[Faith-talk] Good Night Message for Monday, February 4, 2013

[Paul]

Well, here in the Americas it's evening, whereas for you in Europe or the UK, as this is being written, it's a very early Tuesday morning and, for you in Australia and Kiwi country, it's almost afternoon or soon will be.  At any rate, I hope and pray that, by God's matchless grace and His providential care, that your day went well or is going well.

Some years ago Peter Lundell wrote an article called "A New Perspective" which I'd like to share with you today.  It is rendered as follows:

My wife won an all-expenses-paid trip to a gargantuan, opulent resort for a working vacation, and I got to go with her.  I was awestruck at the gardens, aquariums, water park, ocean, and at the grandiosity of the architecture--the billions of dollars that must have gone into making this heaven on earth.  I thanked God I didn't have to pay.

Being so enthralled with the immensity of the place, I found myself not praying or reading my Bible as much as I normally do.  Oh, my.

So I asked myself where God fit into this picture of extravagance.  Since God is everywhere all the time, isn't it up to us to determine where He fits into our lives--or more accurately, where we fit into His universe? As I surveyed this Garden of Eden, this palace of kings, I started looking beyond it.  And I saw two things.

First, though it would take four days to see everything in this resort, it's still just a dot on the planet.  It would take many lifetimes to see even a fraction of everything on God's earth--and it's still a tiny ball in a vast cosmos.

Second, if humans could build such impressive places, what must heaven be like? Being at this resort gave me a new anticipation for how God's eternal resort must be infinitely beyond this earthly one.  Absolutely beyond imagination.

>From that point I continuously found myself praying and reaching for my Bible.  The change was a matter of getting a new perspective.  Whether your life feels good or bad right now, here's a promise from 1 Corinthians 2:9:  "No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love Him."

And there you have Brother Peter's article for today.  This is my humble opinion and it just might be shared by some of you, but all the books and testimonies about near-death experiences seem to fly in the face of this Scripture from 1 Corinthians.  I'm not doubting most of them, but I personally am very sceptical about the vast majority of them.  How does one know, for instance, if near-death experiences aren't really a figment of the authors' imaginings? No, I'll bank on that verse in 1 Corinthians rather than the perceived stories of people dying, going to heaven, seeing bright lights, hearing beautiful music, meeting Jesus and other things.  All of this is my opinion and not necessarily that of the lists and individuals who receive my messages.

And now may the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob just keep us safe, individually and collectively, throughout this night or day and especially in these last days in which we live.  Your Christian friend and brother, Paul