Letter To a Friend Who Attends Church And Believes He Is Going To Heaven

Hi,

I just wanted to clarify about our chat on Wednesday.

I wasn’t attempting to judge you by what I was saying.  As we are both well past the proverbial three score and ten (70 years of age), I was only expressing concern as to whether you were going to exit in the right direction (Heaven) when your time does come. Let’s face it, for either of us that could be any day!

Think of it in terms of a little friendly loving concern, which is what it was intended to be. If I put it across badly, please accept my apologies. I’m a work in progress!

Photo by Tobias Bju00f8rkli on Pexels.com

Imagine I was out walking on a foggy night, and you saw me near where you knew there was a 500 foot drop over a cliff edge.  I am sure you would want to make every effort possible to warn me of the potential danger I was in, wouldn’t you?  Similarly, if there is ANY possibility that you could be heading in a dangerous direction spiritually, you likewise would surely want me to make every effort I can to let you know dangers to avoid, based on my own experience and what I’ve learned through that.  If you had terminal cancer and I had discovered a cure for cancer, would you thank me if I kept silent and you were denied the benefit?  Eternity is even more important, since our personal outcome lasts for ever.

From my own personal experience I know that a person can attend church every week, hold an office as Church Elder and be a Sunday School teacher and yet not be a Christian pursuing a personal relationship with God, as was my situation some years back. Had I died at that time I would most certainly have gone down and not up.  My Christian life was merely an outward sham, with no interest in the spiritual life of a Christian, nor did I pray or open a Bible at home from one week to the next – perhaps a clue to my non-Christian state that I somehow missed!  I had no experiential knowledge of God (as opposed to head knowledge) nor was I interested in submitting to a personal relationship with God either. I was boss of my life and that suited me fine.

The Chief Priests and Pharisees in Jesus time were experts in the scriptures. They tithed faithfully their 10 per cent, fasted twice a week and observed scrupulously every commandment as they saw it. Nevertheless they were blind to recognising Jesus as God in their midst. If church commitment, intellect and obedience to God’s commands were the standard, then they were heading for heaven, effectively home and dry. Except, as we know, they weren’t. They were proud and refused to repent, both at the teaching of John the Baptist and then Jesus.  In fact Jesus pointed out to them that Satan was effectively their Lord, not His Father in heaven.  They weren’t best pleased! So scrupulous, regular and sincere religious observance clearly doesn’t get you over the line into heaven.

On the other hand, the disciples Jesus chose were quite the opposite of the Priests and Pharisees who referred to them as “ignorant and unlearned men!”  I guess Jesus chose them because he saw  they were open and honest men, with teachable hearts. As Jesus said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the Kingdom of Heaven.”  Little children have simple trust in Daddy, that Daddy knows best and that what Daddy promises he will fulfil.

In the gospels, we read that that Jesus “breathed on the disciples” and said “receive the Holy Spirit.  Subsequently, on the Day of Pentecost, the disciples were again filled with the Holy Spirit. Paul’s letters in the New Testament exhort us to “go on being filled with the Spirit” (the tense in the original Greek is present continuous, so not just a once only event)).  Without the Holy Spirit within, we are “running on empty” since the unregenerate human heart and spirit cannot please God.

  You recall I said “think of how we are all born, live and die using this example of two buses”.  We are all born on Bus Number 1. That bus is going to Hell and Satan is the driver. If we spend our life on Bus 1 and never change, we die in our sins and end up in Hell. We therefore need to change buses. The way to do this is to repent of our sins to Jesus Christ. That allows us to change to Bus Number 2, headed to Heaven and driven by Jesus. Both the Pharisees and myself were on Bus No 1 (being driven to hell), and were totally unaware that Bus No 2 even existed. Likewise I didn’t know I had to disembark and climb aboard Bus Number 2, driven by Jesus. As you know, it’s rather difficult to get off one bus and on to another without knowing it. It’s a conscious choice.

The key to changing buses is recognising the need within ourselves for personal repentance. Repentance is a fundamental change of thinking and direction as regards our propensity for sin. Without the indwelling Holy Spirit – who comes in when we truly repent – we cannot change our sin nature. Asking for forgiveness does not change us on the inside the way true repentance does.  Jesus didn’t preach “Ask for forgiveness”. His cry from the outset was “Repent of your sins!”, Repentance equates to “open heart surgery” compared to the “bandage/sticking plaster” of forgiveness.

