On Death

People in this day and age are concerned, nay frightened by the prospect of death. Some worry themselves to the point of death. For the Christian, fear of death is foolishness, for what is death to the Christian but the passage from this cell to the kingdom of God to wonderful for words. Death is the Christian’s ride out of this life and into the presence of our Father. Death is the carrier of old worn out souls to the Creator to be made anew. Death is the one who Christ sends out to bring to Himself His beloved servants. So in one since, death is a gift the Father gives to His children when He is ready to take home, to Himself, those that are affectionately His.

As for me, I do not fear death, for he is my deliverance from my sinful body. He is the kind messenger who brings me into the presence of my Savor. When death comes to me, I will rejoice for I will soon be in the presence of almighty God. When I reach the blessed gates of heaven I shall have no more sorrow for the only thing I will have lost is this life, which brings about pain and sorrow. How can this life compare to eternity with God? For this life pails in comparison to what I will have gained.

However, death is a different matter to the un-saved man. Woe to the pagan, for to him death is not a face that is welcomed. Death delivers him, not into the loving arms of the Father, but into the burning furnace were there is no rejoicing. Theirs shall be an eternity of gnashing of teeth and anguish, where they shall burn but not be consumed. To the Christian, death is a blessing, but to those who are un-saved, death is a curse.

Keeping Things in Perspective

I want to challenge and remind all of us to be spiritually minded. That is that we would be thinking of spiritual things and things of heaven rather than being caught up in the things of this world. A great example of this comes from my morning devotions, were I was reading in a book entitled Living A Life Of Hope: Stay Focused on What Really Matters, by Nathan Busenitz. George Muller was a man who was converted to Christianity and moved to England to be apart of a missions team there. Here in England, he founded five orphanages. Refusing to advertise the financial needs, he relied totally on God for all income. Whenever a need or crisis would arise, it was noted that Muller never became worried, but knelt and prayed, knowing that God would provide. Muller's life was characterized by this because he had hope in God and great faith that God would provide. If Muller can not be worried about major things such as running out of money to freed thousands of orphans, than why do we fret and whine about our relatively small problems? The things of this world are only here for a short time and then the will fade away and burn. So do not be caught up worrying about this life. God will provide, and our life should be focused around Him.

Worry is faith in the negative, trust in the unpleasant, assurance of disaster and belief in defeat.
-Walter Kelly

Lord's Provision

I wanted to talk about the Lord's provision. Most of you know that some months about I was in a car accident around the time of the Heritage Dinner. I was given a ticket for $154.00 for driving to fast for conditions (I was driving 25 mph in a 25 mph zone when it was raining.) Well yesterday I went to court to pay for my ticket. Before I left to go to the courthouse I borrowed $40.00 from my sister Sarah and from my dad because I knew I did enough money in my checking account. Right before I left to go to the bank to deposit the money and then the courthouse to pay my fee, my mom gave me $5.00 to get coffee (this by the way was totally out of the blue and totally random) before I arrived at the courthouse because I had left about one hour early. Anyway, when I deposited the $40.00 I found out when I got my balance back that I only had $149.27 in my account, exactly $5.00 short of my ticket. So I was able to deposit then $5.00 my mom gave me and then I had enough money to pay for my ticket. All that to say that the Lord is so good and He showed tremendous amounts of mercy and grace to me on that day, because if my mom had not given me the $5.00 for coffee I would have been $5.00 short.