May 26, 2007
Newsletter Archives

Because some quotations are like dandelions (they are always popping up), we should always be looking for new ones. Yet one I have heard literally hundreds of times has not lost its edge. It is the statement: “Heaven is a prepared place for a prepared people.” This is so true. Yet most people expect to be in heaven without any preparation.
A 1991 Gallup poll showed that 78 percent of Americans expect to go to heaven when they die. However, many of them hardly ever pray, read the Bible, or attend church. They admit that they live to please themselves, instead of God. Another poll noted by Maurice R. Irwin in an article entitled, “Are We Ready for Heaven?” points out that only 34 percent of the American people who call themselves Christians attend church at least once a week.
It is not necessary to go to church to have a place in heaven, but we should be going somewhere to try to find out if we are ready. The Lord Jesus warned his listeners to be ready for the kingdom of God and for His return. He said, “Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh” Matthew 24:44.
When the Lord Jesus went to the cross to die, He made the provision for us to be with Him. Yet if we don’t accept the provision, we will never be in heaven. The Lord Jesus warned some who fully expected to be in God’s kingdom that they would not be there. He stated, “There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out.” Luke 13:28
With such a warning from the Lord Jesus to the most religious people of His day, it is advisable for all of us to ask the question, have I made the right preparation for heaven?

Russ Nesbit