Yes, I said it. When we leave this Earth, and we aren't astronauts. Kicking the bucket, passing away, or going to a better place. We all fear it. Many people have had to face it early on, others have never experienced the death of a friend or relative but yet they fear it because they know of it. Now you may be thinking "Laura, what is up with you? Everyone knows about death and how scary it is, so why are you tormenting me here?" The reason is because, if you are a Christian, which I hope you are, you shouldn't fear anything. Nothing. This is especially hard for me to understand, but in the Bible it says "Do not fear" over 100 times. A favorite verse of mine says:
"For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind." 2 Timothy 1:7
We aren't supposed to fear, especially death, because we get to go to heaven!!! I'm so excited for heaven, it is the most beautiful and glorious place, and we get to go to it!
"If our Creator has so bountifully provided for our existence here, which is but momentary, and for our temporal wants, which will soon be forgotten, how much more must He have done for our enjoyment in the everlasting world?" - Hosea Ballou
I want to share this part of a book I read by Don Piper called "90 Minutes in Heaven." This guy crashed his car into an eighteen-wheeler and died instantly, and went to heaven for 90 minutes. He saw his friends and family that had died, and realized he was in heaven.
"After a time (I'm resorting to human terms again), we started moving together right up to the gate. No one said it, but I simply knew God had sent all those people to escort me inside the portals of heaven.
Looming just over the heads of my reception committee stood an awesome gate interrupting a wall that faded out of sight in both directions. It struck me that the actual entrance was small in comparison to the massive gate itself. I stared, but I couldn't see the walls in either direction. As I gazed upwards, I couldn't see the top either.
One thing did surprise me: On earth, whenever I thought of heaven, I anticipated that one day I'd see a gate made of pearls, because the Bible refers to the gates of pearl. The gate wasn't made of pearls, but was pearlescent-perhaps iridescent may be be more descriptive. To me, it looked like someone had spread pearl icing on a cake. The gate glowed and shimmered.
I paused and stared at the glorious hues and shimmering shades. The luminescence dazzled me, and i would have been content to stay at that spot. Yet I stepped forward as if being escorted into God's presence.
I paused just outside the the gate, and I could see inside. It was like a city with paved streets. To my amazement, they had been constructed of literal gold. If you imagine a street paved with gold bricks, that's as close as I can come to describing what lay inside the gate.
Everything I saw was so bright-the brightest colors my eyes ever beheld-so powerful that no earthly human could take in this brilliance.
In the midst of that powerful scene, I continued to step closer to the gate and assumed that I would go inside. My friends and relatives were all in front of me, calling, urging, and inviting me to follow." -90 Minutes in Heaven by Don Piper p. 34-35
It doesn't matter whether you think his story true or not, that's not my point. My point is heaven is wonderful. I've read that book two or three times now because I love the description of heaven. Now I'm not suicidal or have a death-wish or anything like that. We all have jobs to do on Earth and I've got mine. I'm saying look forward to heaven and look forward to seeing our God. Because in seeing what life after death really is, we can see everything in this life much more clearly.
"The Spirit of God whets our appetite by giving us a taste of what's ahead. He puts a little of heaven in our hearts so that we'll never settle for less." 2 Corinthians 5:5 (Message Paraphrase)
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