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I sat in the doctor’s office on a cold March day, listening as he told my sister that she had cancer and it was already too far advanced. There was no treatment they could offer her. She had very little time left to live.

Never before in my life had I been so aware of the certainty of heaven and the uncertainty of life. My mind was flooded with so many happy memories of growing up on a farm with my parents and two brothers who were already in heaven, and my sister who would soon be there with them. The thought of being the only survivor of my birth family of six seemed overwhelming, but my thoughts were pulled back into that office as I heard someone ask Betty how she was feeling about all of this. She very calmly and confidently replied, “Oh, I’m doing just fine. I have no fear of death. I don’t have a death wish, but I know to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.¹ On November 17, 1968 I admitted that I was a sinner and needed God.² I believed God loved me and sent Jesus His Son to die for my sin.³ I called out to Him to save me.⁴ God saved me that day, and even though I could never be good enough to deserve heaven, He will welcome me home to be with Him for all eternity.”

Then, as was typical for her, she looked at them and asked, “What about you? Do you know you are going to heaven when you die?”

She lived about a month after that, and I never saw her faith in God’s promises waver.

To believe in the certainty of heaven is to believe in the certainty of hell. It doesn’t matter if you think you deserve hell or not, none of us deserve heaven. God is “not willing that any should perish [go to hell], but that all should come to repentance.”⁵

All my birth family is in heaven now. Though I have lost the pleasure of being with them, I haven’t really lost them. They are forever in heaven, and because I have also admitted my sin, believed on Jesus, and called out for Him to save me, I will join them some day. They will be part of my forever family.

You could never be a part of my earthly family, but there is a much bigger heavenly forever family we can all be a part of. How?

It’s as simple as A.B.C.

A. Admit you are a sinner. “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). “The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 6:23).

B. Believe. “God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16).

C. Confess (call). “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved” (Romans 10:9).

Are you a member of God’s forever family?

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