What’s an eternity anyways?

What? 2 weeks in a row?!?!?! That’s right. Last night I talked about people who take all of their anger and aggression and they bottle it up until the moment it completely explodes. I have been experiencing this feeling, only it hasn’t been with anger or aggression. If you know me, then you know my mind often wanders, and this is because I seriously have like dozens of thoughts racing through my mind at the same time. Am I the only one that experiences this? Sometimes I feel like I have the absolute hardest time settling down and actually sticking with one thought or one conversation. Who knows, perhaps I should be taking some kind of medication. Anyways, it helps me tremendously to be able to write these thoughts down and hopefully you find it helpful to read it.

I have experienced two things this past week that have coincided with each other in a way, and it has really got me thinking. First off, at our yard sale a couple weeks ago, I bought a book entitled 23 Minutes in Hell (Thanks Michelle!) by Bill Wiese. The topic of Hell has always intrigued me a bit, and I had heard of this man a long time ago, so I figured I would pick it up. To give you a little background, he was a man who considered himself a Christian. He went to church, had a lot of knowledge of the Bible and he was an overall “decent” guy. He went to bed one night in November, and without any explanation was thrown out of his bed and into Hell. I would strongly recommend anyone reading this, because it doesn’t mean as much hearing it from me.  He backs his story up with scripture as well as other people who have experienced the same horrific event. The book left me with a better sense as to what Hell is about and left me with an even greater feeling that I do not want to end up there.

Last Sunday night, I went and saw a movie called Paranormal Activity. Chances are, if you haven’t seen it you are beginning to hear things about it. Again, I don’t want to give away much because it is a pretty insane movie. What I will tell you is that it is about a couple who is being haunted by a demonic presence. My good friend Toby saw it the night before and was seriously afraid of the dark for a couple days. I am not sure how many of you guys like scary movies, but I know for me, the one thing that keeps me from going crazy and curling up into a little ball on the ground is the fact that it’s just a movie. Yeah, there are serial killers, crazy people who do crazy stuff, but for the most part, these plots and stuff are nothing but fiction.

I guess the major parallel between these two things is that whole idea of demons and Hell. Everyone who has any knowledge in God and the Bible know that those who choose to reject Him will spend an eternity in Hell. We all have our own little images of Hell, whether it is hot, dark, or scary. I think what we end up losing, is the severity of this choice that we make. We make jokes about going to Hell, but I don’t think we really understand what it all means. Hell is a place of horrifying torment and a place that we can never escape. I want you to spend a moment and think of your biggest fear. Something that absolutely terrifies you. Then I want you to take that and multiply it by 1,000,000 because that is essentially what Hell is. Hell is full of demons (like the movie) and void of all peace, happiness, and worst of all, God. We live our lives with the hope that things will eventually get better. We know that no matter how crappy things are, there is hope that God will make things better. Hell has nothing like that. Hell is a place for hopelessness and hatred. I pray today that everyone who reads this understands that the choices we make today are HUGE! I don’t want you to come to know Jesus because of the fear of going to Hell, but I want you to become aware of how horrible that place is. I want you guys to truly get to know Jesus because despite our mistakes and failures, He is willing to do anything to spare us of an eternity there.  This is why I say the love He has for us is unlike anything we can imagine. Can you imagine being angry at someone and having the opportunity to punish them by sending to Hell? Most of us would jump at that opportunity, yet no matter how much we hurt or anger God, He still offers us grace and a chance to spend eternity with Him. I hope that you all get a moment to sit and really think about all of these words. Grasp the concept of Heaven and Hell and grasp concept of a God who loves us enough to allow us to make the choice. I love all of you guys and I hope you are able to have peace in the fact that you have given your life to Jesus. If you haven’t ever prayed that prayer and if you are really unsure if you are going to Heaven or not, please go to the “Need Jesus?” tab at our website (www.parkwayyouth.com) and get that fresh start today!

Epidemic

Hey what’s going on guys? Sorry again for the lack of posts the last few weeks, but here I am again. I hope all of you guys are doing well… I know I have been dealing with kind of cold/infection the last few days and I know I am not the only one to be dealing with it. Seriously, doesn’t it seem like some kind of epidemic is sweeping the city of Phoenix. Oh well, better get out there and get your flu shots.

Anyways, you know what I hate most about being sick? I hate the fact that you seem almost helpless. I have been sick to the point where I am curled up in a little ball in my bed and I just ache and it hurts to just move. Lately my throat has been hurting like crazy and it hurts to eat or drink, and it just makes you miserable. I know what I want to do, but because of this little bug inside my body, I just can’t seem to do it. I have been lethargic and exhausted, and I don’t even know why! Whenever you hear of people catching a cold, they always say something to the affect of “Oh man, I can’t get sick now. I have too much going on.” We live in a society that we lack a lot of stuff, but probably the biggest thing we seem to lack is time. We don’t even have time to keep ourselves healthy!

This scenario in a way reminds me of our relationship with God. Before accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior, we live our lives a certain way. A lot of the time, we live in a way that we think is fine, and this is because we don’t really know God and the standards that He has for us. If you have ever heard of someone who has been sick for an extended period of time, you will hear them talk about how they almost forget what it is like to be healthy again. This is the same thing with us and God. Before we get to know Him, we are completely satisfied with how our lives are. It isn’t until we actually get to know Him that we see the amazing love that He has for us. His love fills that place in our hearts that has always been empty. We spend our lives trying to stuff that space in our hearts with friends, boyfriends, girlfriends, drugs, sex, anything we can find so that we may feel whole. I didn’t grow up in church, and even when I came to know Jesus, I remember not feeling too much different, but looking back and seeing what God has done in my life, I am completely amazed! Still, even when we get to know Jesus, we still have moments when we can lose sight of Him and we fall into the same traps. We get sick, and we get lethargic about our faith, and it becomes harder to read the Bible, harder to pray and harder to go to church. A couple months ago, we talked about Paul and how he went from a murderer of Christians to one of the most influential people behind the entire Christian movement following Christ’s resurrection. Even after Paul came to know Jesus, and while he was preaching to thousands and seeing them come to know Jesus, he still went through these periods where he just didn’t feel right. Paul talks about this in Romans when he says “For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.” I think we all go through these periods when we decide to get serious, and we try to truly follow God only to once again fall short. We treat it almost like a New Year’s Resolution. We decide we are going to lose weight, and do well for 3 days, and then the moment we cheat once, we give up all together. All of us have that little bug inside of us called sin. This means that even when we do everything we can to stay on the right path, we will have moments of weakness and we will slip up. Everyone goes through this! Paul devoted his entire life to preaching the Word of God to people, and He went through this! If there is one thing I could say to you guys, it is that you cannot give up! Even when you think you have completely failed, you have to get back on the horse and keep trying. Not for my sake, or even for your sake necessarily, but for the sake of this world that needs you! This world needs people to stand up and be the model of a true Christian! When you slip up, instead of giving up, you need to try your best to get closer to God. We are all infected with sin, but our only medicine for this disease is Jesus. No amount of good deeds will ever rid your body of sin. The only thing we can do to get away from it is get closer to God and allow him to cleanse us and get rid of this sin. I hope that you guys can understand that you will mess up, man I still mess up A LOT! But that isn’t an excuse to give up on God. We all have good days and bad days, but in the end this world needs Jesus and some people’s only encounter with Him will be through you. This world needs you!