Where is the Kitty Cat?

Several years ago our family cat died. He was a really great cat. He was kind and gentle to everyone except the mice. His only bad quality was that he was proud of his hunting skills and usually brought the prey into the house to prove what a great hunter he was.
I built an appropriate cat coffin and we buried him under the old oak tree at our property in the country.

A few weeks later I was back out there with my son, who was four at the time. In the midst of typical four-year-old conversation he said; “Where is the kitty cat? I want to see him”. I gently explained that because the kitty died, we buried him under the ground and we couldn’t see him any more. I was not prepared for his next question. So, what will happen to me if I die? Forty plus years of Sunday school flashed through my mind. Countless discussions about “age of accountability” and salvation came to mind. The hesitation lasted only a moment and I told him what I truly believe about our God and His love for children. Son, if you died right now, you would go to heaven to live with Jesus. “Okay”, he said. “What’s that thing over there”? “Can I play with it”?

Then it hit me. This was what Jesus was talking about when He said, “Unless you become like one of these little children, you will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven”. My son had a question about his eternity. He asked his daddy for an answer. His daddy gave him an answer, and he believed it because his daddy said it and he trusted his daddy. End of subject!

For centuries this has been the question; “ What will happen to me when I die?” Volumes have been written and spoken on the subject. Some churches and theologians have devised countless rules and rituals to guarantee entrance to Heaven. It’s really pretty simple.

God is perfect. Only people who do no wrong can live with Him.
We are not perfect. It does not matter how good we are, we still do wrong. God said our wrongs had to be punished. Our punishment was that we would never be able to live in Heaven with God.
Jesus said He would go to earth, as a human, and live a perfect life. He would face everything that humans face, and not do any wrong. He would be the only human being that ever lived who could die and go to live with God in Heaven. Then, He would take the punishment for all the wrongs that we do.
Jesus loved us so much that He was willing to be separated from God, so that we could be with God, forever. God would no longer need to punish us. We would be perfect in God’s eyes because of what Jesus did. All we have to do is accept Jesus’ gift, admit that we need forgiveness for our sin, and ask him to take control of our lives.
God saved Jesus from being apart from Him by raising Him from the dead. He is not in the ground any more! He is alive in Heaven! God keeps His promises. We can go to Heaven to live with Him when we die. All we have to do is believe it, just like my little boy ……because our Daddy said it!