What About Tomorrow?

I remember a little over forty years ago I had been a Christian for just four or five months and a old friend of mine stopped over at my house for a visit.  We had known one another for years and in fact I had bailed hay for his uncle a time or two in high school.  He came from an old German family who had farmed their land for over a century, and some of his cousins rode the bus with my family when we were kids.  It was October or so and the fall weather was brisk and inviting.

My friend came in and he told me and the guy who owned the house how he had heard about how we "were Christians" now and wanted to know what had happened to us. The fact was, both of us had recently become born-again Christians.  The house owner was a farm neighbor when I was growing up on the farm who had accepted Christ about three months after getting back from Viet Nam in 1974.  I ran into him at a restaurant in 1975 and he led me to Christ in July of that year.  My life was changed when I met Jesus Christ.  I immediately got involved in a new church plant and grew very quickly in my Christian walk.

When my old acquaintance came in the door that night my Christian friend and I shared our stories with him and how we had come to trust Christ as Savior.  As my friend shared his story of coming to Christ with him I slipped into a side room and got down on my knees and prayed for him.  I asked God to open his heart to the gospel so he could know the peace that we now had.  When I got up from my knees and went back out to join the conversation our old friend was just getting ready to go home.  I will never forget what he said before he closed the door that night.  He said, "Fellas, I will get saved but it will be right before I die".  And with those words, the door shut and he left the house.

We didn't think much more about it until about two weeks later when my friend’s mom, who lived next door, called the house about midnight.  My housemate said his mom told him she had heard that our friend that had been to the house earlier had been in an accident outside of town and had been seriously injured and rushed by ambulance to the County hospital.  She said, "unfortunately he was DOA."  We both knew of course what that meant.

Evidently, Johnny, as we called him was driving his short-nosed Ford panel van home from the bar drunk when within 150 yards from his parent's driveway, and his warm bed, he veered into the ditch and ran head on into the only oak tree on that stretch of road.  They said when they took him from the vehicle he was unrecognizable but still alive.  Within five miles on the way to the hospital he stopped breathing......

I can't tell you if Johnny ever made it to Christ that night or not.  I can tell you this.  He knew he needed Jesus to have his sins forgiven and to be ready for heaven.  He also knew that he didn't want to give up his sinful lifestyle until it was close to being too late.  I can only pray that it wasn't too late for Johnny.  But none of that matters now.  The Scripture warns us,

Since therefore it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly received the good news failed to enter because of disobedience, again he appoints a certain day, "Today" saying through David so long afterward, in the words already quoted, "Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts."

If you are reading this blog today and do not know if you died today where you would spend eternity, think about the value of your soul.  Think about how much God loved you to have sent Jesus Christ to die in your place on the cross!  You don't have any guarantee that tomorrow will come and go as normal.  God says,

Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring.

Maybe if your family invites you to a Christmas service this year, you should go.  Listen to the story of how Jesus was born a virgin, lived a sinless life, died on the cross for all our sin, and rose again to conquer death so you don't have to die without hope.  Trust Him my friend.

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