What comes next?
- Will you pray with me?
- Will you bow down to your knees to thank the Savior for making the way possible?
- Will you join me in offering our thanksgiving for ALL HE HAS DONE?
- Will you seek His face & His grace?
Heavenly Father,
I come to you today, with elation & with a heaviness of heart for those who do not know You as their personal Savior. I ask for time, for more breaths, for them to live, so that they might come to know YOU.
“For You are great and do wondrous deeds;
(The Psalms 86: 10-13 NAS)
You alone are God.
Teach me Your way, O LORD;
I will walk in Your truth;
Unite my heart to fear Your name.
I will give thanks to You, O Lord my God, with all my heart.
And will glorify Your name forever.
For Your lovingkindness toward me is great,
And You have delivered my soul from the depths of Sheol.”
Have you ever considered death?
Sure, like so many before us, we all have thought about the absence of life, of what comes next (you know, when we die). When we take our last earthly breath and pass away, what then? That is the proverbial question all want answered right here, right now, on this day, while they still live.
The Good News of Jesus is that the answer to the question: What comes next?
Please stay with me for a minute to see how the Bible records Jesus explaining this truth to the religious leaders (the Pharisees), “who were lovers of money.”
Jesus spoke this parable, a story they would understand, so that they would ‘get’ the meaning.
“Now there was a rich man,
(The Gospel According to Luke 16: 19-24 NAS)
and he habitually dressed in purple and fine linen,
joyously living in splendor every day.
And a poor man named Lazarus was laid at his gate,
covered with sores, and longing to be fed with the crumbs which were falling from the rich man’s table;
besides, even the dogs were coming and licking his sores.
Now the poor man died and was carried away by the angels to Abraham’s bosom;
and the rich man also died and was buried.
In Hades he lifted up his eyes,
being in torment,
and saw Abraham far away and Lazarus in his bosom.
And he cried out and said,
“Father Abraham, have mercy on me,
and send Lazarus so that he may dip the tip of his finger in water
and cool off my tongue,
for I am in agony in this flame.”
Did we see the truth Jesus spoke?
- There are two places, two separate locations, two eternal destinations.
- The rich man went to the place of torment, to the place of flames, to Hades.
- The rich man could see into the other eternity, the place where he was not.
Do we see the the truth—what comes next for those who repent?
- The poor man was carried by the angels to his eternity.
- The poor man was taken to “Abraham’s bosom,” a place of comfort and rest.
- The poor man who suffered greatly in this life, who was in torment during his life on earth, was summoned to Hades by the rich man, to serve him who was in torment, “in agony in this flame.”
Now, I know the previous passage does not say that the poor man was carried to Abraham’s bosom BECAUSE he repented, so read with me the Lord’s Truth. Hear the conversation between these two—one in heaven & the other in hell.
“But Abraham said,
(The Gospel According to Luke 16: 25-31 NAS)
‘Child, remember that during your life you received your good things,
and likewise Lazarus bad things;
but now he is being comforted here,
and you are in agony.
And besides all this, between us and you there is a great chasm fixed,
so that those who wish to come over from here to you will not be able,
and that none may cross over from there to us.
And he said,
[the rich man]
‘Then I beg you, father, that you send him to my father’s house—
for I have five brothers—
in order that he may warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’
But Abraham said,
“They have Moses and the Prophets;
let them hear them.’
But he said,
[again the rich man said]
‘No, father Abraham,
but if someone goes to them from the dead,
they will repent!’
But he said to him,
[Father Abraham said these words to the rich man living in torment in Hades.]
‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets,
[while they are alive on this earth]
they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead.’ “
God will redeem our souls from the power of death, but we must first seek Him now, here on earth, while we are still alive. While it is still day, while there remains time for our decision, this is the time and place where we must decide.
What comes next?
The Bible is super-clear!
Our Redeemer lives!
& because our Redeemer resurrected from the grave,
& because He does live,
Then we—who believe in Jesus—will live too, (just as the poor man) in paradise, in heaven—where we will see God face-to-face!
The apostle Paul gives us an understanding to those who have placed their trust in Christ, who have believed in Him as their Savior. The apostle speaks of the body, comparing the one we have here on earth (the temporal) and our body, the one we will have in heaven (the eternal).
“For we know that if the earthly tent which is our house is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.
(The 2nd Letter of Paul to the Corinthians 5: 1 & 5 NAS)
. . .
Now He who prepared us for this very purpose is God, who gave to us the Spirit as a pledge.”
- Can we raise a Hallelujah?
- Can we raise our hands to praise the LORD?
- Can we bow onto our knees and pray to our Father, seeking to know Him better, to walk in His truth, to fear His name?
- Can we lower our heads and pray, thanking the Lord, glorifying His precious name?
Thank You, Jesus, for dying for me.
Thank You, Lord, for resurrecting to new life so we who believe might be saved.
The One, who has power over death, has delivered us from death, forevermore.
“For Your lovingkindness toward me is great,
(The Psalms 86: 13 NAS)
And You have delivered my soul from the depths of Sheol.”