Daily Encounter: A Week-day Devotional by a staff of ACTS International.

Tuesday, February 18, 2020

"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am."¹

Jesus, of course, was talking about coming back to get His followers to take them to be with Him in Heaven.

Jesus's first coming is an indisputable fact of history. His second coming is just as certain. What isn't certain is the date of His coming. Over the years many have tried to predict that date and have fallen flat on their face. Only God knows that day.

Others have accused us Christians of being so over heavenly minded that we are of no earthly use. True, some people are this way, but that is when they use their religion as an escape from or defense against facing their own reality.

I appreciate what David Shibley wrote: "Remember a 'heavenly minded' Wilberforce whose passion for human dignity helped eradicate the slave trade throughout the British empire. Go to the inner city of Chicago and watch the tireless workers at the Pacific Garden Mission as they tell inquiring street people how to get to heaven while providing them food and shelter on the way. Scan the world and look at the thousands of hospitals, shelters, leprosariums, children's homes and colleges that have been built in heaven's honor. The point is obvious. Those who truly set their sights on another world are often the most active for constructive change in this one.

As C.S. Lewis suggested, it is when we cease to think of the other world (Heaven) we become ineffective in this one.

Suggested prayer: "Dear God, as Jesus taught us to pray, may Your will be done on earth as it is in Heaven. And help me, while here on earth, to be a part of Your plans and what You are doing in the world today. Thank You for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully in Jesus's name, amen."

NOTE: If you are not sure that you are going to Heaven, be sure to get your "Passport for Heaven" at: http://tinyurl.com/dm472. Whatever you do, don't leave earth without it.

1. Jesus (John 14:1-3, NIV).

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