For today’s blog post, I will deviate from my plan for unveiling heaven through the eyewitness testimony I have read. Instead I share with you my personal testimony of coming into a relationship with my Creator through Jesus. I wrote it for my personal Facebook page.
On June 26th, 1950, just one day after my eleventh birthday, I joined the Boy Scout troop for which my dad was the scoutmaster and immediately passed the Tenderfoot requirements. At that time, I made a commitment: “On my honor I will do my best to do my duty to God and my country and to obey the Scout Law; to help other people at all times; to keep myself physically strong, mentally awake, and morally straight.”
I took that oath seriously and did all I thought was my duty to God along with everything else I had promised. Later, when I was 17, my parents suggested I join the church. So I did. At the proceedings in the service, the pastor asked, among other things, “Do you accept Jesus as Lord and Savior?” I had no idea what that meant, and I was not going to promise something I did not understand. But I was too shy to say “no” in front of everyone. So outwardly I said, “yes”, but inwardly I said, “no”, and promptly forgot all about the issue.
A year later, a situation arose wherein I had a persistent feeling of being inside a large bell jar. I prayed to God about it, but got no answer. After a few minutes, the feeling went away. The next week, I was walking on my college campus and recalled that experience. Then for the first time in a year, I recalled my saying, “no,” to accepting Jesus. The Holy Spirit then answered the question of my earlier prayer. He told me the bell jar represented my being cut off from God. He then told me in my spirit, accepting Jesus as Lord and Savior was the only way to remove that barrier. So I promptly said, “yes,” not wanting to have a barrier between God and me. I still didn’t know what it meant, but removing a barrier between God and me was good enough for me.
I did not think any more about that experience as it didn’t seem like a big deal. However, a few months later it became obvious that it had been a big deal. I could see some significant changes that had occurred. I no longer did a good deed because I was a good Boy Scout, but because I genuinely cared about other people. I no longer said prayers to a God that I believed was “out there.” Rather I spoke to a Lord with whom I had a relationship as if we knew each other. I sought Christian fellowship without realizing that is what I coveted. I had a new love for my family. I had read the New Testament when I was in high school, but as I turned back to reread the New Testament, it made a lot more sense now than the first time I read it. And I now had a peace and joy in my heart that had not been there before.
Now, sixty-three years later, the Spirit life that began in me that distant November of 1957 remains a steady growing part of my life. I have never needed alcohol, parties, carousing, etc. to fill a void in my life that so many people have. Instead I have been filled with love and joy and peace all these years. God has been my companion, helper, teacher, protector, and loving master through everything. I wish everyone could have the same loving Spirit of God in his or her heart and know the same peace, joy, and love. That, more than anything else, would heal this nation’s wounds and strife. We wouldn’t need “Black Lives Matter,” because all lives would matter equally to us. We wouldn’t have one group needing to dominate another.
I have written Heaven Is Beyond Imagination based on fifty some eyewitness accounts of heaven and nineteen of hell, a successor to my presently available Heaven Is Amazing! Heaven is all of the things we are missing here on Earth because of our failure to let the Spirit of God into our hearts by accepting Jesus’ gift of his lifeblood for us. You cannot imagine how wonderful and full of love heaven is!
I can’t make anyone aware of the void in his or her life; I can only share my testimony that love, peace, and joy are available to anyone who asks. If you want that love, peace, and joy in your life, admit that you have not kept God’s laws that He meant for your good, and ask Jesus for His forgiveness. Then He can send the same Spirit I have received into your life.
May God bless you. (P.S. If you want to see the manuscript for Heaven Is Beyond Imagination write to me at Dr.JELaFrance@gmail.com or buy its predecessor Heaven Is Amazing! from Amazon or any bookstore.)