Four Long Years
Today makes four years that my son, Jamie passed on from this earthly life and went home. Home is where God is and where those who believe in Jesus will spend eternity. Heaven is not the default location of where everyone will go, heaven is where we will spend eternity based on our relationship with Jesus while on earth.
One of my children, Andrew, use to say like Buzz Lightyear in Toy Store, “to infinity and beyond”. That’s a pretty good description of eternity..infinity and beyond.
When you go to funerals it sounds like everyone has gone to heaven. But that is a false supposition and one that can keep people from the good news of Jesus Christ.
C. S. Lewis in his book, The Problem with Pain writes of Hell, “There is no doctrine which I would more willingly remove from Christianity than this, if it lay in my power. But it has the full support of Scripture and, especially, of our Lord’s own words; it has always been held by Christendom, and it has the support of reason.”
Matthew 7:13-14: “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to LIFE, and only a few find it.”
So heaven is NOT our default location.
What keeps us out of Heaven is universal: “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). Sin separates us from a relationship with God (Isaiah 59:2). God is so holy that he cannot allow sin into his presence: “Your eyes are too pure to look on evil; you cannot tolerate wrong” (Habakkuk 1:13). Because we are sinners, we are not entitled to enter God’s presence. We cannot enter Heaven as we are. Randy Alcorn, Heaven Book
James 4:14 says that we are a mist, a vapor. We do not know what tomorrow brings.
I am sure Jamie did not have a clue his life would end here on earth on October 20, 2011.
Matthew Henry said in his commentary on James 4:14
What is your life? It is even a vapour that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away, Jas. 4:14. God that wisely left us in the dark concerning future events, and even concerning the duration of life itself. We know not what shall be on the morrow; we may know what we intend to do and to be, but a thousand things may happen to prevent us.
We are not sure of life itself since it is but as a vapour, something in appearance, but nothing solid nor certain, easily scattered and gone. We can fix the hour and minute of the sun’s rising and setting to-morrow, but we cannot fix the certain time of a vapour’s being scattered; such is our life: it appears but for a little time, and then vanisheth away; it vanisheth as to this world, but there is a life that will continue in the other world.”
The Good News
The good news is that the price for Adams’ sin and ultimately ours as it was passed down to us from the fall, is that hell does NOT have to be our default destination. When Jesus died on the cross He said, “it is finished”. This simply means the debt has been paid. Finished, done, debt cancelled. In Greek the words, “it is finished” means paid in full.
You may think you have done too many things wrong in your life to be forgiven, but that is simply NOT true. There is no sin or behavior you have done that can’t be forgiven…when you repent and ask.
Repent sounds like a religious word, but it just means to turn in TURN AND GO IN A NEW DIRECTION. There is nothing you can do to work for or earn your salvation. It is a gift. Jesus paid the price, he took on the cross what we deserved and paid for it. God see’s everything anyway so when you ask for forgiveness be real, you can’t hide anything from him.
C. S. Lewis, said, “All your life an unattainable ecstasy has hovered just beyond the grasp of your consciousness. The day is coming when you will wake to find, beyond all hope, that you have attained it, or else, that it was within your reach and you have lost it forever.”
You can never resolve your sin by “working on it”. It is all grace. Jesus is absolutely crazy about you, He adores you and when you walk in that truth every day you feel loved and accepted.
St Augustine said, “If we but turn to God, that itself is a gift of God.” My deepest awareness of myself is that I am deeply loved by Jesus Christ and I have done nothing to earn it or deserve it.
How Do I Know I Am Going to Heaven?
Over the years, I have had many people ask me, “how do I know IF I am going to heaven”?
John the Apostle said in 1 John 5:13, “I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may KNOW that you have eternal life.” So yes we CAN know, we don’t have to “hope so”, we can know.
Do you know?
Can you say yes, I am going to spend infinity beyond in heaven?
Today is the day of salvation, if you do not know or are not sure. I Cor 6:2
Today is the day my son went to his eternal home. He has been there four long years for us who miss him so. Yet we KNOW we will see him and Mike and “Lilly Bear” again.
The Solution
Jesus provided the solution to live with him and our loved ones forever.
1) Admit you are a sinner (1John 1:9)
2) Ask for forgiveness
3) Accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior
4) Recognize he came to earth and paid the price and settled the debt. It is finished.
5) Accept that you are forgiven and your sins are forgiven.
Psalm 103:10-12 For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is His love for you;as far as the east is to the west, so far as He removed our sins.
East and West can NOT be measured so they are gone forgotten.
This is my post today for you in honor of my son who has gone before me and enjoying LIFE forevermore.
I love you Jamie and miss you SO much, see you soon.
Mom
