When you work at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station, you know there will be no physical link to the outside world for you between February and October. You are 840 miles from the nearest populated site and you're facing average winter temperatures of 80 below zero. Now, imagine being one of the women stationed there and discovering a lump that indicates you may have breast cancer. Distant medical authorities determined that this lady had to receive some emergency medical supplies. (And it really happened.) Getting those supplies though? Well, easier said than done.

A U.S. Air Force plane took on the mission, flying in driving snow and limited visibility, with just enough fuel to get back, searching in that dark polar winter for a C-shaped chain of burning barrels somewhere down there in the snow. Those barrels were marking the drop point. Once the life-giving supplies were dropped, the ground people had just seven minutes to collect those bundles before the cold weather damaged or destroyed their contents. It was an incredible true adventure, and it worked. The pilot for this amazing mercy mission said it was his most difficult mission. I'll bet! He said, "The whole thing is a loss if we don't put it where they can get it."

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Putting Life Within Their Reach."

When you're bringing a delivery that can mean life-or-death, you do whatever it takes to get it there and put it where they can reach it. If you know Jesus, and you know someone who doesn't, God has assigned you to a life-or-death mission. He says, "He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life." (1 John 5:12). People without the Savior who died for them are dying people according to God.

So, God clearly commands you and me to "Rescue those being led away to death; hold back those staggering toward slaughter" (Proverbs 24:11). God sent His Son on the ultimate rescue mission - to give His life for people you know - so they can live forever. But "the whole thing is a loss if we don't put it where they can get it."

That's where you come in. In our word for today from the Word of God in Exodus 3:7, the Lord is telling Moses about His plans to rescue Moses' very hurting people. The Lord said, "I have indeed seen the misery of My people - I have heard them crying out - I am concerned about their suffering. So I have come down to rescue them." I can just hear Moses saying, "Yes! God's going to do something about the lostness of my people! All right!"

Then God says, "So now, go. I am sending you." I could just hear Moses saying, "Wait a minute here!" But God was reaching to desperate people by bringing life within their reach - by putting Moses in the middle of them - Moses, His chosen representative. Now God says to you, speaking of the people you live close to, that you work with, that you go to school with, "I have seen their misery, I have heard them crying out, and I am coming down to rescue them, and I am sending you."

That's why you are where you are. That's why you are with the people you're with. God has dropped eternal life right in the middle of them and you're the one carrying it. It's like that Air Force crew. God went to great lengths to bring them life, and He went all the way to a cross on Skull Hill. Now He's trusting you to be His connection to some of the people He died for on that cross, who He came and died to rescue.

When it's life-or-death, you do whatever it takes to deliver the life. This is eternal life-or-death for someone you know. And you are life within their reach. Don't miss your mission. Don't let them miss heaven. Look in the mirror and say, "I am someone's chance."

My phone's been blowing up for a week or more. Mostly not good news.

Lots of storms. Lots of sadness.

Severe thunderstorm alerts, tornado and flood watches and warnings. Stacked up in my texts like planes waiting to land at O'Hare. Like much of the country, it's been a "Groundhog Day" cycle of one stormy day after another. I miss the sun.

But that's just been the backdrop for days of accumulating grief. I often get "breaking news" on my phone. This week it's been mostly heartbreaking news.

One of my family members, suddenly crushed by the tragic loss of a third brother. The painful death of a coworker's dad - and a dark diagnosis for the father of another. A lifetime friend living the final days of his beloved wife's battle with dementia. Other friends, faced with brutal decisions on behalf of declining parents. And yesterday's medical emergency for a dear friend who's expecting a baby - she went from ER to ambulance to surgery.

Yes, it's been a season of storms and sadness.

But it's also almost Easter.

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Easter 2025 - So Much Hurt, So Much Hope."

And, oh, what a difference that "Easter" makes! Not the holiday. The Man!

We all have seasons of compounding loss and grief. Storms that won't stop. Dark clouds that keep obscuring the sun. Times when hope seems swamped by hurt. But the Bible puts an amazing word in front of hope - and that word has the power to change every dark moment we face.

In our word for today from the Word of God in 1 Peter 1:3-6 - it's talking about suffering "grief in all kinds of trials." But then it reveals the divine antidote to despair: "In His great mercy, God has given us a new birth into a" - here's that word - "living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead."

