Category: Accepting Christ is your choice

Time off


It is something which we don’t take unless we really need it and that is why I have been absent for a while. I have been having to deal with an auto-immune disease for a while and with the prayers of many people and God’s grace, I will conquer this at some point. It may just go into remission, but if it stays that way for a while then I will be grateful. I have used my time to rest and be the pastor that I need to be and to find ways to cope with this in a natural way rather than taking all the chemicals that the pharmaceutical companies want our doctors to prescribe for us. I don’t need all of the so-called “side effects” that are likely to be worse than the disease itself!

Anyway, enough about my problems.

Time off…is it something that we do or is it necessary at all? It actually is both. We have to decide to really take time off from our vocation and get away for a while. Do people really do this? In today’s society with all of the cell phones and tablets and laptops, it really isn’t very likely that many people get completely out of touch. I can do it, somewhat, because I live in a rural area where there is little or no cell coverage and I have to get my Internet access through a satellite. Granted, I am not out of touch because I still use my cell phone to check in with my Facebook friends and some other friends that I send text messages to over the wifi in my home but that is just my life.

Real time off should be a complete getaway from technology, although I don’t know if that is really possible in our society today. But, twenty years ago we didn’t have such a pervasive invasion of our time and our lives. Cell phones were present but the networks that supported them were sparse and there were no smart phones and no Internet to speak of yet. We and our parents and grandparents lived just fine without all of the technology that we have today and we made it alright. What happened? This technology was supposed to give us twenty hour work weeks and a better quality of life. It seems that life is more complicated and hurried and harried because of the technology that is so prevalent today!

Where can we find a peaceful alternative to all of the technology and the intrusion that it has brought into our families and our lives every day, almost twenty-four hours of every day? Can we possibly find a way or a place that we can have real peace and joy in our lives? Actually, it is not a place or even something that we can do to have peace and joy…it is a person, the Person of Jesus Christ.

Giving your life and your all to Him because He gave His life and His all to redeem you from the penalty of sin is the way to a joyful life and one that can be filled with peace. Contrary to what many believe, the sin which He saved us from is living outside of obedience to God’s grace and the belief in Jesus’ sacrifice for each of us is what saves us. The acceptance of His sacrifice and the repentance that you experience because of it will give you the joy that you seek.

The drug dealers and killers, serial and otherwise, along with those who persecuted and killed hundreds in the past as well as today will pay for what they have done. So will those who have swindled money from unsuspecting victims in the stock and bond market, the war criminals which killed millions during wartime, whether it was during the second World War or during a country’s “modification” of its citizens to a “new way of living” will pay for what they did.

Hell was created to punish only one creature and his followers and that is Satan, but if you have not given your life to Jesus and truly become a follower of Him, then you are on the same side as all the legions of fallen angels who followed Lucifer and were cast out of Heaven with him. You will suffer the same fate in hell because of your rejection of Jesus and the Grace extended to all of us by God the Father. It doesn’t matter what sins you have or have not committed in your life, the unpardonable sin is the rejection of God’s favor and grace through Jesus and the acceptance of your pardon through Jesus’ sacrifice. If you will not accept it, believe it and repent to be a new creation in Christ then your punishment will be no different from Satan’s.

Your life, your joy can be complete through Jesus. But, if you reject Him, your destruction will be complete and eternal as well.

Have you ever hit rock bottom?


Who do you turn to when you are down? What happened to bring you to this place? Is it your fault or someone else’s fault that you are down and out or depressed?

These are legitimate questions about depression and feeling as if you are in a deep well with nowhere to go but up. So, how would you answer them? Many are the answers that go with the last two of the questions and they are as different as we are from each other. The first question, however, is the one that I will concentrate on here because the One that you turn to is the most important decision that you may make in your life.

That includes the decision which you make concerning your spouse or the house that you choose to buy. How can the person that you choose to turn to in an emotional crisis have more to do with your life than your spouse or your home? Because He is your Savior and if the One that you turn to is not Jesus, then you need to examine your life and your heart because if He is not your Savior then you truly do need Him.

In our world today, there are many cares and worries that take up our time and our brain power each and every day and into the night. We are constantly bombarded with advertisements and ads on the Internet as well as from the radio and on television. I don’t know the exact number of advertisements that we see or hear each day, but I am sure it must be in the hundreds.

