Everyone Goes Home

We have more in common than you may think. Before accepting the call to ministry, I served a 32-year career as a firefighter paramedic. Like you, I spent a career responding to victims experiencing their worse day and sometimes encountering their worse behavior. I have attended far too many funerals of colleagues, some of whom took their own lives. Then there were those words above the doors of our engine house; “Everyone Goes Home” which was meant to remind us of the constant vigilance required for the risks faced on every response. Don’t get me wrong, I loved my job, and I felt that I was making a difference. But it would be dishonest to say it didn’t take its toll. Like those around me, I dealt with the stress in several ways, none of them good. Spending so much time seeing the world in its fallen state, eventually leads us to look deeper into ourselves. And that’s where it gets really discouraging. It’s easy to see our situation as helpless. But there is help, and His name is Jesus Christ.

You see Christianity is not a religion, it’s a relationship. Jesus said, I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst. All that the Father gives me will come to me, and the man that comes to me I will never turn away” (John 11: 25-26). So here we are, one beggar, telling another beggar where he found bread. When we ask Christ to step in as our Lord and Savior, he begins a transformation within us. One that not only helps us in this life, but in eternity as well. In his first letter to his friend Timothy, the Apostle Paul wrote, for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and for the life to come (1 Timothy 4:8).

If you have not made a decision to trust in Jesus Christ, I would beseech you to consider Him now. The Bible reminds us of what we already know in our heart to be true. Life is short, death is certain, and judgment is coming. We here at Shelby Bible Church hope and pray that when the last alarm sounds, and the final call is answered, Everyone Goes Home.

Yours in Christ,

Pastor Carl Seitz