I recently came across a wonderful prayer penned by Archibald Alexander many years ago. In it he prays that God would bless and protect him through the years of old age and into the gates of heaven. May his prayer be ours!

O most merciful God, cast me not off in the time of old age; forsake me not when my strength declineth. Now, when I am old and grey-headed, forsake me not; but let Thy grace be sufficient for me; and enable me to bring forth fruit, even in old age. May my hoary head be found in the ways of righteousness! Preserve my mind from dotage and imbecility, and my body from protracted disease and excruciating pain. Deliver me from despondency and discouragement in my declining years, and enable me to bear affliction with patience, fortitude, and perfect submission to Thy holy will.
As, in the course of nature, I must be drawing near to my end, and as I know I must soon put off this tabernacle, I do humbly and earnestly beseech Thee, O Father of mercies, to prepare me for this inevitable and solemn event: Fortify my mind against the terrors of death. Give me, if it please Thee, an easy passage through the gate of death. Dissipate the dark clouds and mists which naturally hang over the grave, and lead me gently down into the gloomy valley. O my kind Shepherd, who hast tasted the bitterness of death for me, and who knowest how to sympathize with and succour the sheep of Thy pasture, be Thou present to guide, to support, and to comfort me. Illumine with beams of heavenly light the valley and shadow of death, so that I may fear no evil. When heart and flesh fail, be Thou the strength of my heart and my portion for ever. Let not my courage fail in the trying hour. Permit not the great adversary to harass my soul in the last struggle, but make me a conqueror and more than a conqueror in this fearful conflict.
I humbly ask that my reason may be continued to the last, and if it be Thy will, that I may be so comforted and supported, that I may leave a testimony in favour of the reality of religion, and Thy faithfulness in fulfilling Thy gracious promises; and that others of Thy servants who may follow after may be encouraged by my example to commit themselves boldly to the guidance and keeping of the Shepherd of Israel.
And when my spirit leaves this clay tenement, Lord Jesus, receive it. Send some of the blessed angels to convoy my inexperienced soul to the mansion which Thy love has prepared. And O! let me be so situated, though in the lowest rank, that I may behold Thy glory. May I have an abundant entrance administered unto me into the kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; for whose sake, and in whose name, I ask all these things. Amen.

Do you ever wonder what it’s like to enter heaven? Do you ever wonder what you will see first, what you will hear first, what you will feel and experience first? Do you ever wonder what your very first thought will be after you’ve fallen asleep in this world to awaken in the next? I’m sure you do. We all do. We all wonder what’s just beyond the great chasm that separates life from death, earth from heaven, here from there.

I have recently found myself pondering this great question. As I take my morning walk to read the Bible and pray, as I meditate upon God and his grace, my mind begins to wonder and my imagination to picture. Though I admit I can do little more than speculate where God has chosen to remain silent, I do find a theory forming in my mind.
I have a theory that we enter heaven with a cry of victory, that our first thought and first exclamation is one of joy, relief, vindication. We have lived our Christian lives by faith, not sight. We have cast in our lot with a God we cannot see or touch, we have lived by the rule of a book that contradicts every bit of human wisdom, we have made a long pilgrimage toward a City that is hidden from our view. We have comforted ourselves in trial by pondering joys to come, we have consoled ourselves in grief with assurances that we will see our loved ones again, we have eased our fears of death by believing in life beyond the grave. We have chosen to believe God’s promises, we have chosen to follow in his ways, we have chosen to suffer for his name, we have chosen to take him at his word.
But it has not been easy and it has certainly never been without inconsistencies and wavering. We must admit that we often mixed faith with doubt, conviction with unbelief. As we have pondered the future we, like the distressed father who cried out to Jesus, have often had to pray, “I believe; help my unbelief!” Like the disciple who had confidence enough to spring from the boat but not enough to stay above the waves, we have often believed in one moment and hesitated in the next. Yet our faith has never completely evaporated. We have never completely let go of our grip on God—which is to say, God has never loosened his grip on us.
And so, if heaven is, indeed real, and if the gateway that leads from this life really does open into the next, wouldn’t it make sense that we enter with a cry of victory, a shout of triumph, a declaration of vindication? Wouldn’t it make sense that our first thought is one of jubilation, that our first action is one of celebration, that our first sense is one of the truest and best kind of relief? Wouldn’t it make sense that when we have fought the good fight and finished the race and kept the faith, that we cross a kind of finish line and celebrate like an athlete? For in that moment we will know—we will know beyond all speculation, beyond all doubting, beyond all need for faith, that every effort was worth it, that no moment of suffering was in vain, that no sorrow will go uncomforted, that no ache will go unsoothed, that no tear will be left undried.
We will know that though we dropped our anchor into the depths of an ocean whose bottom we could not see, it fastened securely to the rock. We will know that though we walked and limped and stumbled toward a city whose gates were obscured from our view, they opened to receive us. We will know that though we fought our way toward a destination we could see only with the eyes of faith, our faith was well-placed. “I knew it!” we will shout in triumph. “I knew it was real! I knew he was true!” we will cry, as we fall into the arms of the Savior.
Or, as the old hymn-writer said:

When we all get to heaven,what a day of rejoicing that will be!When we all see Jesus,we’ll sing and shout the victory!

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This week the blog is sponsored by Baker Books and is adapted from Jamie Rasmussen’s new book When God Feels Far Away: Eight Ways to Navigate Divine Distance. 

If you’re anything like me and consider yourself a Christian, you and I would probably agree on a few ‘essentials.’. Things like believing God is real, that He is good, and that His grace is revealed to us through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. We would also agree that because of what Jesus did on the cross, and our faith in His completed work, we can enjoy an ongoing relationship with God, and He is always with us.
The problem is, it doesn’t always feel like it. 
In fact, if I can be completely honest and vulnerable, there are times when it not only feels like God is not with me, it feels like He’s far away. Like “Elvis has left the building” far away. And after 40 years of being part of this Christ-following tribe and 35 years as a pastor, I know I’m not alone. I’ve never bothered to count, but if I had, I would have lost count of the number of people who I’ve heard cry out in some form, “Where is God in all this chaos?”
When life unravels, even for (or maybe especially for) the faithful, circumstances suddenly feel like a shaky Jenga tower ready to collapse on top of you if one condition is too carelessly shifted. You can know in your mind that God is with you, but when your experience doesn’t match your theology, you find yourself in the middle of a crisis of faith (I think the technical term is “a dumpster fire of life.”) So, what do you do when you don’t know what to do?
As a veteran of difficult seasons of divine distance, I’ve walked these seemingly lonely paths and guided many others through their own. I’m familiar with the too-common practice among Christians to “buckle up and double down” on our spiritual disciplines, expecting God to be drawn magnet-like to our good behavior (only to be exponentially more disappointed when it doesn’t work as intended). 
There is a better way. 
Using the historic narrative of Esther and the Jewish people in the time of their exile, this book illustrates how eight biblically grounded actions, expressed through a relational filter, can yield fruitful results that bring hope, encouragement, comfort, and even direction. When God Feels Far Away isn’t a self-help book. It is a guide that will help recalibrate your mind and perspective to be both practical and biblical, empowering you and I to see and experience the nearness of God in our circumstances even when He feels far away.