Tuesday 4/9/13 "Pick a Side" 1

Dear Father in Heaven, thanks for another day, and I am thanking You in advance for another great night as I get a jump on my Tuesday message.  Thanks for trusting us to carry out Your work, how blessed we are, Jesus, not just to be saved but to work for You.  Father, thanks for hearing our prayers each day.  Please, Lord, please, touch this dear sweet child named Curtis, and watch over him,  help his little head to stop hurting, and Lord, drive out those "cats" that he sees in his dear little head.  Lord, once again I thank You for watching over this line, I thank You for Jesus and Jesus for dying for me, for all of us.  Lord, I do appreciate it now, and how unworthy I really am.  Help me now, dear Lord, with the message, please.  In Jesus' name, I pray.  Amen.

Good day, my dear brothers and sisters.  What a great day.  Please add "Curtis" to your DAILY prayers for awhile.  Again, I am not posting a last name here, just trust me and pray.  Dolores' eye surgery has been taken off the table for this Friday, she goes in to be measured.  Dolores and others have been on my case about not getting a haircut, after all it has been over ten years.  So last week I did go to the barber shop and I got an estimate!!  Yep, an estimate!!  So yesterday I got my money together and went into the barber shop to get that haircut and would you believe it, would you believe it, they did not have one in my size!!  Forget it, folks, I heard your hair keeps growing after you pass from this earth.  I am just getting an advance start.  Okay, let me get to the message ... "Pick a side."

Tuesday 4/9/13 - "Pick a Side", Day One

Heaven

Revelation 21:3 - And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Now the dwelling of God is with men, and He will live with them.  They will be His people and God Himself will be with them and be their God.  4 He will wipe every tear from their eyes and there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.  (NIV)

Revelation 21:7 - Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb's book of life.  (NIV)

John 3:16 - "For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life."  (NIV)

Hell

2 Thessalonians 1:8 - He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the Gospel of our Lord Jesus.  9 They will e punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the majesty of His power.  (NIV)

Revelation 20:15 - If anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.  (NIV)

I have a dear, dear friend at the Bridges named Sterling Funck who has this saying, "You win some and you lose some and the rest come out even."  Over the years I have heard him say this many, many times and I just love the saying.  Today I would like to try and tie my message into his neat saying.  While I have heard often over the years "you win some and you lose some" I never heard it with that last part, "and the rest come out even."

Have you ever driven past a farm and you saw a cow or horse with its head through the fence eating the grass from the other side?  A saying from that is "the grass always looks greener on the other side of the fence."  Oh, and that brings up that old fence ...

Looking back at my days of childhood (no jokes about it today, please, you will see why),my buddies and I would go to John Harris High School to see a football game.  (Yes, I went to high school there, but this was back in my tender years.  My dad tanned my backside once in awhile and that made it "tender.)  Okay, stop it, Dan, and get on track.  Anyway, my buddies and I would go to a game and we would sneak in.  (Sorry, Lord, I forgot about that sin.)  Sometimes we would go under the fence, but once, and only once, did I try and go over it.  First of all I do not like heights and that fence seemed like it went way up.  Come on, Danny, you can do it, come on, Danny, you can do it, those guys called, hurry, the policeman is coming, so I climbed to the top and went to crawl over the top of the fence and there I saw, one leg on each side of the fence.  Come on, Danny, come on over and then jump,  just let go and jump.  Oh, how I wanted to do that, but I just could not.  I knew that policeman might be coming, and I wanted to jump to the other side and I just could not.  You see, my pants were stuck on top of the fence and since I was still in my pants and wanted to stay that way, I had to sit on top of that darn old fence.  By now some were at the fence, on both sides and they were laughing at me.  Even that really nice policeman who was the one who helped me down was laughing, and with all things in their proper place (no more on that) I was hurried off to the gate and sent back out.

Folks, here we are today, and we have a decision to make, do we want to go to Heaven or to go to Hell?  Sorry, folks, no fence to sit on here, it is one side or the other, and you have to make a choice.  It is not up to me, it is up to you and the results are between you and our Lord Jesus.  Let's take a look at those scriptures, is there anything that is the same between Heaven and Hell?  You are saying of course not.  Let's look.  Yes, there is one thing the same.  Might you know what it is?  Well, you will need to come back tomorrow to find out.

Dear Father, my eyes are tired and my body is weak and I need to get to bed.  Thanks for the help with the message, and now rest us down for the night and rise us in the morning, please, to serve You again.  In Jesus' name, I give thanks and pray.  Amen.

Now go forth and share those blessings, and remember, don't sit on top of the fence, you must decide.  More tomorrow on this subject, and maybe a tired old joke also, or not.  I love You, Jesus, and for you folks, I love ya also.  Pass it on.

Pastor Dan.