So huge. So large. So many people with little or no idea of life and eternity.
This life on earth is temporary. It is short in physical time. After that comes eternity. How many people do you know who have ever spent any time thinking about that – eternity? Forever.
There are only two eternities available for people.
One, an eternity with Jesus and the Father, and the other an eternity in a place of horror, a place separated from God, a place called hell, a place the Bible refers to in the last book as the Lake of Fire, a place where Satan himself and the Antichrist and the false prophet will also dwell for eternity.
We have all in the last couple days been inundated with news stories about the world famous great basketball player who was killed in a helicopter crash. He was the sports idol of many in the US and the world.
I haven’t listened to most of the reports, just a few minutes, but I have never heard it said whether he was a believer in the Lord or not. And that is the key of all life.
Is a person a true believer in the Lord? Have they been born again, as Jesus said must happen to be in the Kingdom of God? Have they accepted Jesus as the Lord of their life?
The Lord was very straightforward about all this. He laid down the criteria. I have written about all this before. It all comes down to truly realizing who Jesus is and truly believing in him. You must know the Lord and he must know you are his.
In all the news lately about the superstar there are all kinds of reports. But what about his eternity, or that of the others on the helicopter?
Every day we hear accounts of death – some in our circle but mostly people we do not know, deaths from car accidents or violent and insane crime, or some disease. Wonder how many know the Lord truly and have moved on to a wonderful future?
Death is in the end a very simple thing. I have had many in my life die, young and old, as I expect you have if you have lived a few years.
Think of death this way. Suppose we are in the room of a person who is dying, who is near their last moments of life. Let’s say her name is Betty. Suppose other people are in the room – Betty’s brother and children, a couple friends. Somewhere in this room is a door that at the moment no one can see. But soon Betty will see that door, and she will go through it into another room, another place. Betty’s brother and children and friends will all still be in the first room, but Betty will now be in the other room, the other place. All in the first room cannot see Betty in the other room. They can’t even see the door. But she is indeed there. And she is no longer in the first room. All that remains there is the physical body that she once lived in, now just lifeless material that clearly is not Betty the person.
A real mystery isn’t it. Really unusual for us here in this physical realm. No wonder so few ever talk about death. No wonder it is so ignored in our society. We believers know and understand it is a way to be with the Lord forever, a way to Heaven. It is the only way in fact other than going with Jesus when he returns to collect his believers.
Life is far more weird and unusual and bizarre than we can even imagine. The world that made ours and us and in some way oversees us is the spiritual realm. God himself made earth and people and animals and trees and so on. Father God and Jesus and all those who have died knowing Jesus like Betty are in Heaven, a wonderful place located somewhere. The Holy Spirit form of God is on earth right now, especially involved with those who are true believers in the Lord. Those who have spent much time studying Heaven think possibly it is itself a planet in the north. But then others think it may be in a parallel universe, whatever that is.
All the time we have been living our lives on this planet, there has been a raging war between God’s angels and the evil ones that follow the devil, Satan, Lucifer, the evil one, whatever you choose to call him. This formerly top ranking angel of God has been thrown out of Heaven along with a third of the angels. Now some of these fallen angels are in captivity. How many? Satan also has following him hordes of demons. We just don’t know what they are. Some think they are the fallen angels, but nowhere in the Bible is there any evidence angels seek or want to inhabit a human body, which is what demons do. Maybe demons are disembodied life forms, in other words, spirits of individuals of some type that have long departed their bodies. Are they from our human being race? Or from some time before that? We don’t know.
We believers are protected and I think in part kept alive by some of God’s angels that he has assigned to take care of us. See Hebrews 1:14. And our knowledge of all God has given us to protect ourselves also helps protect us as long as we know how to apply it.
But back to the title and the opening paragraph. Just how few people really know God and know where they are going after death? And how large is that group that does not know and – at least for many – doesn’t appear to give that subject any thought.
Maybe the death of this world famous athlete will at least get some people thinking about death and their future, leading to their being open to being drawn by God to Jesus.
My challenge to you and to myself as well is to speak of the Lord, the gospel message, and his imminent return to others every opportunity you have. Ask the Holy Spirit to arrange such opportunities for you and to guide you in all that. The only truly important thing for any person right now is that they truly know the Lord. If they do they can move on to the next most important thing – telling others.
You can see easily from the television news and the sports programs and the entertainment world and all those around you that huge is the number of people that do not know the Lord truly and thus are not going with him when they die or when he returns unless something changes in their lives. It is a big challenge – and responsibility - for you and me.
(January 2020)
Copyright © 2020 by John Newlin
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PLEASE NOTE:
It goes without saying that we are living in the last days before the return of the Lord. It goes without saying that most people on earth, including a great many who attend churches on Sunday, don’t know at all about this. They just aren’t aware. They have never been taught. They don’t spend any time themselves to study the Bible or seek out more information on the subject. For your family and friends and really anyone you care about, please get copies of our book WAKE UP AMERICA! now! Give copies to those you care for. Help wake them up! Most people will accept a gift of a book, even if they are difficult for you to speak to about such important matters.
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