This is part 4 of a series of questions that have been posed to me that have been particularly challenging to my faith. I hope you will go back and read the first 3 posts. The question that will be discussed in this post is from a book I have been reading. The book is titled Crazy Love by Francis Chan. The question that he poses to the readers in this book is this:
“If you could have heaven, with no sickness, and with all the friends you ever had on earth, and all the food you ever liked, and all the leisure activities you ever enjoyed, and all the natural beauties you ever saw, all the physical pleasures you ever tasted, and no human conflict or any natural disasters, could you be satisfied with heaven, if Christ was not there?”
If you’re anything like me, your thought progression as you read that looked like this: “yes…yes…oh yes…that sounds great too…wow…yes…awesome…………..oh….ouch.” This question punched me in the gut. It made me really see where my love was placed. My love was placed in physical beauty and food and friends and fun things on earth, but it was not placed with Christ…. and thats not okay.
Christians can’t wear the name Christian if their love is only in the reward of a great heaven, and not in Christ…..Please read that sentence again slowly…. Think about those words. Becoming and living as a Christian is about so much more than escaping hell and about more than inheriting heaven. Being a Christian is all about pledging my allegiance to King Jesus because I love Him and He loves me, and I want to spend my life worshipping and living for Jesus, the one who left heaven (the greatest place to be) to come suffer and die so that I could be with Him in eternity. I can’t fully grasp what Jesus has done. What I can grasp is that I don’t love Him enough for how much He loves me.
Again I ask the question:
“If you could have heaven, with no sickness, and with all the friends you ever had on earth, and all the food you ever liked, and all the leisure activities you ever enjoyed, and all the natural beauties you ever saw, all the physical pleasures you ever tasted, and no human conflict or any natural disasters, could you be satisfied with heaven, if Christ was not there?”
I hope you will take that question and look inwardly, as I had to, and really consider where your love lies. If your love is in anything but being with Jesus for eternity, you may have missed the point. I want to encourage you to not just live for Jesus, not just worship Jesus, not just be thankful for Jesus, but to LOVE Jesus. After all, He loved you first (1 John 4:10).
Remember that I love you and God loves you.
-KB
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