As I write this, I am probably as ill as I have ever been, with a full-blown sinus infection that seems to have invaded each and every body system I have. My legs are weak, my fingers numb, my pulse is throbbing in my head, and I'm as pale as a sheet of typing paper. Up until about half an hour ago I didn't have the energy to rise from a supine position, let alone stand up. I just barely had the strength to make the fifteen foot hike to the bathroom. In fact, I was looking at my ghostly pale hands and all I could think of was the fact that they closely resembled corpse hands that I have seen while attending funerals. I actually thought I was dying and this is what my corpse hands would look like in my casket.
Ten minutes later, I was back in my sick bed, which happens to be the living room couch at the moment, and although nothing much had changed in my currrent condition, I suddenly felt like I was back in the land of the living again. The change was a subtle one, but it was there none-the-less. Suddenly I wanted to do more than just sleep. I picked up the book I had been way too sick to read and read several pages, but then decided to do something a bit more constructive with my time. So here I sit, at my cute little lap top, with my head still hurting a little bit but my spirits lifted far higher than they were just an hour ago.
I still can't contemplate much in the way of supper. My entire lunch consisted of freshly sliced tomatoes, a few fresh cucumbers, and a large amount of water. That was it. It was all I had the stomach for, and I'm thinking tomato soup for supper, and nothing else. Just staring out this window while I think of the next sentence to write helps me to feel a bit better, which I guess helps to prove the theory that natural light is good for a person's health. I am still quite weak, but much stronger than before and having to correct a million typos along the way because my fingers are as weak as my legs.
I have to wonder just how sick does a person have to be before they give up entirely? What does it take to overcome the strong human spirit, and just lay down and die? A lot apparently. I have periodic sinus infections but have never had one that laid me as low as this particular one did. Yet, even just an hour from feeling as though I was at death's door, here I am writing the only thing I can think of to write. I'm a born again Christian, and as such I've been taught that there is no tomorrow, only today can be held in the palm of my hand. I could go to sleep tonight and die without a peep. In fact, I could do that when I feel as healthy as a horse. I think the turning point for me was while I was looking at my shaky, pale hands, and thinking I was about to die, when the realization came to me that the thoughts I was having were destructive ones, sent from Satan to torment me.
Perhaps you, the reader, do not actually believe that Satan exists and if so, I commend you because I really don't know how you do it. Since I believe in God and His healing power, I must also believe in the devil and his destructive power. The two go hand in hand. The power of good always supercedes the power of evil, even when we don't believe in God or Satan, and that says a lot for the human spirit alone. We are designed to try to survive, in any way we can, and we do so with vibrancy and very strong will. Death is, believe it or not, an unnatural state for the human race, as we were originally designed to live forever, just like the power that Created us in His image.
It is our own sin that sickens and weakens us, making us vulnerable to Satanic attacks and the wages of sin are death. Thanks to the first man, Adam and the first woman, Eve, sin has been very much a part of our lives from their time onward. We die slowly thanks to our sinful nature, with each passing day. The Christian believes that Christ died for us all so that we won't have to pay the wages of sin and spend eternity in Hell. Believing this or not believing this is entirely up to you, the individual, for we are all given the opportunity to decide for ourselves.
It is human nature to choose life, yet so many of us refuse to make the choice that leads to life. In fact, we don't make the choice that leads to death either. We go through life, neither believing nor disbelieving, in a luke-warm state of spirituality, thinking that there is plenty of time left to us to make the big, important decision. Trouble is, there is a limited amount of time for all of us, thanks to our deeply ingrained Adamic nature, and eventually the choice will be taken out of our hands. If we die without making the choice for Heaven or Hell, eternal life or eternal death, we will automatically have chosen death.
Don't wait to make the all-important choice. Whether you choose Heaven or Hell, decide quickly and with a sound mind, so you can live with your choice later, for all eternity. If you wait too long to decide, then the decision will be taken out of your hands, and then it is too late. After natural death has taken place, there is no longer any way for the deceased person to make the choice between Heaven and Hell. Jesus says that He is the Way, the Truth, and the Light, and no man can come to the Father but by Him. That means that Jesus is the intercessor between us and God the Father. He prays for us, and when we pray to him for forgiveness of our sins, he prays to His Father for the same thing, and the result is always the same: A new believer enters the security of the Grace of God.
