A story is told of when Orville and Wilbur Wright invented the airplane. They had tried repeatedly to fly a heavier-than-air craft. Finally one December day, off the sand dunes of Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, they did what man had never done before. They actually flew! Elated, they wired their sister Katherine, “We have actually flown 120 feet. Will be home for Christmas.”
Hastily she ran down the street, shoved the telegram – the news scoop of the century – at the city editor of the local paper. He read it carefully and smiled, “Well, well! How nice that the boys will be home for Christmas!”
The “scoop” of the ages is that Jesus rose from the dead after being crucified. He’s alive! We know it in our hearts, but we often act like it’s not the lead story in our lives. Life has a way of crowding out the main headline and getting us to focus on the less important news. Of course, we have to balance the here-and-now with the sweet by-and-by. We can’t be so heavenly minded that we’re of no earthly good. But neither should we bury the lead story.
I once heard that great preacher, W.A. Criswell say, “The main thing… is to keep the main thing… the main thing.”