Eternal Life

John 11:25–26 NKJV

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live. And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?”

. Though our hearts are heavy today, as we mourn for our brother Geoff, we must also find peace in the confident hope that we have in Jesus, who scripture tells us died that we may have eternal life.

. It is not wrong to mourn it is actually what we are meant to do, and we are to mourn with Susie and the family and be there to support them in anyway.

Ecclesiastes 3:4 NKJV

A time to weep, And a time to laugh; A time to mourn, And a time to dance;

. I believe the thing that we need to try to remember the most is that Geoff was absolutely and undeniable a man of great faith, he had no doubt at all in his heart that God is good and that his God loved him, even on his worst days his faith in Jesus did not waver.

. and he believed wholeheartedly that when his time on earth was done he would be going into the glory of heaven to spend eternity with the God who loved him enough to die for him.

. moments like these can be make or break moments for our faith, it is moments of hurt and sadness, and also of not understanding why that we make choices to either dive fully into our faith or choice to walk away.

. I want to make sure that you all know, that right now Geoff is healed, that healing miracle that we have all been praying for has happened. It did not happen the way that any of us wanted us to. and we could spend the next few weeks or even months trying to figure out why.

.But the prayers that we prayed have been answered, Sometimes God takes the sickness away from the person, other times he takes the person away from the sickness.

. But there is no longer any sickness or pain in Geoff, he has a new body that is perfect, he will never again feel pain, sickness or fear.

. But is right now in heaven with God experiencing something that one day all of us will experience with him, while it feels to us right now that this is the end, its actually only the beginning of eternity for Geoff.

. The question at the end of the verse in that we read out is what i want you to ask yourself today, “Do you believe this?”

. Because if you believe this, if this rings true in your spirit.... we can find some comfort and some solace in the fact that Geoff is in the presence of God,

. One thing that we can do together to honor Geoff, is to take hold of the things that he was believing for and working to see. I know that everyone of us have had our lives touched and impacted by Geoff, something that he said or something that he did for us, or just by Geoff being the amazing man of God that he was.

. I was privileged a few weeks ago to get to spend some time talking with Geoff, and i asked him what his favorite scripture was and why?

. and i believe that he would want me to share it with all of you today.

the verse is an amazingly simple one

John 11:35 NKJV

Jesus wept.

.amazingly simply and amazingly beautiful at the same time

amazingly simply and amazingly beautiful at the same time

.When i asked Geoff why this was his favorite verse he told me it was because of the compassion that Jesus was showing for all people.

. people were grieving at the loss of Lazarus, and Jesus knew what he was about to do, yet he joins with the people in cry and grieving in the same way that they were.

. Jesus is grieving with us right now, he understands complete how each of us feel. he knows the questions that we are asking ourselves he knows.

. When i think about that conversation that i had with Geoff i can see that this definitely was his favorite verse.

. This describes Geoff and the way that he lived his life, i don't think i have ever meet anyone as loving and compassionate towards all people as Geoff.

. Even until the very end this was who he was and this is how he lived his life, i know that everyone that came into contact with Geoff over the last few months walked away encouraged. and walked away feeling encouraged and inspired.

. I know that some of you are hurting, and wondering why, why did this have to happen.

. I wish i had all the answers to give you but the honest truth is that i don't know.

. But what i do know is that our God is a good God, he is a loving God who has and wants nothing but the best for our lives.

. I know that my faith tells me and that according to the word of God, Geoff is now in the Kingdom of Heaven. he is living eternally with the king of kings, and he will never ever again know what it means to feel pain or sickness.

. This is the hope that we have as Christians, as sons and daughters of God this is our inheritance and this is what we look forward to. lets forever celebrate and remember Geoff.

. as well as allowing our faith to give us peace and comfort during this challenging time.

. Another choice that we now need to make is will we allow this to kill or weaken our faith? or will we now choose to honor Geoff’s life and his vision?

. Will we learn to love others the way that he did? the greatest thing that you and i can do to honor Geoff is to live and love the way he did?

. to weep with compassion and genuine love for others the way that Geoff did.

. his life touched impacted and changed many other lives!

. You and I have that same opportunity to touch impact and change lives.

. But it comes down to a choice you make to trust whether or not God is in control and knows best, there will always be things that we don't understand but that's where faith comes in.

. and remember as we spoke about last week, your words will decided whether you choice life or death, your words will determine whether or not your faith is genuine.

. I choose to honor Geoff and to honor my God, by trying my best to live and the love the way the Geoff did, which is the same way that Jesus does!