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I typed up this story/letter to all my friends and family in the wee hours of the first morning of the year 2000.  While it is quite long winded, and very silly at times, I decided to include it here in hopes that it might bless someone.

When I look back on the last 28 years of this century (before that I wasn't born, so I don't remember much of that), it is not the "stuff" that I remember so much, as everyone keeps talking about, you know, those round vinyl things called records, and those round plastic things called hoola hoops; instead I think more of the relationships I've had, and the things we've done together. My parents did not have a lot of money while my sisters and I were growing up. However, it seemed like they always managed to take us on some sort of vacation almost every year. There was this great place where families used to go on vacation. Not Disneyworld or Hawaii. Not cruises or Europe. They were family vacation communities. The one I remember was in the Catskills. I don't remember the name of the place, but I remember there was a pool, and a candy store in a kid's walking distance where my sisters and I could actually buy several things for 10 cents. This may have actually been some sort of grocery store, but of course in my memory as a child, it was a candy store. The other great thing about this vacation community was that each family had it's own house! Sure, it was only a "cabin", but when you live in the Bronx in an apartment 50 weeks out of the year, it sure is cool to have your own house. I also remember there being some sort of circus or animal farm near by, and you could ride elephants there.

I remember one year my Grandfather from Turkey came with us to our vacation getaway, and that he didn't speak any English. The only time I remember actually communicating with him was when I was in the pool one day, and he came by and dunked my head under the water. He apparently thought this was a good way to get to know me, and he was laughing and smiling. Meanwhile, I thought he was trying to drown me...

Another fond vacation memory was our trip to Maine, or maybe Virginia Beach. I really don't know which, those two vacation memories have kinda meshed together in my mind. In any case, or maybe in both cases, I remember that for the entire ride (we always drove to our vacation getaways) we listened to an Ann Murray tape over and over again. The whole family had every song memorized by the time we arrived at our hotel. And now, my father has thoughtfully taken all our home movies from all those years, and put then on a video cassette. And guess what the sound track is in the background? You guessed it. Don't ask me why we listened to that one tape over and over again. I think that may have been the only tape we had with us that everyone liked. I think Dad may have had some Turkish music on tape too.

My dad and his music. My father has always loved listening to music, and LOUDLY. I remember that on days when we did not have to get up for school, maybe Sundays, when my dad actually had a Sunday off from Florsheim Shoes where he was the assistant manager, he used to lovingly wake us up by playing excruciatingly LOUD Turkish music. The kind of loud that you could not just shut your door, and put the covers and pillow over your head to make go away. And now, years later, I sometimes lay awake in bed for hours late at night or early in the morning, listening to the beautiful sounds of my husband's technological music tour going on directly underneath our bedroom in his pseudo-studio in the basement. Hey, he's an artist. Or should I say, an Uplifting Trance Specialist. The biggest shocker, although in retrospect makes all the sense in the world, is that my Dad loves the DH's music. Too weird.

Now that I am a teeny bit older, I can look back on the whole man-woman, boy-girl thing, and just laugh. I was hysterically not good at the whole thing. At all. No one had to tell me that girls are supposed to like boys and vice versa. I figured that out all on my own by the age of 6. When I had my first kiss. We were King and Queen of the playground. Eddie and me in first grade at the Catholic school I attended for one year before my family moved out of the Bronx, and into the suburbs. Since that first boyfriend, I was always on the lookout for the next one. And back then, if I was telling you my life story, I would have referred to the periods of my life by the boy I liked, or the boy I was dating at that particular time. When did I go to Maine? Oh, that was when I was dating Mr. Blank...you get the idea.

If I knew then, what I know now. Ah, but it's always easier in retrospect. As the old saying goes, hindsight is always 20/20. Well, I'm going to tell you anyway. If I had known then what I know now, I would have "kissed dating goodbye". What a WASTE of time and energy. How many boys did I shed tears over in Junior High School? And scream at my sister about because she was on the phone when he was going to call. (This was back in the days before e-mail and chat rooms, and when houses only had one phone line.) Now, my goal is to concentrate on things of lasting importance, eternal importance. When I think back on my feeble attempts at evangelism in High School, when discussions turned into arguments, it makes me so sad. If I had taken some time out from writing notes and talking on the phone to actually find out the simple truth about salvation...People have so many crazy ideas about what it means to be saved, or to be a Christian. But the truth is so simple. I have so much joy in my heart and in my life, regardless of what is going on around me. And there is a way that everyone can have that joy. Why wouldn't someone want to have joy? Why would anyone choose to ignore this? O.k., here's the big secret revealed. It can be summed up in the answers to two simple questions. I ask you now this: Have you come to the place in your spiritual life where you know for certain that if you were to die today you would go to heaven or is that something you would say you're still working on?