Not sympathy card hope or "positive thoughts" hope. Not hope, the idea or the wish. This is hope, the Person! The One who, as testified to by six historians, 12 disciples and hundreds of eyewitnesses, literally walked out of His grave on Easter morning!

In short, Jesus is alive! He's present. Powerful - having conquered the one force that has stopped every other person who has ever lived.

As the sadnesses and grievings mounted these past few days, I felt increasingly powerless to be of much help.

But since the day I put my trust in Jesus' death for my sins, I have the Living Hope Man to turn to. As I did on that shattering spring day my Karen - my love since I was 19 - was suddenly gone.

On that first Easter Sunday, Mary Magdalene had found Jesus' tomb empty. She was grieving inconsolably in the graveyard garden - when suddenly she heard a familiar voice speaking one life-changing word. "Mary" (John 20:16). And on my darkest day, it was my name He called.

I have asked Jesus to speak to each weeping one on my heart - and speak their name. For Scripture promises that He is "close to brokenhearted" (Psalm 34:18). And that He can go deep in the human heart where no one else can go and bring hope and healing no one else can bring.

Our times of greatest loss are the times of our greatest experiences of His love. I have lived it. I can't carry all the burdens of my wounded loved ones. But if my Jesus has beaten death, surely He can bear their burdens and bring back the sun.

Jesus can simultaneously be holding and hugging each one as if they are the only one. I have felt that hug. I have been carried by Him when I could not take another step.

If you want to have this personal relationship with Jesus, tell Him today, "Jesus, I'm Yours." Go to our website and see how to be sure you belong to Him. It's ANewStory.com.

The storms keep coming. But, Jesus, You are our safe room. And hope wins.

Our local high school team won the state championship in football one year, and the coach gave at least one reason in the newspaper. He said, "We have mastered the two-minute offense. In other words, you have to know how to do the "hurry up" offense and get a lot done in a short time in order to be a championship team, like when there's only two minutes left in the first half or the end of the game.

In fact, I watched this happen in a game for the conference championship. They were ahead 13-6, and the other team was gaining momentum. There was about a minute and 30 seconds left in the first half. A minute and a half later our team went to the locker room up by 26-6! They'd scored twice. They knew how to go for broke when there wasn't much time. That's actually not a bad idea for all of us.

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Going For Broke With Two Minutes Left."

Our word for today from the Word of God comes from the words of Jesus in John 9:4. "As long as it is day, we must do the work of Him who sent me. Night is coming when no one can work." Notice Jesus says the word "must" here. "We must work the works of Him who sent me." And the must; the imperative, the "I don't have any choice" comes from knowing what time it is. It's like somebody trying to gather in the harvest and night is coming. You know the harvest is going to rot and you don't say, "Well, maybe today, maybe tomorrow." We've got to do it now because time is running out.

Now, short time brings out the best in a football team - that two-minute offense. And it brings out the best in a follower of Christ. I think we might be living in a two-minute warning time right now. You know, as we look at our world right now, it looks increasingly like the kind that Jesus said He would return to. Historic stirrings in the Middle East, the power of Russia - the biblical king of the north, many believe, is coming back again. Natural disasters - a lot of them are unprecedented in their severity and their frequency. Israel, of course the center of world attention. This is no time to be a casual Christian.

See, time is short for other reasons - our freedom to proclaim the Gospel of Christ in our own culture - that's a fragile freedom. And the people around you? Well, they turn so hard so fast. Have you noticed? You may be their only window to get to heaven, and if you don't reach them, they may never know, and they may never go where He is. Night is coming, and who knows how long this window is going to be open.

See, when you set goals and you think about your priorities, would you take a look at God's clock? You know, it could be late in His plan for planet earth. And it's certainly late in the lives of the people around you, and late and lazy don't go together. It's time to, well as they say in football, throw the bomb, go public for Christ. Have that long postponed conversation about your Jesus.

Don't wait any more. Time's going to run out. To fix that broken relationship, to get involved in the work of God's Kingdom. To deal with that hidden sin, and most of all, to live so there will be some people in heaven with you that you told about Christ. The Bible talks about this urgency when it says, "Redeem the time," "buy up the time" because the days are evil. And think of the urgency in the verse that says, "Snatch others from the fire and save them."

You know, we talk about every year A.D. being the year of our Lord. Let's go for victory to make this that kind of a time, going for broke with two minutes on the clock.