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The US Congress has mandated a conversion in your life, whether you like it or not. If you are an average American, this conversion may affect nearly thirty of your leisure hours every week.
On February 17, 2009, federal law demands that all full-power TV broadcast stations stop broadcasting in analog format and broadcast only in digital format.
So there!
Your analog TV may soon require a digital-to-analog set-top converter box if you want to receive over-the-air digital programming. They say this DTV conversion will free up frequencies for public safety communications (police, fire, and rescue) and allow broadcast stations to offer improved picture and sound quality. [If interested, more solid & detailed information is at: www.dtv2009.gov ]
It can be difficult to live on planet earth without some occasional conversions.
If you need to convert heat into electrical energy, you can do so with the Alkali Metal Thermoelectric Converter. Now you know! Car companies may suffer if they refuse to convert their machinery and manufacturing format to meet new market demands. Refusal to change may be more costly than change.
Some conversions can open the way to better living!
Your body converts calories into energy. Some appliances require converters or they won’t work. Sometimes, computer data has to be converted for use in other computers. My lovely wife has converted me to some better eating habits but has more work to do on my organizational skills. Extra point conversions can make a difference in championships. In foreign countries, your money must undergo a conversion or you cannot spend it.
Have I opened your mind to the concept of conversion? I hope so, since no one can be a Christian and go to heaven without it. I am not talking about a conversion that congress can mandate, but one that can lead to better living – and not for just thirty hours a week.
I am not talking about a forced conversion, but one that is totally voluntary. Yet, it is more controversial than the sort of conversions that can be mandated by congress. I am talking about the willing conversion of a doomed and hopeless sinner into a redeemed follower of God, filled with His Holy Spirit.
The kind of conversion that puts you (or anyone) on heaven’s road takes more than just an adaptor or a converter box. It takes a full personal about-face. The apostle Peter once proclaimed; “Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord,” (Acts 3:19).
The Latin word conversio literally means, "going the other way." This about-face begins when you humbly acknowledge your sinfulness (repent) and fully surrender your life to God. Then, simply reach for His loving hand and hold on as He guides you on a brand new course for the rest of your life—all the way to heaven. From your baptism to your final breath, He will transform (convert) you from a dead-man-walking into a spirit-filled follower of God.
Is this picture clear?
Here it is in high definition: God does not want you or me to just be who we are. This point is hard to stomach since, in these days, we are often told to just be who we are (whatever that means). Sorry, but who we are is not good enough. Not by a long shot. That’s why God sent His Son, Jesus, to die for you and me. That’s why God raised him from the dead. That’s why God sent His Holy Spirit to live in us. And that’s why we are actually willing to give up our self-ownership and hand the “deed” over to God, who made us for this purpose in the first place.
He just wanted to give you and me the choice!
Joel Mark Solliday, B.A., M.Div., is the editor of Campus CrossWalk and the pulpit minister of the Northern Light Church of Christ in Minnesota . He earned his M.Div. at Fuller Theological Seminary and has worked at Pepperdine and ACU. His wife Katie is a junior high school teacher.
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