Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but through Me.”     John 14:6 LSB

I prefer getting directions the old school way. I like to be told which road to take and where to turn and what landmarks are there. It has taken me a while to warm up to the whole GPS thing, but I will admit having that voice coming from your car or your phone telling you turn by turn where to go is often helpful. But sometimes the GPS gets it wrong.

I asked Siri for directions to heaven, and it gave me a place called Swede Heaven which is 2,639 miles from my home and according to GPS instructions, it’s a 38-hour journey. Apparently, Swede Heaven is a town located in Washington in Snohomish County.

If your directions get messed up, you can make a short trip much longer. The Israelites made a 14-day journey take over 40 years. Due to their whining and complaining and refusing to obey God, they just kept wandering around in the desert. Many never made it to the Promised Land.

When we set out on our journey to heaven, we need to understand we have no idea how long we have to get there. We don’t know the day or the hour when we will be called home. We need to take the direct route. The devil will try to talk us into detours and will try to distract us and get us to take wrong turns. Our Scripture passage tells us that there is only one way, and this is through Jesus Christ. Jesus, Himself, clearly tells us He is the way, the truth and the life and no can come to God the Father except through Him.

We must accept Jesus Christ as our Savior in order to get to heaven. Once we are truly saved, we must follow Him and obey His commands. We must serve Him and love Him with our whole heart. This is not always easy to do, but we must strive to do our best. We must call upon Him to help us in times when the going gets difficult. We must rely on Him and acknowledge Him in all we do, and He will guide us on the right path (Proverbs 3:5-6).

Jesus tells us in Matthew 7:13-14 that in order to get to heaven we must enter through the narrow gate. He tells us the gate is wide and the road is broad that leads to destruction, and many will enter that wide gate and travel that broad highway. But He says the gate is narrow and the road is constricted that leads to life and there are few who find it.

The road to heaven is not an easy road to travel. This is why we must surrender to Christ and follow Him. Obviously, you can’t just call on Siri to get you there. We must call on our Lord and Savior. We must put our faith in Him and obey Him. You can’t take your choice of roadways to get there. There is only one route. That is through Jesus Christ, through the narrow gate and along the narrow roadway.

We don’t know if we have a matter of seconds, minutes, hours or years to get there. All we know is that once we get there we will go through gates of pearl and walk on streets of gold. Revelation 21:21 says, “And the twelve gates were made of twelve pearls; each one of the gates was a single pearl. And the street of the city was pure gold like transparent glass.”

It’s a difficult journey, but well worth the trip. Don’t get distracted or allow the devil to talk you into a detour. There’s only one way to get there. Surrender to Him and follow Him today.

Have a great day!