Monday, August 3, 2009
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Our daughter was driving through town with our four-year-old grandson in the back seat. As she passed a local senior housing facility, she said, "Honey, that's where my grandfather lived until he died." At that point, our four-year-old jumped in with a respectful correction of his Mommy's choice of words. "Until Jesus called him home," he said. There was a pause, and then our grandson added, "And someday Jesus will call me home too."
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Last Call."
Not bad for a four-year-old. Well, OK, I know I sound like a grandfather, but that little guy actually has this death thing figured out better than a lot of us grownup people do. We don't decide when it's over, God does. And the thing you want to have happen on the day you take your last breath is for Jesus to call you home to heaven. Unfortunately, not everyone's going home. And the alternative is just too eternally awful to contemplate.
The Bible makes it clear in 1 John 5:11-12, our word for today from the Word of God, that we're all in one of two groups, headed for one of two possible destinations. It says, "God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son." Notice, it doesn't say eternal life is in His religion or His rules or in living right. The only One who can get us to heaven is His Son, who died to pay for all the sin we all have; sin that makes it impossible for us to enter a holy God's heaven. The Bible continues: "He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life."
There it is. Either you're totally forgiven or you're still carrying your sin and its penalty. Either you're headed for heaven or you're headed for hell. And Jesus indicated that there will be surprises both places; people that humans would never forgive who are going to be in heaven because they pinned all their hopes for rescue on Jesus. And there will be people in hell who had tons of Christianity but somehow missed grabbing Jesus as if He were their only hope.
The truth is that your last call can come at any time. Speaking to God in Psalm 139:16, King David says, "All the days ordained for me were written in Your book before one of them came to be." You're not going to die until your work on earth is done. And you can't stay one day longer when it's done. And God decides when that is. For a 17-year-old girl who attended a youth event I spoke for a while back, the call came in a head-on collision on the way home. And because she had put her trust in Jesus that night, when she got the call, she was called home.
You can't postpone God's call. And you can't be ready for it any other way than to be sure you belong to Jesus - the only One who can remove the sin that will keep you out of heaven. You say, "But I'm a good person." I'm not good enough, not for a perfect God. That's why Jesus came, that's why He died, that's why He rose again. And it's why He's knocking on the door of your heart this very day. He wants you in heaven with Him forever. But you have to choose that by consciously and totally giving yourself to Him. If you've never really done that, let this be the day you finally say, "Jesus, I'm Yours. I was made by You, I was made for You. I've lived for me. I'm done with that. I'm putting all my hope in the One who died to pay for every sin I've ever done. Now, take me to Your heaven someday and give me the life here I was made for."
If you're ready to begin that relationship with him, I would urge you to go over and check out our website as soon as you can today. It's YoursForLife.net. I think you'll find there some helpful guidelines and information on how to be sure you belong to Jesus. It's YoursForLife.net. Or if you'd like the booklet Yours For Life, you can call for it toll free at 877-741-1200.
It just doesn't make sense to risk one more day without Jesus, does it? So He's calling you right now to give yourself to Him, so that one day when the last call comes He can call you home.