| “But he saith unto them, It is I; be not afraid” (John 6:20).
One can be driving on the interstate and before becoming aware, the driver could be swooped into a direction they never intended to go. Uninitiated drivers, flying along faster than they really want to go in the farthest right-hand lane, can suddenly look up in dismay to see the interstate dividing into two. Just in a blink or two, one is swept along in another direction, toward another destination. Could this be…her time, her release? Could this be the EXIT she had longed for all those years? Was this the one exit sign that read “HEAVEN”? Was this God’s plan? Is this God’s itinerary of being taken to a destination that calls out to Heaven? This is what Joni Eareckson Tada wondered when she realized she had breast cancer. Friend, all of us are on a plane that is loading and unloading passengers. We might get off of one plane in this city or in that destination, but eventually, for those who know the Lord Jesus there is Destination Heaven. Twenty-four hours before you are humming down the interstate and you miss the turn, for there is no going back, you find out for sure this is your destination–Heaven. This is it; life on earth is about to end from the way you used to know. I will never forget what a gentleman said to me some years ago. I was asked to come by and visit for his days were numbered. He said to me, “Joking about death is funny until it’s about me.” You see, the speedway had split, and he was heading at a different destination than what he thought he would be on for that day just twenty-four hours ago. There was no going back, no turning around, the destination was set. Remember what Alan Redpath, a British pastor and author, had written. “There is no circumstance, no trouble, no testing, that can ever touch me until, first of all, it has gone past God and past Christ, right through to me. If it has come that far, it has come with great purpose.”
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