Miles McKee Ministries
Box 353, Ponte Vedra Beach, Jacksonville, Florida 32004-0353
PO Box 8, New Ross, County Wexford, Ireland
"I was a politician. I refused bribes and people knew they could trust my word. I always represented the needs of my people and always put service to my country first and foremost".
"I sold drugs but I never sold to kids. I may have been in the narcotics business but I wasn't as bad as some of the dealers".
"I was a housewife. I raised my children the best that I could. I made sure they all had their first communion and all those things. I went to the church every Sunday and tried to do all that the church told me to do. I was a good neighbor and a good person".
"I was an upright man and I make it my business to practice morality. I think it's safe to say that I hated wrong doing. I got on well with everyone except that is, for those people who kept talking about me needing the grace of God. All that talk about grace really annoyed me for I always felt as though I was being put down".
"I was a housewife. I raised my children the best that I could. I made sure they all had their first communion and all those things. I went to the church every Sunday and tried to do all that the church told me to do. I was a good neighbor and a good person".
"I was an upright man and I make it my business to practice morality. I think it's safe to say that I hated wrong doing. I got on well with everyone except that is, for those people who kept talking about me needing the grace of God. All that talk about grace really annoyed me for I always felt as though I was being put down".
MESSED UP -
On and on the conversations go and it quickly emerges that there is a pattern here. All of the people we talk to in Hell claim to have been reasonably good and decent folk who don't deserve their fate. On the other hand those in Heaven equally claim to be totally undeserving of their eternal bliss since they were so sinful and useless while on earth.
Somebody switched the price tags
I remember reading once of how a few years ago some teenagers broke into a leading New York department store and stole absolutely nothing. Instead of stealing, they went all around the store switching price tags. The result was that in the morning a fur coat was priced at $1and a bar of soap at $5000. A toy soldier was $10,000 while designer handbags were 50 cents.
WHAT’S UP DOC?
Well it seems then when we look at the inhabitants of both Heaven and Hell that somebody has switched the price tags. No one in either Heaven or Hell thinks they deserve to be there. Can it be that something has gone desperately wrong?
To get the answer to this question it's not enough to spout off some well worn philosophy invented by some man, rather we've got to take our answer from God’s point of view as recorded in the pages of the Old and New Testaments.
VICE VERSA!?!
Here's the truth of the matter -
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If you want to get to Heaven before they close the door then read on. You might want to fasten your seat belt for we are going to take a journey across some bumpy yet scriptural terrain. You might find yourself challenged and at times, perhaps, offended but, if you read on, these next few pages could unlock the answer as to how to get to Heaven before they close the door.
A SHOCKING DISCOVERY!!!
Now this might seem strange at first, but the truth is BEING BAD PUTS NO-ONE INTO HELL....from the word go, we all deserved hell, not because of what we'd done but because of what we were.
DAVID’S MOM - A BIT ON THE SIDE !!?
A careful reading of the Bible will tell you just that we deserve it. Listen to the psalmist David who laments "I was shaped in iniquity and in sin did my mother conceive me" (Psalm 51:5). He doesn't mean by this that his mother had had a bit on the side. Far from it! He is speaking of the depravity and pollution which was his from conception and he is speaking for all of us. From the word go, we were all born in sin. All of us were born with a nature which twisted away from God.
NATURAL BORN SINNERS
We all have a sin nature. That's why we sin. Think about it. I think I hear someone asking me “What do you mean by sin?” Let me illustrate, no-one ever taught us to lie. Even as kids if we were caught with our hands in the cookie jar or biscuit tin we still said "It wasn't me, I didn't do it!" Our parents had to teach us how to tell the truth because our nature was to lie. It is the same thing with obedience. We had to learn to obey because by nature we are all born as little rebels who want their own way.
STICKS AND STONES
Tighten the seat belt for it gets worse. I always flinch when I hear people telling me how good they are for in reality what they are saying is that God is a liar. The Lord has made it abundantly clear through His prophet Jeremiah what He thinks of man's innermost being for he describes us this way "the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked - who can know it" ? (Jer. 17:9) Now that is not exactly a verbal bouquet. "Desperately wicked and deceitful"..!!!!!!1.... That is fighting talk. Just try calling me that one more time. Then another Prophet, Isaiah, speaks up and says "But we are all as an unclean thing and all our righteousness are as filthy rags" (Isa 64:4). What me ....an unclean thing? And my best efforts filthy in God's sight!..........that's out of order!
MAY BREAK MY BONES!!
Well keep tightening your seat belt for it gets worse. Isaiah speaks up again by saying "The whole head is sick and the whole heart faint. From the sole of the foot even unto the head there is no soundness in it; but wounds and bruises and putrefying sores: they have not been closed neither bound up neither mollified with ointment"(Isa 1:5-6)........What is that all about? That's all about you and all about me.
BUT NAMES......?
By the way, God is not trying to insult us when He describes us this way. He is just calling it the way He sees it and its not a pretty sight. God loves us enough to be honest with us and to tell us the truth. We can try to self improve and can do as many good things as we like but, in God’s estimation, we can never alter the fundamental flaw which comes with being human. We can never equip or qualify ourselves for Heaven for Sin has left a giant sweat stain deep inside which can never be deodorized by good works.