All of that information, welcome or not, is not good for you and the stress that it causes is even worse. Then, when you get past the stress, there are the bills and the other troubles of daily living. I don’t have to go into the details here but we are all exposed to far more information than we were designed to handle on a day to day basis. It was predicted in the book of Revelation that knowledge would increase at this point in time but the overload is staggering and the more age your mind has on it just makes it worse.

The problems that we have in this life, the ones that affect us individually as well as culturally, are the same ones that have been prophesied and yet many people do not believe this. We will see, in a very short while, that God is always right and that His prophecies are true. Believe in Him and His Son, Jesus. Believe in the saving grace that has been given to each of us without cost.

We don’t have to pay anything for this, Jesus paid the price for us, all that we have to do is accept it and believe. Because, your life doesn’t end here, we all have a soul which will live on with an immortal body. We will live somewhere, whether it is in Paradise with God or in torment with Satan, and we will be there for eternity. Billions of years from now, what decision will you be glad that you made here and now? The only decision which will matter at that time will be whether you decide to give your heart and life to Jesus and believe that He did all that was required for you to be saved….or to decide that you don’t need Him, which will condemn you to hell. Which will it be?

You are never alone


Our lives are very busy today and many people get down and depressed, especially during the winter months. What can help them? Fortunately, it is not a “what” but a Who that can be a help for you and a Comforter too. Jesus is always near and is always ready to help in whatever way is needed.

Although many people discount Him because the help that is provided is not monetary in nature. He doesn’t provide the means to buy whatever you want, but He does provide comfort where it is needed, salvation when it is asked for, security regarding your eternal destination, a shoulder to lean on and the strength to get you through any situation that you might find yourself in.

He is the Creator, the Mighty Counselor, our Everlasting Father and the Prince of Peace. What more could you want or need from anyone or anything here on Earth? Nobody on Earth could supply your need the way that God can, since He owns it all anyway. Do you depend on Him? Do you think that you can supply or in some way get everything that you want or need?

If you already have the money and a great job, maybe you can do it all on your own without anyone’s help but what can you do if you have a job that pays by the hour, or your house is about to be repossessed, or your car may be if you can’t pay a payment, then what will you do? I am not knocking hourly workers, there are more of them than there are salaried workers, but the point is that much of our livelihood is needed just to live. Buying food and paying bills are the main things that our money is being used for, but God never leaves you alone.

Granted, He doesn’t drop money from Heaven to pay your bills but He is always near to comfort you and bless you in ways that nobody else can! You are blessed to be alive and you have your family and if you have a job, then it is a blessing too. God provides for us far more than we can provide for ourselves, yet many people take all of His provisions for granted. Many people even think that they have the things that they do because of something that they did. You wouldn’t be doing your job or earning your salary or wages if God had not given you the ability and the education to do whatever you do!

God can provide all that you need, He will not provide your wants if they don’t line up with His wants and will for your life. Giving your tithe to the church will not automatically put seven or ten times that amount in your bank account! Giving money to some preacher on television won’t bring back a lost loved one or cure cancer unless it is in God’s plan and will for it to happen in the first place!

God will use your talents and your ability to glorify Himself and to bring others to Himself through your testimony and your life and He will bless you with whatever He deems necessary to accomplish that.

Realizing exactly where your blessings come from and Who provides them is something that we all should be doing. Acknowledge God’s provision and His grace to each of us that we benefit from each day, because if it weren’t for His blessings each day we would be in more dire need than we are now.

Salvation, what is it?


“Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God.” 1 John 5:1

What is salvation? I will tell you that it is not a creed. You might say, “Well, I believe in the plan of salvation.” You can believe the plan of salvation and go straight to hell. You’re not saved by the plan of salvation, you’re saved by the man of salvation, the person Who purchased your salvation with His blood.

Salvation is not a creed. It’s not a code. You say, “Well, I believe if you live right you’ll go to heaven.” If you could be saved by living right, then Calvary was a blunder and a colossal mistake! It’s not a cause or your church. You say, “I’m a member of a good, fundamental, Bible believing church.” It’s not any of these things. It’s Christ Jesus, the Holy One of God, our Savior and Redeemer, our Creator and Shepherd, our Protector and our Lord and King! Belief in Him, and giving your heart and life, including your money, your family, your job and your home to Him is the only way to Heaven.

