Select Page

“How to Avoid Being Miserable”

Sunday I am preaching from I Thessalonians 4.13-18.

The sermon is “Whatever Happened to Grandma?”

Ever been tempted, when you began reading a big book, to turn to the last page and see how it turned out? You wouldn’t pay the high price of a first-run movie ticket and wait until the last five minutes to go into the darkened theater, would you? You want to see the whole thing, don’t you? You want the drama and the suspense of the story as it gradually unfolds.

But, the Bible tells us how everything is going to turn out. The Gospel has a happy ending for those whose names are written in the “Lamb’s Book of Life.”

Paul wrote I Corinthians 15. It is the greatest treatise in the world about the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Paul lays a series of subjective phrases, one by one, on the table, “If Christ be not raised . . . .” Finally, he says, “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men.” The King James Version puts it this way, ” ?we are of all men most miserable.”

However, as Paul declares with authority and clarity in the very next verse: “But Christ HAS been raised, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.”

If your Grandmother, like mine, was a Christian believer when she died, she is with Christright now and will accompany Him when he comes for all believers. That’s how things turn out.

But, don’t take my word for it. Sunday, I’ll show you what Paul said.

After all, I don’t want you to be miserable.

There’s no need.

Blessings,

Dan