Let Us Prepare the Way - John 14:2

  
In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. - John 14:2

    Each and every one of us, believer and unbeliever alike, have found ourselves in the precarious position of impending loss . . . great loss. Whether it be our homes or businesses, our health or our security; and often, most often, the loss of a loved one.
    For the unbeliever, the loss will result in further estrangement from God. They often cry out, “If there is a God and He is a loving God, how could he do this to me?” For the believer, the angst is just as real. “My child (husband, wife, mother, father sister, brother) is sick and dying. Why, Lord, why?” The question is legitimate. The lack of understanding, real. Indeed, God; why? “‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,’ says the Lord. ‘For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts.’” - Isaiah 55:8-9.
    This is certainly one of the most trying times in the life of a believer. We can only imagine how much more difficult it is in the life of those who don’t believe. So, those of us who believe in the providence of God pray, and we pray mightily to forestall what we know in our hearts is inevitable. “In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for dust you are, and to dust you shall return.” - Genesis 3:19.
    We know this to be the truth. It is beyond argument or negotiation. While unbelievers are steeped in their anger and denial, believers hold on in hope and the possibility of reprieve. And all the while we consider ONLY our needs and desires, never giving thought to the eternal fate of those we are about to lose. Shouldn’t we focus our efforts on helping our loved ones spiritually prepare to shed this earthly shroud? Shouldn’t we be preparing ourselves for our time?
    Those who refuse to believe have no hope. As death, the final arbiter creeps slowly into the room, they are faced with the worst of all finalities. Would but someone offer a prayer for the spiritually dead as well as those dying in the flesh. Death will come to us all, regardless - “All things come alike to all: one event happens to the righteous and the wicked; to the good, the clean, and the unclean; to him who sacrifices and him who does not sacrifice. As is the good, so is the sinner; he who takes an oath as he who fears an oath.” - Ecclesiastes 9:2.
    We who have faith in Jesus and believe in the resurrection of the soul, can take comfort, knowing that our crucified Savior rose from death into glory and that we and our loved ones who believe will rise into that same glory. “And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have everlasting life; and I will raise him up at the last day.” - John 6:40. Jesus has promised us that He has already prepared the way for us. It is up to us to prepare our loved ones and ourselves.
    For those who have deliberately chosen to live and die in unbelief, the eternal path that awaits them is quite different. Imagine believing that there is nothing after death. How dismal such a life lived must be. But they are wrong. The pain and suffering that awaits them will be apocryphal. And make no mistake: there is no proverbial “better place” simply because that idea is more comforting to their survivors than the stark realization that they are now and forevermore confined to the sulfurous pits of hell. This most terrifying eternity should give one pause for thought if not prayer. If it doesn’t, then perhaps Dante’s infamous line is better suited for their ‘slip of the foot’: “Abandon hope all ye who enter here.” How terrible a realization for the believer to acknowledge that their loved one: a parent, sibling, or child is doomed to an eternity in that dark and hopeless place, a place “where ‘Their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.’” - Mark 9:48.
    Heaven awaits those of us who have been washed in the sacred blood of Christ’s atonement. He alone has taken our sins upon Himself so that we may be justified before our almighty God. “But as it is written:‘Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him.” - 1 Corinthians 2:9.
    Let us not pine at the reality of physical death but prepare our loved ones and ourselves for the eventuality we all face. Let us turn our back on the world, the flesh, and the devil. Our immortality does not exist in this mortal world. Let us and our loved ones acknowledge our salvation . “But what does it say? ‘The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart’ (that is, the word of faith which we preach): that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.” - Romans 10:8-9. Let us celebrate our election as saints, predestined by our almighty God, to live and reign with Him in eternity.