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Article Archive |
2007
The Proving Ground
by Jim Morris
Imagine a place that gives you a chance to make things right after you have really blown it. It is a place where your sins are “purged” and your faith is proven. It is a place of “second chances.” Some folks bank their souls on purgatory’s existence. They plan on the ability to make things right “after they die” so they can eventually end up in heaven. What a nice dream. What a pleasant thought. Just think, we could live it up now and when this life is over then pay for our wayward ways, get out of purgatory prison and eventually end up with the “good folks.” Unfortunately, it’s only a dream.
The only “Purgatory” or “Proving Ground” that exists is the one we are living in right now! Our time on earth is the only chance we get to make things right. It is the time where we learn our lessons and change our ways. If we do not change while we are alive then we may be locked into a destiny we do not want. “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad” (2 Corinthians 5:10).
Look around. This world is contaminated with sin. Our world does not even come close to being heaven. Murders, rapes, robberies, thefts, destruction, wars, plagues, diseases, pollution and such things are a part of our world. Societies suffer under the sickness of sin. Even as Christians we must live in this world while allowing God to “transform us by the renewing of our minds” (Romans 12:2). We sin. We suffer. We sorrow. We supplicate and God saves. It is a repetitious process of humanity where either our desire to sin is “purged” or our desire to repent is “destroyed.” We choose our own fates.
In Luke 16:19-31, Jesus describes the fates of a rich man and a poor man named Lazarus. The rich man did not know that he had been tested and was found lacking while alive on earth. Lazarus, though, passed the test in spite of his terrible circumstances. At death, God reversed the fortunes of the two men. Lazarus went to paradise to be comforted while the rich man ended up in Hades to be tormented. The rich man did not know that he had been in purgatory when he was alive. At death all fates are sealed and unchangeable.
The rich man pleaded with Abraham for mercy for himself but was denied (16:24-26). Having failed to secure mercy for himself he requested it for his brothers. If Lazarus could be sent to warn them then they would surely listen! But it was to no avail (16:27-31). “Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.’” (Luke 16:29). Only by obeying God’s word while we live can we pass through “the proving ground” to reach Heaven after we die.
11-14-07
# 46
