Posts Tagged "relationship"
Are You Prepared?
“Go to now, ye that say, Today or tomorrow we will go into such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell, and get gain: Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.” (James 4:13-14 KJV)
A story is told of a married couple who enjoyed their luxury fishing boat together, but it was the husband who was always behind the wheel operating the boat. He was concerned about what might happen in an emergency. So one day out on the lake he said to his wife, “Please take the wheel, dear. Pretend that I am having a heart attack. You must get the boat safely to shore.” So she drove the boat to shore.
Later that evening, the wife walked into the living room where her husband was watching television. She sat down next to him, switched the TV channel, and said to him, “Please go into the kitchen, dear. Pretend I’m having a heart attack. You must set the table, cook the dinner, and wash the dishes.”
It’s not a very pleasant thing to pretend such a thing, but there are some legitimate concerns we should have. I wouldn’t consider it at all out of place for an insurance salesman to ask the question, “If you were to have a heart attack today, would your wife and children be taken care of?”
An even more important question needs to be raised as we consider our spiritual relationship with God. If I were to have a heart attack tonight and die, would I be prepared to stand before the great judgment seat of Christ? It’s a legitimate question. When I was a teenager, I thought that I would live forever. As I grow older, I become more and more aware of the fact that each day is a blessing provided by God, and I am not promised even one more.
I know it requires a degree of seriousness that may make you a bit uncomfortable, but just for a moment, pretend that you are having a heart attack. Are you prepared for eternity?
Read MoreThe Reward of Loving God’s Son
“Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father: (but) he that acknowledgeth the Son hath the Father also.” (1 John 2:23 KJV)
A very wealthy man lost his wife when his only child was very young. Then there came into his home a housekeeper to take care of that boy. The boy lived until he was of age, and then he died. The man had no other relatives; and he died heartbroken soon after the boy died. He had no one to leave his enormous wealth to, and there was a question about what would become of his possessions. They could find no will. It looked as if it would all pass over to the state. At last it was taken over by the state, and they held a sale to dispose of his personal effects, at the mansion where he had lived.
The old housekeeper who had brought up that boy from infancy, not having any money of her own, being just as poor as when she began to work for this wealthy man and keep house for him, went to the sale. There was only one thing she wanted. She couldn’t buy the furniture; she couldn’t buy the expensive rugs, but there was a picture on a wall in that house, a picture of the boy. She loved that boy. He had been to her a son, although she held no relationship to him. When the picture came to be sold, nobody else wanted it, and she bought it just for a few cents, and took it home.
It had been hanging on the wall for some time, and she thought she would clean it, take the back out, take the glass out, and polish it. But when she took it apart, some important looking papers fell out. They were given to a lawyer, who said to the woman, “I guess you have fallen on your feet this time. This man has left all his wealth to the one who loved his son enough to buy that picture.”
God will do anything for those who love His Son… try it!
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