I don’t mean , like the rich young ruler, that you have to sell everything to be saved, but you do have to at least acknowledge that your blessings came from Him and that you thank Him for them. Jesus did not mean that he would be saved because he sold all that he had, but that he had to turn his heart toward the Savior and turn his back on the things of this world. But, he couldn’t let go of his “stuff”, so he walked away sadly because the things of this world had such a hold on him that even when the Messiah asked him to give them up, he couldn’t.

Salvation is not believing in something, it is receiving Someone. The true gospel is one that centers in Jesus Christ. If you won’t put Christ at the center of your life and put everything and everyone in your life and family under Him, then what good are you to Jesus? We have been bought with the precious blood of Christ, our salvation was purchased by Him through suffering on the cross and giving His life as a ransom for all!

What have you given up for Jesus today? Did you decide not to eat that candy bar or maybe put down those cigarettes because your body, is the Temple of the Holy Spirit if you have accepted Jesus, and should be treated as a Holy Temple. It shouldn’t smell like the joint down the road, nor should it have garbage in it because that is what you want to eat! Change your ways, your eating habits so that it will be good for your body, your health so that you can be more useful to Jesus!
God loves us, and He created us to be the Temple not made with hands for the

Spirit to dwell in. What right do you have to mess up the living area of the Spirit of God? Would you smoke and leave garbage inside your church along with magazines and other things which you wouldn’t want anyone to know about, especially Jesus? He already knows what you are doing anyway, so why not admit it and allow Him to change you! Then, treat your body the same way. If Jesus is the Lord of your life and you worship Him with your body, mind, soul and your strength then show it…act like it!

The love of God is expressed through Jesus and the Holy Spirit and it is the true manifestation of God and we, as Christians, need to learn to notice it and accept it. Allow God to come into your heart and your life in a way that you have never experienced before. Many Christians have not even allowed Him to come deeply into their lives, every part of their lives, and that is what He wants of us. Because if He isn’t part of your life at home, at school, at work and at church then you may believe in Jesus but you may not have asked Him to come to live in your heart!

There are many people who can do a great job of acting like a Christian all the way to the pulpit even, but acting like one and being one is totally different. We can go through the motions and say all of the right things, but when it comes down to what or rather Who is in your heart, it is still you and not Jesus. Many people have died in this condition thinking that they were saved, when they had just been playing the role of “looking like a Christian”! Examine your own heart, ask God to examine it and convict you of anything that you may not be doing or of the fact that you have left Him out. Because, when your life is over there are no second chances to make it right.

Think about it.

Patience and time


What do we need to do each day that requires all of our time? Very little actually. Nothing in your life should take up that much time during your day. So, what should we do about our time and cultivating patience?

practicethepause Prayer does wonders for your life, your doubt, your anger and hurt feelings, and your life. Prayer relieves stress and anxiety and the time that you take to pause during the day can yield time to think in a world that is so full of information.

Can you do this during your day? Of course you can, taking a few minutes to speak with God about what you need is no more intrusive than Tweeting or posting on Facebook and the results of your prayers are much more rewarding. Pausing occasionally can yield an awful lot of time, even when those pauses are only for a minute or two at a time. A pause during your day, during your drive to work or back home is more than enough for you to speak to God. The time that you have is given to you by God, the job that you have was given to you by God, your family that you love is a gift from God so when you do pray, thank Him for everything that you have.

The timing of God is perfect because He knows when you were born, who you would marry and He knew when and how many children that He would give you, and He also knows when  your last breath will be drawn. Your life is in His hand and where you will spend eternity is decided so all that you have to do is to make up your mind to follow Him and believe that He did come and die for you and your sins just as He died for my and your sins.

The only thing that you have to do is to believe that the work that Jesus did was enough. There is nothing that you can add to His death and resurrection that will help get you a better spot in eternity. The only thing that we have to do to receive our salvation is to believe Jesus’ sacrifice was enough and that He did it because He loves you. Believing “in” Jesus or God is not what is required because Satan believes “in” them because he knows Who they are, but he doesn’t have the ability to humble himself to them in submission to serve them. We can and should because it is necessary if you want to have a joyful eternity.

Your life doesn’t stop when you stop breathing as some people suppose. Your next breath will be taken in Heaven but before that you will stand for your life to be judged by God. If you have accepted Jesus as your Savior, then your life and your judgement is covered by the blood of Jesus and His righteousness. If you did not accept Him, then your eternity will not be enjoyable. The choice is yours now, so choose how you want to spend it.