You may be thinking to yourself that you don't believe in the bible, or in heaven, but let's just say, hypothetically, if there was a heaven, and if the bible was true, would you know for certain that you would go to heaven, or is that something you are still working on?

Have you formulated a response? O.k., here's the second question. Now, again, hypothetically speaking: Suppose you were to die today and stand before God, and he were to ask you, 'Why should I let you into my heaven', what would you say?

Again, you may say you don't believe in heaven, or even in the bible. I'm not asking if you do. If you don't know what you would say to God, well then, what would you say are the general entrance requirements? And again, I'm not asking if you believe in the bible, I'm asking what you think the bible says are the requirements.

Now, do you think I'm just going to leave you hanging there, pondering these questions for eternity? Of course not. First off, the bible says in 1 John 5:13 "I write these things that you may know you have eternal life." That you may KNOW. So, according to the bible, you can KNOW you have eternal life. Not just hope and pray. KNOW. Isn't that cool?

Now onto the really good news.

Heaven is a free gift.

That's right, you're not reading that wrong. Heaven is a free gift. According to the bible, in Romans 6:23, it says, "For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."

A free gift - that would be the kind that can not be earned or deserved. In Ephesians 2:8-9 the bible says "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith - and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God - not by works, so that no one can boast."

Let me give you an illustration to clarify this. If Heaven is a free gift, that would be like if you got your wife or daughter or whatever a really expensive gift, like a diamond ring. Now when you showed it to her, she realized it was an expensive present, so she ran right over to her purse, and pulled out some money for you to help pay for it. Now, if she gave you any money for that gift, would it still be a free gift? Of course not.

This is seen more clearly when we understand what the bible says about man.

First of all, man is a sinner. The bible says in Romans 3:23 that "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God."

Now, what would you say sin is? Would you say it could be things that we do that we shouldn't do, and also things that we say that we shouldn't say, and what about things that we should do, but don't? The bible tells us that sin is anything that doesn't please God or is a transgression of his law.

Now, with that definition of sin, how many times a day would you say the average person sins? A hundred times a day? Ten times a day? Well, let's say that I was almost a walking angel, and only sinned 3 times a day. Over the course of a year, that would be over 1,000 sins, and if I lived to be 90, that would be 90,000 sins.

Think what would happen to a habitual offender in a criminal court with 90,000 transgressions on his record!

So, after pondering that for a moment, we come to the conclusion that we can not save ourselves by being perfect. However, God wants us to be perfect. The bible says in Matthew 5:48 "Be perfect therefore, as your heavenly father is perfect."

Why? Well, let's think about it in terms of eggs. Let's make ourselves a nice omelette. If you were to come over to my house for brunch, and I were to make us up a nice big omelette, say with 10 eggs, and I crack 9 of them, and scramble them up, and then I crack open and add the tenth egg, but it was rotten, but I scrambled it in anyway. Do you think that omelette would be acceptable to serve you? No, because the one rotten egg ruins the whole omelette. Even less can we serve up our lives to God, which may have many things in them that men would call good, and yet are filled with deeds and thoughts that are rotten, and expect them to be acceptable to God. If we want to get to heaven by our good works, then all we have to do is be perfect. God's standard is complete obedience to Him for all time. We all fall short of this.

This comes into sharper focus when we look at what the bible says about God.

First of all, God is merciful, and doesn't want to punish us. The bible says that

"God is Love." 1 John 4:8 Also, God is just, and he must punish sin. Exodus 34:7 says "Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished."

This creates a dilemma. God loves us, but he must punish sin. And we sure sin. God solved this problem (our problem) in the person of Jesus Christ.

First of all, who do you think Jesus is? You might say, a prophet, son of God, a nice guy who died on a cross. Jesus is the infinite God - Man. That is a fancy way of saying that He is fully God and fully man. The bible says in John 1:1 that "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and the Word became flesh, and made his dwelling among us." And in John 20:28, after Jesus rose from the dead, one of his disciples saw him and said "My Lord and My God."

And what did he do? Jesus was born like a man, grew up, led a perfect life without sin, then died on the cross and rose from the dead to pay the penalty for our sins and to purchase a place in heaven for us.

To understand this more clearly, think about a record book. If I wrote in a book, every minute detail of my life. Each page details the sin of a particular day. Every word, thought, and deed. I'm holding this book in my hand. This book, this sin, is the problem. God loves me, but hates the sin, and the sin is in the way of our relationship. In Isaiah 53:6, the bible says "All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned everyone to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all". Jesus took my "book" and laid it on himself. Now I don't have my "book" in the way. All of my sin which God hates has been placed on His beloved Son. Christ bore our sin in His own body on the tree (cross).

