Hi Drew,

That man must have been really desperate with his son in that condition. I was just thinking, maybe it was easier for him to believe as he wanted help for his son? I don’t feel as though I’m in that position so may be it’s harder for me to believe? Should I wait until I am at death’s door before I need to believe. The Christian life might not be as fun as if I did my own thing–drinking, smoking, going out with girls, doing drugs–you know what I mean. I suppose what I’m saying is, can’t I enjoy life and believe in God later?

Jack

Welcome Back Jack,

I appreciate your honesty. And to return the favor I would like to be candidly honest with you. Is it geeky to numerically address several ideas from this most recent letter? I’ll accept your tacit approval on this one…

Here are three things from your paragraph that I want to speak to:

1. Easier to believe vs. harder to believe; or desperation
2. Waiting until “death’s door” to believe; or postponement
3. Fun now, belief later; or treasuring the world above God

ONE. Ease of belief sort of sounds like an excuse, because ultimately what does ease have to do with believing, if believing in God is really what you want to do? More on this in number three.

TWO. Very simply, What if death’s door is a trap door that sneaks up on you and you don’t have time to all-of-a-sudden believe? Furthermore, is that a sincere belief/faith, if it postpones belief right until the last minute as if it were an unpleasant exercise?

THREE. Jesus speaks of surrendering one’s life to him as “treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field” (Matthew 13:44). In other words, trusting in Jesus for the forgiveness of your sins isn’t something that should be avoided like the plague and put off until the last moment of life. Contrariwise, salvation and new life in Jesus is more akin to treasure and joy, which one gladly forfeits in order to receive. Passages in the Bible that speak of the joy and happiness found in God flood my mind right now. Paul speaks of what God has prepared for us being immeasurably superior to that which we have now. A more contemporary Christian, C. S. Lewis, paints a vivid picture in his sermon The Weight of Glory when he says:

We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.

Indeed we are far too easily pleased because we were created to find our maximum joy and fulfillment in God, and we have turned from him. When we realize that we are playing with mud pies apart from God, we too become somewhat desperate like the man with the sick child that we talked about in your last letter.

The bottom line is we are to treasure God above all the things found in this world because he is truly the most valuable of all. It is exciting to know that God has so orchestrated everything that our maximum joy is found in him, and this can be discovered by heeding his call to repent and trust Jesus for the forgiveness of sins.

Talk to you soon. =)