Can racism be fixed?


It is a topic on many people’s mind for some reason, especially in America, but why is it so important? What is bad about racism? Why do we still have it, even after more than forty years of “the dream”!? What can we do about getting rid of racism?

For starters, we could just program our children to not notice the color of people’s skin. It is done in schools all of the time, the “programming” of our kids. But what about the adults, the ones that have lived through the sixties and seventies ad nauseam, where will it end? Those of us who saw the riots in Los Angeles, the shootings in Chicago, etc. cannot just forget. Then there are the family stories of lynchings and the slavery that was endured by great-great grandparents. Yes, all of this must be taken into account but what can be done about the racism of today?

Can we fix it? It cannot be apologized away. There isn’t enough gold or silver or any amount of groveling which will pay the price to a people who were taken from their home land, sold into slavery by their own people or who were conquered and then sold. Nothing that can be said or done in reparation for over four hundred years of slavery and bigotry and hatred!

I am a Caucasian male, born in the same year as our President. Yes, I have seen the terror in people’s eyes, the fear and anger during the late sixties when I was just starting school at about the same time that Martin Luther King, Jr. was murdered and a few months later Bobby Kennedy was shot while campaigning! The thing is that none of my family, as far back as I can trace, has ever owned a slave. Yet, “crackers”, white people like me, are blamed for every slight, every injustice that has ever happened in the past one hundred years or more.

Why? Because of racism. Not our racism, but the racism that exists in our culture. I don’t blame African-Americans for this, it is not their fault. It is not my fault that racism exists in the South or in America as a whole. I believe that Satan himself has used racism to great effect in America and has used it to stir up so much hatred and enmity between people who don’t know each other, they just know that skin color and culture are different between us. God created mankind, He did not create certain races of people to do certain things and others to do other things in this world. God created one race that had many different shades of skin color because of the climate that they settled in, not because one is better or worse than any other!

God is the only person Who can bring about the end of racism and bigotry and when Jesus comes back and rules the world as King, it will happen! This is not an “if” or a “possible” outcome, it will happen because Jesus said so! At the end of the Tribulation, when the one-thousand year reign of Christ begins, there will be no more bigotry and racism and those who try to keep it going will answer to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords! God removed His people from slavery after four hundred and thirty years, He did not endorse it. Those who were in slavery in Israel were to be released on the seventh anniversary of their slavery, it was not to be a life-long servitude unless the slave loved the family enough to become a bond-servant and it was the slave’s choice not the masters.

We cannot do away with racism by our own choices. Humanity doesn’t have the moral and ethical capacity to get rid of it or any other bigoted ways of treating people, not on our own strength at least. The love of God through Jesus can open our eyes and our hearts so that we no longer act on our cultural and familial learned behavior toward others, but if it has been taught from an early age it is still there. Only the change wrought by Jesus in your life and mine can cause it to be any different, so the choice is clear…choose Christ as your Savior and follow Him. Serve Him as your Master and Lord because He is the only Master to whom service is due!

Where is God?


“Can you show me ONE place where you know for sure that God is?”, this was a question asked of a small boy years ago, and supposedly the man asking it told the boy that he should think about it during the day and when he came back, the man told him that he would give him a dime. At the time when this was supposed to have happened, a dime was a good deal of money. Because fifty years ago, a dime would buy a lot more than it does today.

Later, that day the boy was walking by the place where he had met the man earlier and the man was still there. The boy stopped and told him that he had been thinking about that question and it occurred to him to ask a question of him: “You wanted to know of a place where God is present, mister, I would give you a dollar if you can show me a place where God is NOT!?”

This verbal exchange was and is being sent through the e-mail channels because the first time I saw it was a few years ago and it got my attention. It got me to wondering about God’s presence in our world and in our lives. Do we acknowledge Him every day? Do we seek Him every day?

Those of us who are or claim to be Christians are supposed to, but do you? Some people, many of them church-going Christians, claim to be following Jesus but do you really seek Him as He said for us to do? What does it mean to “seek Him”?

Seeking Jesus and the will of God is a practice and a discipline that we should attempt every day. The act and the process of it is not as hard or complicated as it seems. The will of God and seeking His wisdom can be accomplished by the same way…by actually reading and studying the Bible.

