Up And Outer
Can a man who wants only eternal life, really find it? I remember wanting to avoid hell. I asked Christ’s forgiveness feeling that this was what I needed to go to heaven. I was definitely averse to eternal damnation but I was unprepared to live as a disciple here and now as well. Do we have eternal life because we find Jesus?
A person doesn’t have to repent to find eternal life. It’s just something else to gain. A person must repent if they are to find Christ. Because of who he is we are convicted of who we are.
What are you looking for?
q Alternatives
q Affirmation
q Absolution
q
Like a man with a remote. A man is not interested in what is on television but what else is on television.
I always knew where I was going. (The Holy Spirit came to convict the world of sin in regard to judgment because the prince of this world now stands condemned.) There was no doubt in my mind. Some advocate that we need more preaching about hell as though this would cause people to come to Christ. In my mind hell causes people to do one thing, to make them desire to avoid hell and thus they accept Christ because he is the only way out.
Are we coming to Christ to find the way to God or are we looking for another way. People who have non-negotiables in their lives will go to other extremes to try to validate their own righteousness and their willingness. He went overboard to compensate for his hidden treasure. He’d have done anything to save his life and his riches . . . anything except to forsake his weaalth.
He was “missing something”. Otherwise he never would have come to Jesus. Looking for something to gain without considering that he might need to lose something. He was rich and unhappy. He was young and unhappy. He was religious and unhappy. He was powerful and unhappy. His blessing was his curse. Anything that keeps a man or woman from God is a curse. God knows our hearts friends and he will never give us something that we cannot handle. Many can fathom the depths of adversity, few are able to keep their heads with the seductions of success and acclaim.
He had a high degree of dissatisfaction.
He was obsessed with proper conduct
He was distressed with
He was depressed by prosperous conditions. I think he’d been here before. He just hoped that this trip around the barn would produce a different reality. Same trip – same answers.
It’s sometimes difficult to get away from your blessing. The church doesn’t need your money so much as you need to learn to take your hands off what you have been blessed with. Not to track what you give as an investment.
Come to God saying that we are looking for help and guidance but what we really want is a hip-pocket deity who will provide affirmation to us. Sort of like a device with a limited number of prerecorded blessings. We want God to “fit” into our ideas of what is right and wrong, our concepts of life.