Would You Go to Heaven?
One of my teammates, Emily, and I spend time together in prayer each morning. This is a practice we began this month, and it has been so amazing thus far to witness God’s faithful responses. On Thursday morning this week, we began by asking God how to pray. I felt like He wanted us to pray for opportunities to witness throughout the day.
“God I know we are throwing around concrete all day, but would you continually put people in front of us who need to hear the good news of your love? Give them soft hearts and listening ears for whatever you want to say to them.”
Shortly after our time of prayer, our van arrived to take us to the New Testament Church of Clarkston (here in Jamaica). It was our first day at this particular church, and we spent a majority of the day laying a cement floor for their new children’s hall.
Everyone piled in the van, and I found myself on a broken seat in the back row. Before the van could leave, I swapped my broken seat for a small seat right beside the driver. Emily joined me in the shotgun seat, and we closed the door and set out for Clarkston.
I looked over at the driver, “Hi! What’s your name?”
“I’m Vivian,” he responded.
“I’m Madie and this is Emily,” I said motioning towards her.
Madie, ask him about me.
“Do you believe in God?” I asked.
He chuckled and said, “Yeah. I’ve been baptized, so I’m saved.”
“Well, that’s good. If you died today would you go to heaven?” I asked.
“No,” he paused. “I’m not good enough. I don’t do enough.”
I have been to nine countries thus far on the race, and I have witnessed the works-based gospel in almost all of them. I don’t read my Bible enough. I don’t pray enough. I don’t do enough. I am not enough.
I smiled. “Can I tell you some good news? You will never be enough, but Jesus is. In Romans it says that if you confess with your mouth and believe in…” before I could finish, he finished for me.
“Your heart, you will be saved. I believe that and I know Jesus died on the cross. But I still don’t do enough good things to please Him,” he said.
“Okay, let me ask you another question. Do you have a good relationship with your earthly father?”
“Yes, I do,” he responded.
“Me too, I’m a daddy’s girl! My dad is one of the world’s greatest,” I continued. “One of my favorite things about him is that he loves me even when I mess up or disappoint him. He loves me even when we haven’t talked for days. He loves me even if I avoid him. He loves me, and I know that will never change.”
Vivian looked at me with wide eyes, “I love my kids that way. They could never lose my love, even when they do bad things.”
“Exactly! God loves you the same way, Vivian. You never have to earn His love or affection. When you accept Jesus as your savior, He will never leave or forsake you. If you could ever pray enough, read enough, or be enough then you would never need the blood of Jesus.”
“Wow, God loves me like that?” He looked at me thoughtfully, “I have never ever heard or thought like this before. I have thought of God as far away and displeased with me.”
“Vivian, you are a child of God and he loves you with his whole heart! He is close to you now and he is proud of you.”
Emily continued by telling him about King David who messed up several times, yet God called him a man after his own heart (1 Samuel 13:14). We then discussed the story of the woman caught in adultery (John 8:1-11) and how Jesus did not condemn her.
“Vivian, I want to spend more time with my earthly dad because I love him. The same goes for God. I desire time with Him because I love Him, not because I need to please Him. God wants you and He wants all of you.”
He smiled, “Wow. I cannot thank you enough for teaching me these things. I will never forget them.”
We arrived at the church and said our good-byes to Vivian.
The next day, he picked us up to take us to the church for youth group. I chose the small seat right next to him again.
“Madie, I want you to know I thought about what you taught me all day and night yesterday,” He paused. “You know when you are so hopeless and so depressed that you feel like life will never get better? That’s where I was. Then this morning I woke up and wanted to pray. I talked to God and He told me again how much He loves me. My heart is so full.”
I laughed. God you are so faithful.
One of the biggest lessons I have learned over the last nine months is how to love people as Jesus did. Loving people not only means serving them, encouraging them, or meeting them where they are – it also means asking them the hard things and teaching them Biblical truths.
And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. 1 Corinthians 13:13
