"A Date With Eternity" (1)

"Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." (I Thes. 5:23)

Read the verse carefully. Our time on this earth is very limited. We all have a date with eternity and whether one believes it or not doesn't change the fact. Every single thing on this earth is headed to one important date, the coming of Christ. That means there is a day of accountability and that man will live somewhere, even if they die. Everything in time is moving to this one, big event! You and I both have a date with eternity!!

What does this mean for us? It means if we are in Christ, we need to concern ourselves to be blameless. Too many are indifferent and playing around. In the church, we have those who see little need to live blameless lives. They are indifferent toward Jesus and not really concerned about what is coming. This day will over-take them when they least expect it.

When we speak of blameless, we aren't speaking of perfection but living a life with a diligent heart toward following Jesus in our attitudes, actions and desires. To live blameless began with Jesus' cleansing blood. His blood removed all defilement. Our part is to live with a heart moving closer and closer toward Him

To be blameless tells us that we can be defiled and unacceptable when we reach this date. People can come up short of the grace of God and be defiled through bitterness of heart (Heb. 12:15). Bitterness, resentments and unforgiving hearts defile us and we need to concern ourselves with these things if we truly believe He's coming. Not only does bitterness defile us, our defilement spreads to others like a disease because of an angry or bitter heart. The Hebrew writer tells us that bitterness starts like a root that begins in the heart and if left unattended, it will begin to grow and eventually bear fruit. It will cause one to forfeit God's grace (the very thing that saves us) and affect many others. We have heard (or maybe practiced it) when we are holding to some hateful attitude toward another and we tell another how horrible they treated us, have a bad attitude toward the one who hurt us and by our spreading our bitterness to another innocent party, we have begun to defile them. Many just don't see the destructive power of bitterness.

Let's talk about some more of this tomorrow, but remember, YOU HAVE A DATE WITH ETERNITY and there is no escaping it!