Forgiveness doesn’t change the human heart towards God, it merely applies a temporary covering that constantly needs replacing. Forgiveness has its place, but not as a substitute for the heart surgery we all need, to change our love of our own way to love of God’s way as our number one priority in life.  This begs the question: “do we want God as the number one priority in our life, before self and even family?” God reminds us in the Book of Revelation: “Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline, so be earnest and repent”.  God has spoken to me a few times over the years about me getting back on track with my life. That’s part of His love relationship with us.

In summary, I’ve learned that being a Christian is not about regular church attendance and church service, and what goes with it, since if it’s only that it doesn’t change your heart towards God. The Bible says we are by nature rebels towards God, and only repentance can change that. In my case I literally got down on my knees and repented for having been Lord of my own life instead of handing that over to Jesus. As God says through Jeremiah in the Bible: “Cursed is the man who trusts in his own strength… ..  God goes on to say a couple of verses later: “Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord.……..”  You could liken the curse and the blessing  to a hell or heaven consequence.

Repentance brings about a love relationship in your heart with the heart of God. That’s why the First Commandment commands us to: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and mind and strength.”  That’s impossible for unregenerate human flesh to even attempt, since our flesh nature is at war with God. In my case there was no relationship, not even of the cerebral kind.  I had no idea I had to humble myself before God, despite the Bible saying “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble”.  According to the First Commandment, if God is not the number one priority in our lives, then there is something wrong with our heart attitude towards Him.

Because I’m a slow learner, after realising that I was lost spiritually, it took me about a year of searching spiritual things. I then repented of going my own way and gave over my life to trust in Jesus for the future.  Effectively, I gave him control of the steering wheel of my life, and have never regretted it.

But God is a perfect gentleman and never compels us to do anything, which is why He gave us free will. So choosing him as Lord is all about our free will choice.  Someone once said: “Hell is populated by people singing the Frank Sinatra song: “I Did It MY Way”, which just about sums up our natural desire to live without Jesus interfering in how we live.

I hope the foregoing has helped to put my side of the conversation into the context it was meant to be in – a concerned and loving enquiry with your eternal future in mind. Who am I to judge anyway?

I remember someone pointing out that in John Bunyan’s book “Pilgrim’s Progress” there was a pathway leading off to hell right next to the entrance door to Heaven. So none of us are safe till we’re over the threshold! All the more reason to encourage one another on the journey.

I know there’s a lot to digest here, but feel free to come back to me on anything you like on this topic in due course.

Thoughts and Prayers For Lonely Times

  A woman with children came for help and while she was waiting to be dealt with she picked up a small book called: “Thoughts and Prayers For Lonely Times”. She seemed interested in it, so I said:”you can take it away with you if you like – it’s free. She replied :’yes please it looks interesting’.  Like all other clients who came today she also received a Christian newspaper with a gospel message inside it.

I also had a chat with one of our new volunteers today. In explaining the wider context of what we do, I told him it included praying for people for healing. He was bought up as a churchgoer, but no longer attends. I gave him a few testimonies of how some people had been healed while they waited to be seen. I hope my chat with him gave him a wider perspective on Christianity – namely the exciting life possible when compared to the passivity and inactivity of dull times in the pew listening to a dull sermon.

 

20 years in Prison for Stabbing and Other Violence

As an 8 year old child his father showed him how to clean and assemble a handgun. As you can imagine, from then on things went from bad to worse and he ended up addicted to drink, drugs and violence. He told me he had served 20 years altogether in his 47 years of life.

Amazingly, he has come out the other end and is now going round schools warning children of the dangers – and consequences –  they face if they go down a similar route. He told me doesn’t hold back when he describes prison life in all its messy details.

What brought about this remarkable change? He met Jesus in prison and is now  a born again Christian. Needless to say his father is at a loss to understand him and has rejected him. He told me that God had never let him down and, although he has never had a lot, he has always had enough.

I was really touched by his story. I gave him my website URL and invited him to send me his testimony, setting out what he was like before he became a Christian and the change that happened in his life afterwards. We discussed local churches and I suggested one he might like to try out. Finally I prayed for him that God might use him powerfully to reach others.

A great day!

Used, Abused and Unloved By Those He Trusted

He’s now a grandfather, but his early days were horrendous. Abused physically and sexually by his father, he grew up confused, angry and feeling unloved.

No surprise therefore that he spent a total of 20 years in prison, five of them for armed robbery. He went down the drugs route, ending up on crack cocaine.  

man behind bars

Now he’s moved on and slowly getting a sense of perspective and that it wasn’t all his fault. Thankfully he treated his children and grandchildren in a more loving way.

