CLIMBING THE HEAVENLY STAIRS

Excerpt 1

Faith is to the spirit as the eyes are to the body.  We see with faith.  It takes many forms.  It not only enables you to embrace an unseen God; it determines your whole outlook on life.  You have the confidence to try what you believe that you can do.  If you have no faith, you will fail to attempt the tasks necessary to become successful.   It’s difficult to attempt what you can’t see yourself doing, but you don’t know if you could succeed until you try.  Nat King Cole thought he couldn’t sing.  He made musical history when he tried.

With faith we can dream of a time when we will be reunited with our departed loved ones in that land of bliss with God.  With faith we can dream of doing great things.  Everyone dreams but only those that plan and work to fulfill their dreams.  Dreaming without planning and working with stubborn determination is as useless as faith without works.

Thomas Edison taught us a great lesson about achieving success in life.  He dreamed of creating the light bulb.  He planned, worked and failed, or so his friends thought.  He was not discouraged because he knew he hadn’t failed but had merely found things that don’t work. There are many skeptics because when success comes slowly, it’s easy to start believing in failure.  Edison didn’t fail because his motivation was not what he saw, but what he believed.

Glen Miller had a dream of what he wanted his band to sound like.  He was not discouraged when he failed several times over a period of years, but kept trying until he succeeded.  He was not inspired by what his band sounded like, but by how he believed they could sound.

To fulfill a dream, you must plan and work to remove  the obstacles in the way.  The plan is called a goal.  Those without goals have no direction for their life and little energy.  The ones struggling to fulfill a dream have abounding energy because inspired living is energy giving.  The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams. ‑‑Eleanor Roosevelt

J..C. Penny once said, “Show me a  stock clerk with a goal and I will show you the future head of the company. Show me a person without a goal and I will show you a stock clerk."  If you don’t have a dream of your own, you will work for someone else, which is helping them to fulfill their dream.

You are not a failure if your project fails.  Making mistakes and having failures is a part of life.  You can accept them and learn from them or be bitter and give up your dream.  Failures are actually your training ground.  You can learn valuable lessons from them.  If you do, you can make them the stepping stones to your success.

Excerpt 2

We have a personal relationship with Jesus.  Though we all must follow the same steps to obey the gospel, the Lord often has different messages for each of us.  Jesus told Peter to follow him. When Peter asked about John who was following them, Jesus answered  “If I want him to remain alive until I return, what is that to you?  You must follow me” (JN 21:22).  We are all different.  We have different abilities and opportunities.  In that respect we each have our own gospel.  He has different tasks for each of us.

Being in the presence of the Son of God is an experience that can never be forgotten.  His piercing glance could look beyond the outward appearance and examine the heart.  Everyone that meets him is shaken to the very core.  The rich young ruler was torn between following him and keeping his wealth (LK 18:18).  After just one meeting with this word that became flesh, the woman at the well, told everyone she met “Come see a man that told me everything I ever did” (JN 4:29).  The light of the world blinded Saul and sent him to the ground (Acts 22-45).  Those who tried to trick him with their questions were answered so that they didn’t dare ask him any more questions (MT 22:44).  Even the mob that came to arrest him and take him to a kangaroo court, drew back and fell to the ground at the sound of his voice (JN 18:6)!

Is it any wonder that this divine visitor could stir the souls of everyone that heard him?  He didn’t use flowery words or long descriptive phrases but got directly to the heart of the matter.  No one is ever the same after they meet him.  The ones that ignore him don’t know him.  You can’t know him and fail to be changed.  Even those who refuse to obey him are shaken.  Felix trembled as he learned that obedience to Jesus was his only hope to escape the coming judgment, but he put it off for a more convenient time (AC 24:25).  There is no record that he ever responded.  Due to the urgency of the Lord’s message, you are forced to decide whether to follow him.

The one who came to die for the sins of the wor