I know that many people say that understanding the Bible is not an easy thing to do, but if you pray for God to reveal His wisdom to you as you read it, and He will. God’s Word is a living document because it was sent from God through His prophets to give a specific message to Israel, but the message contained in it as it is revealed by the Spirit, is different for each of us. Which is why it is revealed and interpreted to each of us by the Holy Spirit in different ways for each one of us. What one person gets out of the 23rd Psalm will not be the same as what you may get, but the message will be what you need at the time.

The most wonderful part of this is that you will gain new insight each time you read it, regardless of whether you read the entire Bible or just one book from the sixty-six contained in it. As long as you read it while asking Him to reveal His wisdom for you as you read through it, then it will not remain a mystery. The wisdom contained within it comes to each of us by the will of God and the context of each passage needs to be taken with the rest of the chapter that it is contained within so that each passage won’t be taken out of context.

Taking a passage by itself, without the context of the chapter it is contained within, is dangerous. Satan did this by misquoting scripture and quoting it out of context, as have other people in history. Scripture can be twisted to mean almost anything if you do this and that is not what the Scripture was written for. Give it some thought and see if you can find where God lives at all times.

God is closer to you than your sister or your spouse or even your parents and yet many people think that He is somewhere out in space in a place called Heaven where we can’t even talk to Him. This is not the truth because His place is as near as your heart. He is as near to you as your skin is. God is with you in whatever circumstance that you may be in, good or bad. He doesn’t leave you and has never left you at all. If you feel that He has, the only person that has moved is you!

Time, do you have enough?


It seems that when we wake up in the morning, the day just seems to be on meth (or so I’m told). When your feet hit the floor, the minutes just seem to fly by you without stopping. There never seems to be enough time to finish all of the tasks and errands for one day before another starts! I have also noticed that once the number of your birthdays gets past that all-important “21” marker, it seems that someone puts grease on the “line” and time and dates just slip by faster and faster from that point on.

Is it possible for us to take a step back and look at things without getting run over in the process? Actually, no you can’t. When you are born, your life has a certain number of days and years allotted to it by God and just like a pot when it is tipped to a certain point, that time just spills over and pours out faster and faster. As the numbers get larger, your time seems to go faster, at times, than at others.

When you were small, waiting for your birthday to come around took a whole year, but it seemed to take two or three. The same thing happened at Christmas, the time between did not change but it seemed to get longer and longer, until you got older and realized that Santa wasn’t real, he was just the “spirit” of Christmas.

So, do we have enough time? As Christians, yes we have eternity awaiting so we have time. We may not have enough time to tell all of our friends about Jesus though. Many friends don’t want to hear or they have already heard and really don’t want to hear it again. Some think that a decision that they made many years ago, even though it didn’t make a real change in their lives, is enough. The only person that knows for sure is God. But, I still want to tell them and I don’t know if I have enough time!

God will make the time, in His time. He will bring them about to Him, in His time and in His way. The only thing that I can do is present the good news of Jesus here and then hand it over to God and let Him take it from there.

God loves each one of us enough that He sent Jesus to die on the cross as a substitute for us, all of us. That sacrifice of His Son’s blood opened the way for each of us to come to the Father through the covering of His righteousness and ask forgiveness for our sins and our decisions, good or bad. Once we have come to the place where we know that we need Jesus, the rest is simple…ask Him to come into our heart and forgive us for waiting so long so that we can be made whole through Him. That’s it! We can’t add one drop to it at all and what we do add to it, can only be done through Jesus and by Him and His glory.

Give Jesus a chance in your everyday life from your rising up in the morning to going to sleep at night. Your day won’t slow down any, but you will be able to get more done and it will be done for Him and through Him as well which will make it much more worthwhile too.

A new beginning in the new year!


In the new year, we will all have wonderful days and some which are not so great. So, what are we to do about those days which are not so great? In many ways, we really can’t do much about those days which don’t go the way that we think it is supposed to.

Your daily life can be great but only if you are following the author of life Who is Jesus! Why does He have to be in your life for it to be great? Because you need Him! I know, there are many of you who are so independent and able to do anything that you don’t think that you need Jesus in your life, but…you do. Oh, we can make it through some tough times and taking our child to the doctor’s office is no big deal, we can even take ourselves to see the doctor once in a while. But, what happens when you or your spouse or your child gets really sick and the doctor gives you the “Sit down” look or speech?

