“BUT, WHAT IF I’M WRONG?”
[Viewings: 95]
by John Flanner
Throughout the course of our lives we all make thousands of choices. Most of these, especially those we make on a daily basis, are quite insignificant, but of course some decisions we take are life-changing.
At the age of 21 I made, what I consider in hindsight, to be the most important decision of my life. I decided at the end of an evening service at Westminster Chapel to surrender my life to Jesus Christ. In short I accepted Jesus as my Lord and Saviour. In a simple personal prayer I thanked Jesus for dying upon the cross for my sins, asked him to forgive me and I received the gift of eternal life by virtue of his resurrection from the dead. I was told by some of the people around me that Jesus had come into my heart, forgiven my sins and given me eternal life so that if I should have died that night my eternal destination was assured.
In the weeks following my decision to become a Christian (what some people call being “born again”) many family members and friends tried to persuade me that I had been brainwashed into following some kind of a cult. After a while my resolve began to weaken and I decided that all of those people must be right and that, after all, I had been deceived. I chose, therefore, to walk away from all of that God stuff.
Amazingly, however, God did not walk away from me because little by little things started happening to convince me that Jesus was real and that he was actually living in my life. One of the first things that happened was that he answered the cry of my heart for a girlfriend. Sylvia and I got on so well together that as early as our fourth date, I asked her to marry me. Happily she agreed and more than 40 years on she has clearly been God’s choice for my life.
Just as I have grown in my love for Sylvia so too I have grown in my love for Jesus. No one can persuade me that I am not married or that Sylvia does not exist and the same can be said for my relationship with Jesus. I am a Christian and Jesus is very real to me. In the beginning all those years ago I received him as my personal saviour, but now he is so much more than that. He has become my healer, my provider, my shepherd, my strength, my song, my joy, my friend, my king and my God. We walk and talk together every day just as Sylvia and I do.
But, what if I am wrong and that I was deceived all of those years ago? Well of course that would be incredibly disappointing, but along the way I have had a ball. Despite many challenges and set backs in life, my faith and trust in Jesus (deceived or not!) has yielded love, joy and peace in super abundance.
Of course if Jesus does not, or did not exist, then the question comes back to me “What will happen when I die?
Some people are of the belief that there is no after-life so it’s a case of eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die etc. In many ways I am a simple kind of a guy, but to me the whole universe is crying out, ‘ life, life and more life’. The beautiful butterfly cries out to me that there is life after the caterpillar and the chrysalis. Also in creation we see in the seasons how Spring follows Winter and so on. to me these and other things are signs of something beyond death and the grave.
Do we have any say in what happens to us after we die?
People of a fatalist persuasion would say not, but I do not go along with that view. I believe with all of my heart that how we live our lives here on Planet Earth does profoundly affect how and where we will spend eternity. I am convinced that Jesus Christ is the answer for the world today, he always has been and always will be. Indeed it was Jesus himself who answered his disciples’ question “Show us the way (to Heaven/eternal life)”. Jesus replied by saying “I am the way, the truth and the life. No one can come to the Father (God) except through me.”
Jesus made many other claims too indicating that he alone was the way into Heaven and eternal life. Statements such as “I am the door”, “I am the light of the world”, “I am the bread of life”, “I am the resurrection and the life” and “I am the good shepherd” clearly reinforce this view.
Whilst I fully respect people of other Faiths and philosophies, nothing and no-one answers the real questions of life and death for me in the way that Jesus does. If God does exist and he is Holy, righteous and perfect in every way, then my sin is a problem. I am far from perfect and would have no right to enter into God’s perfect Heaven, because I would only ruin it with my sinful nature. It is clearly true what the Bible says that ALL of us have sinned and come short of God’s standard and that is how death came into the world in the first place. Again I quote the words from the Bible, “The wages of sin is death”. That if you like is the bad news, but thankfully there is good news. The verse I have just quoted goes on to say “but the free gift of God is eternal life”.
Jesus was born of a virgin, therefore he was sinless. He lived a totally sinless life and was then brutally crucified by sinful men at the age of 33. It was all in the plan of God, however, that his son should give his life sacrificially for every human being who wanted to receive him as their own personal Saviour. That is what I did in London all those years ago.
Jesus then rose from the dead, conquering death and the grave once and for all and rose to everlasting life. It all makes perfect sense to me. Jesus took my place and because of his death I can live for evermore. This is so wonderful.
Who else in the entire history of mankind has ever done anything like this for you or me? I dare to suggest no Mohammed, no Buddha, no guru – no, not anyone at all has ever loved you as Jesus loves you.
I encourage you with all of my heart to think about these things. You are going to die for sure one day, but the choices you make here on Earth will determine your eternal destination. Again I quote some precious words from the Bible, “The one who has the son of God (Jesus) has eternal life, but the one who does not have the Son of God, does not have eternal life”.
But, what if I’m wrong? I have lost nothing, for I have enjoyed a truly wonderful life following Jesus – real or not. But, what if you are wrong and I am right, then you have lost everything, your life and your soul. It’s worth thinking about!
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