I told him that I knew someone who loves him as he is, and has always loved him. I shared about God, Jesus, sin and repentance. He told me he recently went to church. I told him about the church I attended, and he said: “that’s near where I live”. He couldn’t come this week, but might be able to come next Sunday. He took away a gospel tract.

Leg Healing Confirmed

  In my post on 19th October   I recounted how I’d offered prayer to a team member who had a problem with a ligament on her leg. After praying she had signs of healing, but said she’d report back in due course. A few weeks later I saw her and she said: “have your ears been burning?”. I said “no, why?” She replied: “I’ve been telling people at my church – if they want healing to come to you!”. She went on to say that her ligament problem had indeed gone. I assured her that Jesus was the healer; I’m just the instrument. But it’s wonderful being the instrument!!

On the theme of healing, I recall reading of a Christian man called John G Lake who set up a healing ministry team in the USA in the early 1900’s – in Seattle I think. If you wanted to join his healing team you were assigned a patient suffering from a terminal illness. You had 30 days with the person to minister healing. If you got the person healed in the allotted 30 days, you were allowed to join the healing team. If they died……………..

Makes me think how few people are prepared to go for long term healing prayer. In my experience, if no results are seen from healing prayer after a few minutes most folk go off and consider it a failure. Yet  if these same people were prescribed a course of pills – one a day for 28 days – they would normally persevere and finish the course of pills!  

Satanist Was Serving The Coffee In Church Today!

   The book I promised the Satanist I met Friday last – “From Witchcraft to Christ”, plus another one “Dancing With The Devil”  – arrived by post this week.  He’d given me his address, but also said he was going to ………………Church on Sundays.

I decided to go along to ………………. Church today,  and who should offer me a coffee as I walked in the door? Yes, my Satanist friend was serving the coffee! I gave him the books, had a brief chat and sat down. 

After the sevice we had another chat. He was due to start ……………….. church’s Alpha Course this week. He told me he was really ill that day and couldn’t make it. Sounds like the enemy didn’t want him to go, so put the pressure on. In general chat, he was aggrieved that the local Christian City Mission had stopped him trying to talk to one of their female teenage volunteers. He wouldn’t accept my explanation of their supervisory role in her welfare. Lots of street guys will try to home in on our young lady volunteers, sometimes trying to follow them home. But my Satanist friend has suffered from years of rejection, so to him it’s just another one in the face, sadly. He described the City Mission’s actions in Jesus’ words as “a kingdom divided cannot stand”. I hadn’t the heart to tell him that he was still in another kingdom, as I didn’t want to add to his feelings of rejection. No doubt the church he’s going to will make that clear. The minister is devoted to outreach, so won’t be slow in explaining his true position, I’m sure.

I commended the books to him, so hope he reads them.

Four Ex-Prisoners Came In For Food Today

We had a succession of clients in for food today who’d all just been released from prison in the past few days. Problem is, they come out having been given around £50 and have to get on with it. One guy was clearly “out of it” on drink, as he took a while to make it through the door!  One young guy, who was no more than 23, said he’s just done his SIXTH prison sentence. 

One of the ex-cons was a woman, who I recognised as being in before. She recognised me too. She has a drink problem and inevitably ends up fighting and getting arrested. When she’s sober, she’s a lovely girl, like today.  She plans to move to an area outside town, to get away from “the wrong people”. I told her about a church plant in the district she’s going to, and said how friendly they were. She took the phone number, so I hope she goes along. She doesn’t have any church background whatever, so I hope she goes!

An older woman came in with one of her children. She was a single mum, with five kids altogether. Her partner of 16 years had been shown the door after getting another woman pregnant. The client said this was the last straw, as he’d had 12 affairs with other women in their 16 years together.

“I’m Going To Come To Church!”

In town I met a non-Christian guy I know on the margins of society who has a badly damaged leg. He goes into hospital for a 3 hour operation tomorrow, with a long recovery period following. He was really worried about it and I offered to pray with him which he gladly accepted. He thanked me and said:”when I recover I’m coming to your church!”. 

I then met up with a Christian lady in our  Street Mission as her team were going round town and we chatted to a couple she knew. The wife was a Christian, but not the husband. He talked abut the various illness he was suffering from, and said he was suffering pain in his neck from an accident. I offered to pray and his wife encouraged him to accept. He eventually agreed and I spoke to the pain and told it to go. He got some improvement, but not a great deal. I told him to thank Jesus throughout the day for what he was doing in his body if he wanted to see further improvement.

I had an e-mail today through my website from a guy who said he wants to become a Christian. He asked me to send a Bible and some Christian books, but didn’t give an address. I asked for his details, so am waiting for his reply.