A mother calling to her son shouted, "Johnny, tell your sister to get in the house out of the rain." "I can't mom," came the reply. "And just why can't you?" demanded his mother. "Because we are playing Noah's Ark mom, and she's one of the sinners."

We like to make the distinction between the sinners on the outside of the ark and the saints on the inside, and it is a legitimate distinction. But in so doing, we tend to cover up the reality that the saints inside are still sinners. Sinners saved by grace, but nevertheless, sinners. Noah didn't take much time before he demonstrated that after the Ark had landed.

Failure to be aware of this reality led the Pharisees of Christ's day, and self-righteous saints all through history, to feel that the message of repentance does not apply to them. Repentance is only relevant to those sinners outside the ark. It is a message you can preach at the mission, but it has no place in the sanctuary of the saints. Billy Graham said, "I have been shocked to find that the theme proclaimed so emphatically by the prophets and apostles is scarcely mentioned by contemporary preachers."