Then, one morning as they sat around the kitchen table eating their Cheerios, little Ben announced that he was ready to give his life to Christ. He then got up from the table and went upstairs. Wendy and her husband looked at each other and followed him.
They expected to find Ben on his knees in prayer. They didn't. Instead, they found him folding his Star Wars pajamas into his Sesame Street suitcase. 

They said, "Ben, what are you doing?" He answered, "Packing."
"Why?" they asked. "To go to heaven," he said.
They then understood why their child hesitated to give his life to Christ.
He thought that, in so doing, he would have to leave his family and take up residence, literally, with Christ in heaven. 

We should all possess the faith of little Ben: we should have our hearts so fixed on Christ's appearance that the attachments of our earthly life pale in comparison and that we would be ready to pack our bags in order to be with Jesus.
For we are "aliens and strangers on earth...longing for a better
country -- a heavenly one" (Heb. 11:13). #3710

     B. God can put you on the right path to him.

Illustration:
It was just another normal day at work for Doug. Then a young man 31 years of age, he was his usual ill-tempered, angry self. He says the anger was like a hot coal in his stomach that never cooled down. A troubled person most of his life, he held no job for longer than two years and was about to be fired from his present one.
His wife had just left him, taking their only child -- a son he thought the world of. That day, a co-worker named Jim came up to him, looked into his eyes, then stated, "Doug, God has a better way for you."

At first, this encounter had no impact on Doug, but he started going over and over the statement in his mind for about a year. It was the first step in a long journey. Eventually God led Doug to a group of people who shared the Word of God with him and he was ready to listen. Once he had thought he knew it all; now he realized he didn't. Lying on his bed one night about 10:30, he kept having troubling thoughts.

Then he began to remember Scripture from when he was 12 years old, when for a six-month period his mother had made him attend Sunday school. Thoughts of Jesus and Bible verses he didn't even know he remembered kept coming back to him.
Cone told God then he wanted to accept Jesus as his Savior, but he didn't want to just become "saved." He wanted to live the life. At the moment he was forgiven, he says it was as if God poured cool water over burning coals of anger.

He began to understand some of the Scripture, and he recounted a yearning to learn more of the Bible and to share it with everyone he came in contact with. Doug went back to school, first Georgia Tech, then Georgia State. Realizing after a year that secular knowledge was not what he was thirsting for, he enrolled in a Bible college.
A year later he began to teach Sunday school and feel a call to the ministry.
After much searching and a weekend at a camp meeting in north Georgia, he could not sleep. The tug was so strong, he was exhausted. The moment he gave in and gave it to God, he felt the pressure lift.

After talking to his pastor and congregation at the time, he started a ministry in a nursing home in south Fulton County. Later, with his wife and two children -- in a restored marriage --he moved to McDonough, Ga. There he joined Friendship Baptist Church, was ordained a deacon and served two years as associate pastor.  Soon after that, Doug began a mission church in a mobile home park. It was 1992. His first service had nine people. 

This year they moved into a church building of their own as a fully established church work. #3557

Illustration:
Read Poem - My First Christmas In Heaven

V. INVITATION:
Where do we stand with Jesus right now? 
How far have you journey?  Have you been going in circles?
Are you ready to make your journey to a real relationship with Jesus.