(December 30, 2013)
There is so much here that it is nearly impossible to know where to begin. So I will begin in a very odd place. What must happen to Christopher Hitchens (notable atheist and inventor of the term “antitheist” for an evangelizing atheist) when he died, passed beyond the veil, and awoke to the new reality where he found himself? What, beyond that, would be required to convert someone to the Gospel of Jesus Christ beyond walking up to Peter or Adam and asking them what they should do?
Our rational minds what us to believe that, when that moment comes, all will be converted and all will be right and at peace. I long for the day when I shall awake from this sleep called life and open my eyes to the eternal nature of the soul. When that moment of death has passed, and in the instant thereafter when I realize that the eternal part of me survives, I cannot adequately convey in words the joy I anticipate in that moment.
But here’s the key – that isn’t the end of things. Christopher Hitchens and I will both open our eyes and realize that the soul is eternal. But conversion to the Gospel of Jesus Christ is not an intellectual process – it can be aided by intellect, but that is it. No, true conversion – the process by which we turn our wills to God – will only be beginning for Dr. Hitchens. And, in a similar sense, it will still be only beginning with me. I hope that I will have filled my lamp drop by drop over the course of my lifetime, but just seeing the eternal nature of man will not sanctify me any more than it will sanctify Dr. Hitchens. Thus the need for the Gospel to be preached to those in Spirit Prison.
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