Right before Jesus died on the cross, he said the word "Tetelestai" which has been interpreted "it is finished". This word was used in old bookkeeping practices when a bill was paid, across it was written the word "tetelestai" to mean "it is paid; the debt is paid."

So, you're asking, how do I sign up?

This gift is received by faith.

Faith is the key that opens the door to heaven. If you took my key chain, you would notice that it has many keys on it, and some may even look somewhat alike. You could go to the front door of my house and try all of those keys except the right one and they would not open that door. It does not matter how sincere you are in exercising belief that a different key will open the door. The fact is that only the right key will open the door.

The right key to heaven is called faith, saving faith. That is what will open the door to heaven. There is nothing else in the world that will open that door no matter how sincere you are in exercising the practice or belief of something other than saving faith to open the door to heaven. What is saving faith?

Let me tell you what saving faith is not. Saving faith is not mere intellectual assent to certain historical facts. Some people believe in Jesus Christ the same way they believe in Napoleon or George Washington. They believe that He actually lived. He was a real person in history, but they are not trusting Him to do anything for them now.

The bible says in James 2:19 that "you believe there is one God; good! Even the demons believe that - and shudder."

Saving faith is also not temporary faith. That means trusting the Lord for things of a temporary nature, like your finances, or for a safe trip. Once your financial needs are met, you no longer need to trust in the Lord for them. Once you have safely reached your destination, you no longer have to trust the Lord for traveling-faith.

All the things of this world will pass away. They are temporary. Many people trust the Lord for all these temporary things.

Saving faith is trusting in Jesus Christ alone for eternal life. The bible says in Acts 16:31 "Believe (trust) in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved."

To better understand this, let me use one more illustration. Suppose the chair you are now sitting in represents yourself. You are sitting in it, and you, of course, trust it to hold you up. Now, look around the room and find an empty chair. Let's suppose for the sake of this illustration that empty chair represents Jesus Christ. Now, even though you are not sitting in it, you do believe it exists, right? And you believe that if you were to sit in it, it would hold you up, right? But what are you trusting in right now to hold you up? You - your chair.

To receive eternal life, you must transfer your trust from yourself to Jesus Christ alone for eternal life. If you were to get up right now, and sit in that other chair, this would be transferring your trust from your chair (symbolically you) to that chair (symbolically Jesus).

Does this make sense to you?

Would you like to receive the gift of eternal life?

Let me just clarify what is involved. First, you transfer your trust from trusting in yourself, and what you do, to what Jesus did for you.

Receive the resurrected and living Christ as Savior. In Revelation 3:20 the bible says "Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me."

Receive Christ as Lord. Lord is not a word that gets used a lot today, but it means master, king. It means pulling over to the side of the road, getting out of the driver's seat, and getting into the passenger's seat, letting Christ drive.

Repent. Like we went through before, we've all sinned. If we ask for forgiveness, he will give it to us.

If this is what you really want, we can pray right now, and we can tell God what you just decided.

I pray that God would help you to understand this, to repent, and believe. If you want to receive Christ right now, repeat these words.

"Jesus Christ, I know that I am sinful and do not deserve eternal life. I believe you died and rose from the grave to purchase a place in heaven for me. Lord, come into my heart. Take control of my life. Forgive my sins. I confess them and now place my trust in you for salvation. I accept your free gift of eternal life, and thank you for it."

If this prayer expresses what you believe in your heart, look at what Jesus promises you:

"he who believes in Me has eternal life." John 6:47

If you just made that commitment, welcome to the family of God! John 1:12 says "yet all who received Him, to those who believed in His name, to them He gave the right to become children of God."

Happy birthday! Today is your Spiritual birthday. So, what now? Just as a newborn baby grows physically, in a similar way you can grow spiritually, by taking the following steps:

1. Read the bible. Try starting with the book of John, reading a chapter a day. 1 Peter 2:2 says "As newborn babes, desire the pure milk of the Word (of God), that you may grow"

2. Prayer. Spend time each day in talking with God. Phillippians 4:6 says "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God"

3. Worship. Regularly in a church that honors Jesus Christ and teaches you the bible. Psalm 122:1 "I was glad when they said to me 'Let us go into the house of the Lord."

4. Fellowship. With Christians who will help you grow in faith. 1 John 1:3 "We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ."

5. Witness. By telling others what Jesus Christ means to you! Acts 1:8 says "But you will receive power, when the Holy Spirit comes on you and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."

I hope you enjoyed this journey and I pray that it is a blessing to you!