And as we saw in our brief, previous blog post, how many churchgoers know what The Great Commission is? 17 percent.
It's interestingly sad how we’ll focus so much energy, say, arguing in a comment section on a political-based post on social media (USING ALL CAPITAL LETTERS!), all because someone else doesn’t believe exactly like we do, when Heaven and Hell are where we’ll spend (and here are some capital letters that actually matter) ETERNITY. We focus so little on something that will last so long; and whether it’s in Heaven or in Hell, forever is a long, long time.
Even though Jesus promises to us that we have POWER -- the very power that raised Him from the grave -- to change people's eternal destination, We. Do Not. Take Eternity. Seriously. In fact, only 48% of people in the U.S. believe in Heaven and only 36% believe in Hell; atheists clearly don’t believe in God, the afterlife, and so on; and it’s commonly seen that popular figures such as the Dalai Lama will say on TV that Heaven and Hell doesn’t exist, and Joel Osteen who, in his sermons streamed on TV and online all around the world, among other very questionable things, refuses to preach about the existence of Hell. Author Randy Alcorn adds to this line of thought:
‘“The sense that we will live forever somewhere has shaped every civilization in human history. Australian aborigines pictured Heaven as a distant island beyond the western horizon. The early Finns thought it was an island in the faraway east. Mexicans, Peruvians, and Polynesians believed that they went to the sun or the moon after death. Native Americans believed that in the afterlife their spirits would hunt the spirits of buffalo. The Gilgamesh epic, an ancient Babylonian legend, refers to a resting place of heroes and hints at a tree of life. In the pyramids of Egypt, the embalmed bodies had maps placed beside them as guides to the future world. The Romans believed that the righteous would picnic in the Elysian Fields, while their horses grazed nearby. Seneca, the Roman philosopher, said, “The day thou fearest as the last is the birthday of eternity.” Although these depictions of the afterlife differ, the unifying testimony of the human heart throughout history is belief in life after death. Anthropological evidence suggests that every culture has a God-given, innate sense of the eternal -- that this world is not all there is.”’
What those statistics and those words from celebrities and everyday people alike from cultures around the world all have in common is that they’re merely subjective opinions that aren’t worth betting your eternal destination on; the fact that no human being knows for certain what will happen to our souls upon death can’t be overstated. With that said, opinions can have serious, eternal consequences. Thus, if Jesus is the Son of God (we have very reasonable evidence to trust that He is, and will get to that evidence in the near future), then if we live by subjective opinions alone and not what He specifically says about the afterlife, then our very souls are in deep trouble upon death. Alcorn continues:
‘“For [everyone] who believes [they’re] going to Hell, there are 120 who believe they’re going to Heaven. This optimism stands in stark contrast to Christ’s words in Matthew 7:13-14: “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow is the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.” . . . Judging by what’s said at most funerals, you’d think nearly everyone’s going to Heaven, wouldn’t you? But Jesus made it clear that most people are not going to Heaven. . . . We dare not “wait and see” when it comes to what’s on the other side of death. We shouldn’t just cross our fingers and hope that our names are written in the Book of Life (Revelation 21:27). We can know, we should know, before we die. And because we may die at any time, we need to know now – not next month or next year. “Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes” (James 4:14). It’s of paramount importance to make sure you are going to Heaven, not Hell. The voice that whispers, “There’s no hurry; put this book down; you can always think about it later,” is not God’s voice. . . . The reality of Hell should break our heart and take us to our knees and to the doors of those without Christ. Today, however, even among many Bible believers, Hell has become “the H word,” seldom named, rarely talked about.”’
The world offers promise full of emptiness, but Jesus' tomb offers emptiness full of promise; what happened to Christ can happen for us; death isn’t the end if we trust in Him to eternally save us. Death is either a period or a comma, and with Christ alone it’s merely a comma. That is the message of Christ’s resurrection.
With 150,000 each day (55 million per year), death barely misses us with every passing day. We’re still on this side of eternity, and we must wake up to reality. A handful of those who “get it” can’t do the immense job alone of leading everyone to Christ – especially those who you are closest to that need to hear the Gospel message. God created us uniquely, to not only come to know Him but to uniquely make Him known. Trust Him as your Savior, trust Him in times of happiness, trust Him in times of pain, and trust Him that He will give you the strength to comfort others and lead them to His salvation in ways that only you can. Look first to your family – even to those who’ve been to church every single time the doors are open, perhaps they’ve never asked to be saved. Look into the innocent eyes of your young children and grandchildren, nieces and nephews; you must be their rock; they are your life's purpose.
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