Passport to Heaven

I stepped off the air-conditioned plane and was immediately hit with a wall of humid, stinking hot air. Sweating, I stripped off the winter layers midnight at home had required. Waddling across the tarmac, weighed down with carry-on luggage, I tried to take in my new surroundings. Everything was a lush green and there was a smell of saltwater infused with coconut oil. To one direction I could see coconut palms waving along the sea-shore and to the other direction, tall, dark-green mountains rose into a cloudless blue sky. Longing for relief from the unfamiliar heat, I stepped through the terminal doors. No such luck! Even though we were now sheltered from the sun, and though a row of ceiling fans worked their hardest to circulate and cool the air, it was still unbearably humid. Ugh. All around the room (painted an ugly, cold looking, hospital greeny-blue), rose pillars and woodwork decorated with all sorts of designs and pictures which featured eagles and turtles and fish and signs about foreign 'dirty' diseases that I knew very little about were posted all over the walls making this sound like a very scary and dangerous place to be.
I was sixteen and I had just arrived in the Solomon Islands. I had just stepped into a very new, very different environment and I was scared. But it wasn't the new environment that really made me nervous, it was customs and immigration. This was my first trip overseas since I was a baby and didn't have to worry about that kinda stuff and now I was doing it on my own. Well, Dad was there but I had to do it by myself. The lines were long and we moved slowly so I had plenty of time to stew over my nerves. By the time I came to the ugly, high desk I was worried. What if they didn't let me through? I knew I had no reason to be scared but that didn't help much. And then there was another problem: I could hardly understand the black-as-midnight man at the desk. But I shoved my customs form and passport over to him and after just a moment or two of knee-knocking waiting, he stamped it, scribbled something in the passport and bid me "Welcome to the Solomon Islands!" Then I had my bag searched.

Me with 'friends' and a friend in the Solomon Islands, 2009

Had I forgotten to declare something? Finally I was let out the front doors and joined the rest of my group next to the bus we were to be transported in. I had gotten through it! I was in the Solomon Islands and ready to explore all the exciting treasures and have the adventures that were waiting for me.
I'm going on another trip soon. The destination is paradise, palm trees waving in a gentle breeze, treasures to discover and adventures to go on - without number. I'm going to heaven. The storehouse of heaven is just full of exciting surprises for me when I get there and treats and gifts that it sends to me here and now to make my journey more pleasant. But like travelling here on planet earth, I need a passport. My passport is not a book, nor a slip of paper. Not a microchip, nor a plastic card but a real, live person. Jesus Christ is my passport to heaven. Instead of me paying for a entrance visa, Christ as paid every cent or every drop of the price for me. And instead of showing my passport to a clerk at a desk at the gate of heaven, I just take Jesus with me and they'll let us straight in. Or, if I'm asking for a special gift from the storehouse, I just conveniently drop His wonderful name and blessings are mine, no questions asked! My couple-of-hundred-dollar earthly passport does nowhere near that much for me and it expires. Jesus if FREE and ETERNAL!

"Neither is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved.” 

Acts 4:12

Friends from Goonasu'u
(Baby Rhoda in the middle remembered me when I returned two years later. So special!)