If I said to you this morning, "It is the ending that makes all the difference in how we regard the present"—would you agree?
A new arrival in heaven was being shown around God's Holy Realm. He noticed an angel at a computer terminal looking completely exhausted. "What are you doing?" the man asked. The angel sighed: "I'm on the prayer processing desk. Humans keep sending software update requests for their lives, but they refuse to read the Creator's Instruction Manual—the Bible—or restart their hearts in repentance. They just keep hitting 'remind me later!'"
The humor stings because it's true. How often do we ask God to change our circumstances and even our lives while refusing to change our hearts. We all desire His everlasting love, mercy and joy at the same time postponing His lordship of our lives. I think Rev. Wunderlich said it very well with going to church doesn’t make us christians no more than being born in a garage makes us a car. We look forward to heaven and all that it entails while living as if the present is all that matters. When we deliberately postpone our relationship with God, we are neglecting heaven—God's Holy Realm and eternal communion with His majestic holiness. That ending is meant to inform how we live today.
I confess: I've asked God for His love and grace while wanting more time to get my heart right. I promised Him so much in return for His favor, forgetting that heaven is not just a future home. It is the place where God’s majestic holiness breaks into my present. John the Baptist and Jesus repeatedly remind us that the kingdom of heaven is here, now. This call to repent often feels like a responsibility we ignore. The true battle lies not in believing in heaven but in living as though we do.
Despair, doubt, and fear whisper in our ears: "Heaven is nice, God is real, but the now is what matters. Comfort now. Success now. I can surrender to God's holiness later." The challenge is not the demons but the relentless pressure to treat this world—with all its pain and temporary comforts—as the ultimate reality. God is telling us today that our faithfulness now is building something eternal in the future. What we do today in alignment with God's holiness echoes forever.
Let me tell you about a man named Tom. His seven-year-old daughter was diagnosed with leukemia. Medical jargon like "aggressive" and "survival rates" filled Tom’s mind. One night, he sat in his garage, wrestling with despair: If heaven is real, why does this matter now?
Three days into the nightmare, Tom drove past the old baseball field where his father had taught him to play catch. A memory emerged—sharp and vivid. At nine years old, he struggled to hit the ball, feeling frustration grow. His father had come out and said, "Tom, what I love about this is not whether you hit the ball, but that you're here. I'm here to watch you try. That's enough." Tom had buried that memory for thirty years, but now, in his truck, he felt it again—not as a memory, but as God’s presence.
He understood something transformative: God was saying the same thing to him now. Not "I promise your daughter will be healed," but "I'm here. You're not alone. That's enough." He called his wife to share the story of his awesome experience, and they wept—not because the diagnosis changed, but because heaven suddenly felt near.
The next day, as they prepared for her first chemotherapy session, Tom knelt before his daughter. "Sweetheart, no matter what happens in that room, no matter how scared you get—I'm going to be right here. And God is going to be right here. You're not alone." He realized this was what God had been conveying to him: heaven isn’t an escape from suffering, but God’s presence in the midst of it.
Over the next eighteen months, Tom practiced remembrance. Whenever despair whispered that God was distant, he recalled that baseball field. He remembered God's words: "You’re here. That's enough." Something shifted. Tom showed up differently. He shared with other parents in the waiting room: "I know God feels far away right now. But He's closer than you think. I've experienced it." He volunteered at the hospital, started a support group, and treated his daughter with tenderness that came from understanding this moment is sacred—because God is present.
His daughter went into remission, but that’s not the point. Tom's faith transformed not because his circumstances changed, but because he remembered. He connected his earthly father's love with his heavenly Father's presence. In that remembrance, heaven stopped being distant; it became now.
Jesus teaches us that the kingdom of heaven is worth everything. A man finds treasure in a field and sells all he has to buy it. When we see what matters most, everything else reorders itself. When Tom remembered his father’s words, "You're here. That's enough," everything shifted within him. His fears and desperation for approval lost their grip because he encountered something more real: belonging to God's Holy Realm.
Heaven represents God's majestic holiness in a realm we cannot fully grasp. It’s not merely a place; it’s God’s all-encompassing presence, where pain, death, and separation end. What changes everything is this: that realm is breaking into your present through the Holy Spirit. Not later, but now.
In *Revelation 21*, John reveals the ultimate ending: the old order passes away, and all things become new. God does NOT abandon His creation—He redeems it. The deepest comfort we will find in heaven is knowing we will never be alone. Not as a distant judge but as a loving Father in our home. That truth is already yours if you recognize it.
This week, I ask you to engage in this important task—it’s not optional. Sit down with a pen and paper, and write out one memory—a moment when God showed up in a way you couldn't deny. Think of the quiet events that revealed His fatherhood or His faithfulness. Perhaps someone believed in you when you didn’t believe in yourself, or unexpected grace came after a failure.
Write it down as evidence that the God who was faithful then is faithful now. When you remember, you rewire your heart to see that heaven is not just in the future. God's Holy Realm is here, hidden like leaven, small like a mustard seed, yet present and transformative.
When you live with this clarity—ceasing to hit "remind me later" and aligning yourself with God's holiness—you experience a life that matters, a faithfulness building something eternal, and a presence you can trust. The spiritual discipline of remembrance is warfare. It's how we combat the whispers of despair that say, "God is far away. This moment is meaningless."
When you remember—when you trace God’s faithfulness through your story—you’re not creating heaven; you’re recognizing it. You’re waking up to what is already true: God's Holy Realm is here. The kingdom has already come near.
Stop hitting "remind me later." Remember instead, and let that remembrance reshape everything about how you live in the present. Because it is the ending that makes all the difference in how we regard the present.