What happens when you hear words like “There’s nothing that I can do” or “It has progressed too far”? Your independence from belief in God is going to go into hyper-space mode trying to get back to Him! Why? Because, at this point He is the only One Who can help! He can help and He will, but it may not be in the way that you are expecting. Sometimes God’s help seems to come too late or not at all and people wonder why.

Have you ever considered that your blessings in this life, including your family and your finances, may have been given to you temporarily so that the life you have after it is taken will be better and greater than before? Like Job, whom no Christian ever wants to emulate, people in this situation have two choices, curse God for taking your “stuff” which He gave you or to bless Him for being in control in the first place.

Our lives are supposed to be living testimonies to the world regardless of our situation in life and yet many don’t see it that way. Most of us seem to think that we were born to try to get as much as we can before we reach our expiration date, whenever that may be but…that is not why God put us here. It is very likely that is why this site doesn’t have many visitors on a daily or monthly basis, because I don’t “fluff up the truth”, I don’t cover things with flowery words and phrases. I give you the total, unvarnished message as it is given to me period.

I don’t mean to offend anyone with that statement but it is the truth. I have written some poems on this site and no one seems to notice. I have told a few stories and it seems that they aren’t good enough. I am ranting right now because that seems to be what gets people’s attention. The truth is that ….. Jesus is the only answer that you will ever need for your depression or your finances or your life! He is the only One that can help and make sure that you are a child of God.

He is not going to make your life rosy and rich, unless you were on the road to that already. Don’t give up on His blessings in your life but also don’t think for a minute that you and you alone were responsible for what you have because it is not true!

God gave you your talents and abilities and He gave them to you for a reason. That reason is to be a servant of His, not a slave as one who is dragged against his will and sold, but as one who has been bought with the precious blood of Jesus! Your sins were paid for with His blood and He wishes for you to tell others of the bondage that you were released from not a bondage that you were put into. I am a bond-slave of Christ, one who is willing to live for and serve my Master until the day when He comes back or He calls me home.

Give your life to Jesus and He will give His life, strength and purpose for living to you so that you can show it to others and bring them into the family too. 🙂

Time enough to grieve


When the holidays are over we tend to be saddened by the passing of the feelings of togetherness and love that we experience during the holiday. The gifts, the joy that getting a present brings, the look on children’s faces as they open their gifts, these are all precious and will never be repeated exactly the same way again. For those who may have lost a loved one during this time of year, it is especially hard because the joy of the season is tamped down by the grief and sadness.

Unfortunately, those feelings don’t really go away with time like everyone says, they become a little less bothersome but that is all. The good news is that God knows exactly how you feel and is there with you to carry you through it, no matter how deep the sadness goes or how long it lasts. He never leaves you and He won’t forsake the friendship that you have.

If you don’t know Jesus as your Lord and Savior, then the sadness will be terrible and deep and you may feel that you can’t bear it. For some, this is a reason to “get off the wagon” and get back into a bottle or go back to their habit of taking drugs to ease the pain. This is a really bad idea! Jesus can strengthen you and help you through this, if you will let Him!

He told us in His Word that we would never be alone, if we have accepted Him into our lives. He loves us much more than we can ever imagine or believe and if we will just trust in Him, we can gain the strength that we need to make it through the days and weeks ahead. The death of a marriage or a family member is a hard lesson in life and it is one that many of us have gone through, especially me, but Jesus is the Wonderful Counselor, the Everlasting Father and the Prince of Peace and He will be with you through this if you will ask Him into your heart and life.

Grief is a natural part of life and death and there are many stages to it, but the most devastating is the depression and anger. We feel anger because we weren’t ready for our loved one to leave or for the marriage to end or whatever it may have been. We are depressed because of the loss of our loved one by whatever means that has taken them away and we know that we may never see them again. Cheer up, if you have Christ in your life and they did too then it is only a temporary separation. They are in a more wonderful place than you can imagine and they are with Jesus!

Their salvation could lead you in that direction if you will allow it to. Grief and loss for a Christian are not permanent but temporary because Jesus conquered death and the grave! You will see them again if you decide to give your heart to Jesus and ask Him to come into your life. Once you have done this, your life and that of those around you will never be the same because of the change in you that they can see.