Good to Go to HEAVEN?

Are we ready to Rise Up and Reach Out to help people God puts in our paths and come closer to Him? Do we feel the stirring to seekHim for help as seasons of sickness, sadness, sin, and situations we never thought we would see become commonplace in our homeland? Is time nigh to look heavenward with praise and glory to God and peace inside knowing we are prepared for HEAVEN?

Last summer, seven Sonshine Kids and I visited three shut in families and took a detour to Clinton Cemetery before heading back to The Learning Station. Giving them a charge to find a tombstone that shared a powerful epitaph proved to be a learning experience none of us will ever forget. After twenty minutes of exploring, reading dates, discussing the dash between those dates, and finally choosing one epitaph, we were charged up and could hardly wait to share the message we chose. I was reminded of how intrigued the children were as they paid tribute to those gone before us and learned about people who passed hundreds of years ago.

Preparing to do a series of stories on HEAVEN, prompted sharing that memory of a divine field trip to our cemetery and a thought provoking one I read in a book by Randy Alcorn about HEAVEN. This epitaph was on a tombstone found in a cemetery in Indiana.

“Pause, stranger, when you pass me by: As you are now, so once was I.

As I am now, so you will be, So prepare for death and follow me.”

Randy told how someone scratched the following words on the tombstone below the epitaph.

“To follow you I’m not content, Until I know which way you went.”

Wow! While those words sting, they speak truth to those of us who take eternity in HEAVEN for granted and could be following the wrong principles and people.

There are many questions about death, angels, and HEAVEN that we don’t have answers for here. Yet, there is much we can learn by reading God’s Word and living everyday like it could be our last. Taking another day, celebration with family (CHristmas: my favorite) or milestones we hope to make in this world for granted is risky business. Being prepared to go to HEAVEN is so important. Asking Jesus into our hearts, abiding by God’s way of loving Him first with all that we are and loving our neighbors as ourselves, and being led by His GPS -the Holy SPirit living in our hearts is a wise and wonderful way to live daily. Preparing for HEAVEN should be our top priority; yet, many live in the fast lane with good intentions - but never taking time and making effort to get hearts and affairs in order.

If we’re taking a trip to Disney World in Florida, we rely on our GPS for the best directions to get there. We don’t start driving, take detours, fiddle faddle along our way, and realize we reached the wrong destination by going in the wrong direction. Guesswork doesn’t work and is a dangerous strategy when dealing with going to HEAVEN or hell. Our trip to HEAVEN is more worthy of advanced planning than any journey we will take here, even to Disney World! Sadly, there are those who spend much more time planning trips here while procrastinating preparations for the trip that will come to all of us one day when our work here is done!

Can we really know where we’re going when we die? John wrote about the new heavens and New Earth in a letter that gives blessed assurance we have eternal life and can go to HEAVEN if we are prepared when we die.. “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.” 1 John 5:13

Do we know?

May this season of Lent, these messages about HEAVEN, studying God’s Word, seeking Jesus, listening to the Helper (HS) guiding from within, and coming closer to loved ones and HIM encourage each of us to make sure our tickets to HEAVEN are ready and we’re good to go!