Unpacked and Ready to Go

Have you ever taken your “dream” trip? There is so much to do to prepare for any trip, making the arrangements, packing, taking time off work, etc. There is so much to do before leaving that you wonder if you’ll ever get it all done.

I’m preparing for a trip now. Heaven. We are all preparing for this trip actually – I mean hopefully. Jesus has prepared a room for us in His father’s house. Everything is all set for us on the receiving end, we just need to do our preparations. This is no ordinary trip though and so our preparations will not be ordinary either.

For one thing, we don’t need to pack for heaven. In fact, we need to unpack before we go. The unpacking is so much harder than the packing we are used to, but the rewards are worth it.

If you are anything like me, you’ve accumulated “stuff” over the years and you probably think that either you need it, or you might one day need it, so you don’t even consider getting rid of it. It seems harmless to keep these things around, especially if you have the storage space but let me tell you why you should get rid of all of it. Because if you don’t use it, but insist on keeping it, you have an unnatural attachment to it. Attachment to temporal items does us no good whatsoever. Get rid of it! If you haven’t used it for a year, or two years or five years, it is extremely unlikely you will need it one year from now, two years from now or five years from now. If by some off chance you find one day you do need it, you’ll likely be surprised at how you cope without it.

We keep things because it makes us feel good, like we’re in control of things. Well, get rid of it. If you think you can’t live without something, get rid of it. Don’t let “stuff” control you (and I do mean stuff, not your children or spouse!). We cannot be attached to things of this earth. Earthly attachments need to be unpacked right now.

One really important thing we should be unpacking before we go to heaven is unforgiveness. You’ll never make it through “customs” with unforgiveness in your luggage, even if it’s one thing. You will be rerouted to a holding area and if you’ve ever had that happen to you, you know it feels like an eternity before you’re released!

You need to forgive everyone. The first grade teacher who made you stand in a corner, your mom for believing your sister when she was the one lying, your sister for lying, the repair man who was late and made you miss a meeting, even ourselves for the things we have done wrong. Ask the Holy Spirit to bring to your mind all those you need to forgive and then lift them up to Jesus and tell Him you forgive them.

Pride is another thing to unpack and don’t think you can sneak by with that one because pride has a stench and they’ll smell it on you before you reach the check in counter. They’ll take you so deep into the holding area you’ll feel like you’re next to the boiler! You are not the most important person in the universe, God is, and you better be treating Him that way. If you are putting yourself first then that means God isn’t. You’ll need to start working on unpacking that right now because pride likes to stick around and it’s hard to get rid of.

I have found the best place to unpack is the confessional. Picture yourself being sprayed with a spiritual “Shout It Out” before you go into the confessional. As long as you’ve confessed everything, then absolution sends you back out nice and clean and fresh. There is no limit on how often you can use the confessional to unpack and in fact, the more frequently you go, the cleaner you’ll be and the lighter your luggage gets. If it happens that you’re departure date is moved up, you’ll be ready to go anytime and you should be ready to go anytime, whether you had a departure date in mind yourself or not.

There are many, many things that need to be unpacked and since we are all so different, what I need to unpack will be different than what you need to unpack. Ask the Holy Spirit what’s in your luggage so that when you arrive at the pearly gates, your bags are completely unpacked.

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