Is your Golden Ticket punched?

““Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. You know the way to the place where I am going.” Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?” Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
‭‭John‬ ‭14:1-6‬ ‭NIV‬‬
http://bible.com/111/jhn.14.1-6.niv

Have I mentioned how much I love my new home? It has plush gold carpet in the living room. I love to walk barefoot on it. Every time someone comes to visit, I make them take their shoes off and go barefoot through my living room and bedroom. It feels like walking on puffs of cotton balls, no lie.

Even as I write that, the Lord has a thought swirling through my mind. “If you think your gold carpet is “all that”, your gonna love what I have prepared for you! Walking on cotton balls can’t even begin to describe what you will walk on in heaven!” Jesus is so excited to show us all He is preparing for us!

That is eternity calling out to me. Eternity was planted in my heart before I even came to be. God planted eternity in every human heart.

However; if you read through John 14:1-6 carefully, there is one way and one way only to get to heaven. Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

That’s our golden ticket. Jesus is our ticket. This Christmas season, my husband and I rode the “Polar Express” with our grandsons and our daughter and her husband. We each had a golden ticket that we had to get punched. Our conductor took the boy’s tickets and punched their names in it.

Jesus has punched my name in my golden ticket. I was eight years old when I got my ticket punched. I was sitting in service one Sunday evening and this time I was listening to my preacher. Usually I squirmed and fidgeted, or wiggled and colored, or passed notes to a friend and got elbowed in my side by my mother when I got too loud. But this Sunday evening service was different. I was still. I was listening. I felt a heaviness on me. I was quiet. I didn’t say a word to my parents. I went to bed still feeling that heaviness in my heart. I started crying. At that moment, at eight years old, I knew I had done wrong in my life. I wanted to go to heaven. I wanted to live forever with Jesus but I knew I couldn’t because of the wrong I had done in my short life. Now don’t think I had it all figured out at eight years old. At that moment, lying in my bed, it just all came together for me. Everything I had been taught my whole life by my parents, by my Sunday School teachers all made sense. John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son and who so ever believes in Him shall not die but will have everlasting life.” At that moment in time, there was such clarity of thought for me. I got it! I understood this verse! My mom heard me crying and came into my bedroom. I told her. She called my dad in; I told him. The next day, my dad called my pastor; I went to his office and he led me in a prayer in which I confessed I was a sinner, I confirmed that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. God sent Jesus into this world to die on a cross, and on that cross Jesus shed blood, and His blood shed for me washes all my sins away. Jesus died, was buried, three days later was raised to life and is now sitting at the right hand of God interceding for us!!! I confessed all that publicly. My golden ticket was punched the moment I said I believed.

I am not that wise and I really wasn’t at eight years of age, but in Christ I am. I now know it was the Holy Spirit of God convicting me of sin and helping me believe. That is what John chapter 17 tells us.

“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”
‭‭1 John‬ ‭1:9‬ ‭NIV‬‬
http://bible.com/111/1jn.1.9.niv

This is my golden ticket for heaven. It is your golden ticket for heaven. It is the only golden ticket for heaven. To believe in Jesus, Son of God. Believe in His death, His burial and His resurrection. To believe in His forgiveness. Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life!!! He is the Resurrection!!! No man comes to the Father but through Him!!!
And really that is heaven…. Being with the One Who created us forever and ever!

If you haven’t had your ticket punched, I cry out to you today pray that prayer I prayed! Don’t wait another minute. It is the best decision you will ever make!

Then tell your pastor or reply back to me and I will pray for you.
If you have your ticket punched reply back with some of your favorite verses on heaven.