Tonight I found myself in a quite unfamiliar situation. I was caught in the middle of a frenzy, a frenzy of hundreds of students some of whom were greatly influenced by the beverage. Georgia Tech had just won a thrilling game 31-28 against Florida State. With less than one minute remaining in the game Florida State had driven the ball down the field to our three yard line and was in prime position for a winning score. Almost all hope seemed to be lost for the home Yellow Jackets. After being up ten points with seven minutes to go, defeat and heartache were looming. Then, unexpectedly and seemingly out of nowhere a miracle of sorts. As the FSU running back took the hand off and lowered his head toward the goal line, our true freshman safety put his helmet on the football causing a fumble. The ball rolled into the end zone and into the arms of another true freshman defensive back for a touch back. The crowd erupted and the GT sideline went into a frenzy. I found myself standing on our bleacher seats next to one of our players dancing as the PA system played “We will we will rock you”. As soon as the clock expired I kept with ritual and headed toward the middle of the field to congratulate FSU on a game well played and pray with our team. Only as I made my way to mid-field, so did half the student section, and they seemed to have a crazy look in their eyes. Not fearing for my life, but just sensing self preservation at some level was at stake, I ran out of the sea of on coming people traffic and I observed. I witnessed a once in a while celebration. A celebration that began as the game clock expired, and will no doubt last until the wee hours of the morning. So it got me thinking about celebrations. We Christians like all others, celebrate victories in sports, we celebrate the accomplishments of ourselves and others, we celebrate weddings, we celebrate birthdays, and for some reason we even celebrate cinco de mayo. The point is we love to celebrate, if really for no reason if necessary. But what about heaven, what do they celebrate there? Jesus speaking in Luke chapter 15:10, 10In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” Heaven celebrates our birthdays all right, our spiritual birthday. When sinners like you and me respond to the Holy Spirit’s call for salvation, and we express explicit faith in Jesus Christ and His blood sacrifice as atonement for our sins, and repent of our own sin before God, there is a party in Heaven. A party where Christ is honored most, and our name is added to the book of life (Revelation 3:5). We are good at celebrations, we do it big and we do it right. But it begs the question, are we celebrating like we should when we witness or hear testimonies of sinners being rescued from hell and saved to Jesus Christ and his beauty and splendor? It’s great that we celebrate all the things we do, but birthdays, weddings, football games, and St. Patty’s day all have an end. Our eternal destiny in Christ is well…..forever. Let us all strive to be better about celebrating and enjoying the greatness of God through His son’s salvation, and then we can say, we are partying with all of Heaven.
