Travel

Over the last few weeks, I have been travelling to Asia from U.S. twice. First time to Singapore for about ten days, then back to U.S. for my graduation walk at the U. Next to Beijing, China for about one week as part of my International Applied Management class and then flew back to U.S. again on May 12. It had been really tiring flying four times over the Pacific Ocean. One can truly appreciate the fact that 70% of our earth is covered by water.

The flights over the Pacific Ocean are normally at least about 12 hours. It is long, boring and tiring being cramped in a little space with at least 80 other people. However when you finally get to your desired destination, life is good. You get to visit the places you want to. You enjoy the beautiful times and create new memories for your trip. You forget the long and tiring flight you took to get to your destination. It is true. You just don’t remember that tiring experience until you are about to board your flight back home…

In some sense, taking a flight to a destination of choice can be like our current life here on earth. It seems to us that our life can be filled with so much suffering, pain and even bored with all our routines. However, I do believe that when we as Christians get to Heaven, it is going to be such a beautiful and amazing experience that we will forget the suffering and pain that we had gone through with our lives on earth.

As mentioned in my April blog post, Revelation 21:1-4 gives us a nice description of what the new heaven and earth will be like. All of us whether we are Christians or not, are travelling right now to our eternal destinations. There are only two eternal destinations which are either Heaven or Hell. These two destinations are different for Christians and non-Christians because it depends on whether we have placed our trust in Jesus Christ to be our personal LORD and Savior.

Jesus Christ is the one and only access to Heaven (John 6:44, Acts 4:12, Acts 16:30-31).  There is no other possible way to get to heaven but by the Son of God Who is Jesus Christ.  Getting to heaven is a one-way trip and so you only get through the travelling part which is your current life here on earth once. If heaven is not your final eternal destination because you did not trust in Jesus Christ, then you are most certainly going to the only other eternal destination which is hell and that also is a one-way trip from which there is no return.

Revelation 21:8 shows the fate of those whose final eternal destination is not heaven:

“But for the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and immoral persons and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their part will be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.”

For some, they think that it is okay to choose hell as their final eternal destination because all their friends will be there. I suggest that it is naive to think in this way because if hell is ever going to be a ‘not so bad’ place, we will not get to read the story of the rich man and Lazarus in the Bible (Luke 16:19-31). This parable is a warning to all of us that we should take God’s Word (the Bible) seriously. The rich man was seeking to change his final eternal destination but it is a one-way trip. Once the plane has landed on the airport like once you have reached your final eternal destination, there is no turning back. For those who will like to read more about this topic, The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis is a great book where he described the Christian conception of Heaven and Hell.

Therefore folks, please remember that our lives here on earth are a one-way trip to one of the two eternal destinations (i.e., Heaven or Hell) for mankind. We are all on a journey to either one of these destinations. Please choose wisely, yeah?