30 Days To Live

DeathClock.com tells me I have until June 7, 2048. Type in deathcounter on google and watch it go…it has real time deaths ticking away…(start snapping fingers)

The unnerving reality of watching this counter go is that at some unknown point, your life …my life…will ultimately collide with it. Leaving behind grieving family and dear friends in its wake. It leaves everything behind, houses, cars, jobs, money, trophies, titles, achievements, goals, desires, fame…death is a sure thing…unavoidable…waiting, watching, ever moving closer with unchanging precision until its final second of arrival...STOP SNAPPING! (Exhale)

House MD clip

Is there something more? Or is death the sum of all we have been living for?

Whether you sit at Whitehouse, here at Perrysburg, or in your chair at home watching from the internet…your time has been determined.

I am going to keep this short and to the point, just like life☺

There is someone who has cheated death, conquered sin and as a result, beat down a new path of existence. There is someone who has offered an alternative.

Imagine being diagnosed by a doctor, given 30 days to live…but then they turn to you and offer you an option. What if they told you there is a chance for a new start on life. What if it were explained to you that they could provide you with a new body, soul and mind…disease free, sin free, one without pain or heartache, one without tears or sorrow. One that would never break down, one that is truly living?

What if they told you this wasn’t the end, but merely the beginning?

Would you take that offer? Would you choose to live like that? Or would you reject it and stay the course of your own decisions, based solely on your own power to provide a life through your own means, answering only to yourself?

Would you take that offer? Now imagine that offer didn’t come from doctors, who are fallible, or scientists, whose resources are finite…but from God, who created all that is.

Life and death is the only human struggle that means anything.

The question of death is the only answer that can truly bring life. The understanding of death brings a profound answer to how we live our lives. It changes everything. It encompasses meaning, hope and purpose.

So what does the bible say about death?

We need not be afraid if God is with us. It’s in the Bible, Psalm 23:4, TLB. "Even when walking through the dark valley of death I will not be afraid, for You are close beside me, guarding, guiding all the way."

To be "absent from the body" is to be "present with the Lord" (2 Cor. 5:8). This is the clearest of truths in the mind of Paul, and one of the most comforting assurances for the child of God. Death for the Christian is not so much an exit out of life as it is an entry into the Lord’s presence in a very personal sense.

John 14 Jesus says “I go and prepare a place for you, so that where I am, you may be also”. Death for the Christian means eternal life with God. Lee will have much more to say about heaven in a few weeks.

But what does death mean for those who chose not to accept Jesus Christ?

In the Bible there are two options…heaven and hell.

Bertrand Russell (atheist philosopher)“ there is one very serious defect in Christ’s moral character, and that is – he believed in hell…I do not myself feel that anyone who is really profoundly humane can believe in everlasting punishment.

What does the bible say about hell?)

1. Not of this world, realm or creation: Jn 18:36; Heb 9:11,24; Rev 20:11=2 Pe 3:10

1. A place of unquenchable fire of Gehenna: Mk 9:43,45,47; Mt 5:22,29,30; 18:8,9; Jas 3:6

1. "Away from God’s presence": 2 Th 1:9; cast into outer darkness: Mt 22:13

G. Worse than drowned in sea with millstone hung around neck: Mt 18:6 (Jesus)

A. A place of everlasting destruction: 2 Th 1:9; Phil 3:19; Heb 10:39

4. Weeping and gnashing of teeth: Mt 13:42,50; 25:30

C. Duration of punishment is forever, eternity

Some Christians believe different things about hell…

Some take it literally, that there will be literal gnashing of teeth, worms physically eating the body, nothing but darkness, eternal burning in a lake of fire…screaming!

Some take it metaphorically, claiming that hell is certainly an eternal state of torment and separation of God, but the actual punishments are not clear in the bible…

While others believe those who choose not to turn to Jesus are simply annihilated and cease to exist.

It depends on hermeneutics, that is simply, how you choose to interoperate scripture.

I personally believe the bible points to a place of everlasting torture, a stark contrast to heaven…a place separated from God, filled with agony and endless suffering.