Impending Doom - My Search for Truth Part II

The 2nd thing I realized in my search for truth is that the Church of Jesus Christ doesn't teach the Judgment and the Wrath of God like it should. Before I go on and lose your attention, let me say,

YOU WILL STAND BEFORE GOD TO ANSWER FOR THE DEEDS YOU DID IN THIS LIFE!

There, I got that out of the way and now we can go on. First of all, I charge the Church with moral cowardice, because we're not able to stand up to people like John the Baptist did. John called the religious leaders of his day to account by saying, "you brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?" And then John called Herod to account by saying, "it is not right for you to have your brother's wife."

This age was not worthy of John and so he was beheaded.

Instead of warning people to flee impending wrath and prepare to stand before God at the Judgment, we tell them Jesus loves them (which is certainly true and not a bad thing to tell them). However, the Ungodly and Wicked have heard, "Jesus Love You," until it's become useless to them. They don't even pay attention to it anymore. Even worse, they make fun of the sayings, "Jesus Saves," and "Jesus Loves You." So now it's time to change our message, and make it more Biblical.

It's time to tell people that there is a final Judgment for both the Wicked and Righteous. Each man will stand before the Lord God most high and give account for everything done in this life, both good and bad. The Godly will recieve a reward for the good things they have done, and the wicked will suffer eternal punishment because they refuse to repent and turn to God.

And if you're a professing Christian that is practicing sin - stop now. The Holy God commands you to be holy and accepts nothing less. Don't think that just because you go to church that God somehow allows you indulgences. God forbid. God accepts only one thing from you - entire obedience to his will.

In the service of the Holy One,

John Wheeler

What will Heaven be like?

What will Heaven be like?

The question of what will heaven be like is probably best answered by asking, what are you like? For Heaven is a place that will be created for YOU!

God is self-existent (meaning he always existed and wasn’t created), so he existed before Heaven was created. Therefore Heaven wasn’t created for God – he didn’t need it. Since Angels are spirits, it’s possible that they didn’t even need heaven; or at the very least they don’t need the same things in heaven that you and I need in Heaven.

So Heaven is created for us.

Think about the splendor of Heaven. Heaven will not have any sin, evil, or decay, so all of the things that are ugly and lack beauty here on earth will not exist in Heaven. When you walk around Heaven you will be aware of the beautiful Holiness and Purity of the place. Heaven will be clean and pure in a way that you cannot imagine right now. There will be no sickness or disease. There will be no poverty. Heaven will be perfect because God made it that way and there will be nothing to change that.

Heaven will be a place of peace and love. When the Beatles sang about peace and love in the 60’s they were longing for Heaven. Heaven, and the fact that it exists has been birthed in your heart. It will be like your most fantastic dream come true. You will see the lion lay down with the lamb. You will bask in the love, mercy and presence of the Almighty God. God will walk with you face to face. People will love each other in a way that you cannot even imagine in this life.

Heaven will be more beautiful than you can even imagine. Heaven will be the most beautiful place that The Almighty can imagine. You’ll be awed by just how wonderful his imagination is. If you’ve ever been to the Grand Canyon and stood on the rim and marveled at the size, scope, beauty and grandeur of this amazing place, then you’ve had a teeny tiny sample of what heaven will be like.

Every place in Heaven will be incredibly more beautiful than anything you’ve ever seen or dreamed of on earth. You will see mountains that will absolutely awe you with their beauty and grandeur. There will be waterfalls that will floor you with how beautiful they are. There are going to be islands that will make the Caribbean or Hawaii look like garbage dumps, because they are more beautiful than anything you’ve ever thought of.

And one of the most interesting things about Heaven will be it’s size. We read in Revelation about the New Jerusalem and think that Heaven will be limited. NO WAY!

Heaven will be made for people that are going to live forever; a people that like to explore; a people that must learn new things to be challenged; a people that are filled with insatiable curiosity; a people that could easily become board in eternity if Heaven weren’t designed to meet their needs. So heaven will go on forever and ever. You will never explore it all. Nobody will. You will go to a waterfall one day (there won’t be days in Heaven, but bear with me. It’ll be easier for both of us to understand if we talk in terms of this age that we understand.) The next day you will go to another beautiful waterfall and you will marvel at its beauty, and so it will continue. Each place and each experience will be rewarding, mentally challenging, and invigorating. Heaven is made to keep you interested and fulfilled forever.

So like Jesus says, “Lay up your treasure in Heaven.” Keep your mind fixed upon Heaven and your eternal home. The 80 years of hardship that you endure here on earth will be immediately forgotten as soon as you get to Heaven.

John Wheeler

My Struggle for the Truth

My Personal Struggle for Truth (Part 1)

At about the age of 18 I started a long and arduous spiritual journey to find the truth about God. I grew up in church, but a lot of what I had been told didn’t make sense. The gospel that I was taught didn’t intuit well – it made no sense. I saw people come to church on Sunday and live like the Devil the rest of the week, and we were supposed to believe that they were children of God and even elders in the church. It makes no sense that you can live anyway you like and not offend a holy God.

I was taught that salvation required no works. In fact to think that you had to do anything to procure salvation was evil. All one had to do to be saved was to sincerely pray the sinner’s prayer.

I heard and saw people pray the sinners prayer and they didn’t make any changes their lives. Obviously they didn’t have any faith in God or Jesus other than that he possibly existed; but because they prayed the sinner’s prayer the pastor or other religious leader would pronounce them miraculously “saved.” Sometimes this rite of the church was such a farce that the saved person himself didn’t even believe that he was saved and didn’t understand what he had just said. Not to worry, we were taught that salvation was so wonderful the carnal mind could not fathom it, and these were new citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven.

Like so many other Christians, I believed what I was taught about salvation until one night I saw a great travesty. A woman had come to the church. She was the mother of a young lady that attended the church. The woman, who’s name escapes me, was from a Pacific Island, barely spoke any English, and if she wasn’t a little mentally ill at the very least she was simple minded.

Her Daughter had a great desire to see her mother saved, so when the Pastor made an alter call that evening, the daughter helped her mother to the front of the church. After a few moments at the front of the church, the mother, the daughter, myself and possibly some others were directed into a room off the main sanctuary where we could spend some time with the woman.

I’m not really sure what the woman understood about God, about Jesus, or about religion in general. To my mind, it seemed like she understood nothing about God (although because of the language barrier, I may have gotten the wrong impression). Our time with the woman centered on getting her to recite the Sinner’s Prayer and have faith. She belligerently resisted for at least 20 minutes, but the crowd’s desire to see her “saved,” and the fact that her daughter was in anguish for her mother’s unrepentant soul caused people to persist. The poor woman was encouraged and badgered with words such as, “Don’t you want to go to heaven?” “All you have to do is say this prayer with us, and you will go to heaven,” or, “just have faith in Jesus, that’s all you need.”

Finally, I think they told her just to say, “Jesus,” and she would be saved. As I remember it, the woman finally repeated whatever the group wanted her to repeat, and there was exuberant praise because another soul had been added to the Kingdom.

I was less than convinced by the conversion. I don’t think she had saving faith at all. I doubt that a soul was added to the Kingdom that night, and I don’t see that God was glorified by our actions.

In fact this night has haunted me like Poe’s Raven, constantly causing me to question the instructions that we give sinners.

John Wheeler

PS, I will post Part II soon