forecast the weather for the next few weeks.

So, you might be wondering, where in the world is he going with this? Well, I will hasten to my point. I remember as a young boy watching Clyde "Cloudy" McLean give his weather forecast on the nightly news. He had a flip chart, if my memory serves me correctly, upon which he would draw an outline of the area, and then he would make all kinds of squiggly lines to show weather fronts that were coming our way. Back then, in Cloudy's day, there was not a lot of sophisticated technology like we have today, so his forecasts were sometimes on target, and other times completely off base.

Well, we have come a long way, haven't we? We now have all that sophisticated technology, and because of that the forecasts are quite a bit more accurate. However, if you pay close attention to the extended forecast on any given day, and keep up with the predicted temperatures and day to day weather patterns, you will notice something very interesting: the extended forecast tends to change from one day to the next. Now, yes, by the time we get to that seventh day, the day to day forecast has changed enough to be pretty accurate. But from seven days out - not so much!

So, this morning, we once again watched with keen interest a rodent who is supposedly telling us that to expect for six weeks! Leaves me sort of awestruck and breathless - how about you?

Well, it's past time to get to the point. There is One, and only One, who knows the future. He needs no sophisticated technology to assist Him in His predictions. As a matter of fact, He gave us some predictions which were for much farther in the future than a mere seven days. His predictions were given hundreds, and sometimes even thousands of YEARS in advance. And His predictions are ALWAYS 100% ACCURATE! Pretty good record, don't you think?

No, He didn't give us a weather manual with weather patterns for the extended future. But He did give us a manual, with the course of human history laid out for any and all who will take time to read. Isn't it truly amazing that He "forecast" more than 700 years before the birth of Christ exactly where He would be born? Isn't it also amazing that more than a thousand years before the death of Christ He "forecast" the exact method of death penalty Christ would suffer, even though that particular form of death penalty had not even been practiced at the time of this prediction?

Needless to say, if we are going to listen to the prognostication of a rodent from Pennsylvania, or if we are going to pay attention to the predictions of those who use the advantages of every form of modern technology known to man, even though they miss about as much as they hit, wouldn't it be wise to listen to One who has a proven track record that extends over thousands of years, and hasn't been proven wrong even one time?

That, my friend, is simply amazing grace! God has revealed His plan to us so that we might read it, understand it, and accept it. Let me encourage you to read His plans and purposes for His creation, and be a part of His great future, with Him, for eternity.