A Personal Challenge For Me
This Sunday morning, August 6, 2023, I was provoked to research Holy Scripture to test the veracity, accuracy, the reasonableness of a Jewish online publication called Aish. An article published August 6, 2023, asks, “Why Doesn’t the Bible Mention the Afterlife?“
I am a Christian who was not a product of church denominational liturgy or a member of a church through force of habit. I was an ordinary, certifiable heathen who knew nothing about our Creator, the Bible, or the promise of forgiveness of sins and eternal life.
Sparing the reader the details of my tumultuous childhood, I summarize in a few words. Suffice it to say from my early childhood until age 27, addictions to alcohol and tobacco assuaged my fatherless upbringing. No, daily drunkenness was not my lifestyle; chain smoking was.
Over those early years, there were innumerable encounters with religious people, both Jews and Christians. There was no hostility toward religious people on my part, simply indifference. Personal testimonies, religious tracts, and preachers had no effect on me. I was what we from South Texas call a “hard case.” A Jew, Saul of Tarsus, was also a hard case. Our common experience was a personal, life-changing encounter with the Living God. I can attest to the fact no one can ignore a personal encounter, a personal revelation of the Creator of the Universe. That undeniable, inarguable personal encounter was in August 1974. It was way beyond an “a hah!” moment. At my age, many things are lost to memory, but not that personal revelation of the Living God and his miraculous healing of my body. No one can “talk me out of it.”
As an old hippie-turned-Christian songwriter and performer, Gary S. Paxton discovered the Messiah in the early 1970s, about the time of my own personal revelation. Gary summarized his new life in a song titled, He Was There All The Time.
My Research of the Old Testament
Salvation in the Old Testament: 21 verses in the Old Testament speak of Salvation by God, including Exodus 14:13, Job 13:16, Exodus 15:2, 1 Samuel 2:1, 1 Samuel 11:13, 1 Samuel 19:5, Psalm 25:5, Genesis 49:18, Micah 7:7, Psalm 62:7, Isaiah 33:22, Psalm 80:19, Psalm 62:1, Psalm 34:17-18, Jeremiah 17:14, Psalm 103:12, Job 19:25, Psalm 3:8, Psalm 79:9, Psalm 68:19, and Jonah 2:9.
Jesus as Messiah in the Old Testament: 47 verses in the Old Testament, beginning with Genesis 3:15, culminating with Daniel 7:13-14, describe Messiah, who He is, what he will do, and the construct of His everlasting dominion, His Kingdom.
One verse in the Old Testament sticks out like a sore thumb (another South Texas colloquialism): Zechariah 12:10
“And I will pour out on the house of David and over those dwelling in Jerusalem a spirit of favor and supplication so that they look to Me, whom they have pierced through. And they will mourn over him as one mourns for an only child and weep bitterly over him as a firstborn.”
My worldview, my point of view, understands the Holy Bible, the Old Testament, and the New Testament as true in every sense of the definition of the word true: being in accordance with reality; agreeing with reality or fact; real; genuine; authentic, faithful; precise; exact; correct; accurate.
The Jewish timeline of history frames my point of reference for world history from the year 1 (3760 BC) to the year 5783 (2023 AD).
The specificity of the afterlife in the Old Testament is clearly articulated in Job 19:25-27, Isaiah 26:19, Psalm 49:15, and Psalm 73:23-25.
Nevertheless I am continually with You;
You have held me by my right hand.
You will guide me with Your counsel,
and afterward receive me to glory.
Whom have I in heaven but You?
And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides You.
Psalm 73:23-25
On the basis of the above Biblical evidence, all Jews can know there is an afterlife for those whose names are found “written in the book,” according to Daniel 12:1-3.
My Invitation
Are you a Jew? Do you want to know about eternal life from a Biblical point of view? I welcome you to attend my Saturday evening Life Group at the Rockwall Campus of Lakepointe Church. Join us at 7:00 pm; late arrivals are welcome.
Lakepointe Church
Rockwall Campus
Room W304
701 E. Interstate 30
Rockwall, Texas 75087
Church membership is NOT a prerequisite, all ages, married and unmarried, are welcome.
Childcare is outstanding and secure. For your convenience, use this link to preregister your children. Upon arrival, escort them to their LP Kids assigned room before joining me in
room W304. See the map to the right.
Advise the adult leader(s) of the assigned
LP Kids classroom, your child eats only Kosher.
My mission is to be a Lantern of Hope and to equip others to become Lanterns of Hope in these troubled times. As any Jew who knows the history of Israel, there have always been troubled times, and more are to come, but we who know our God will overcome evil, and we have the assurance of eternal life with our Creator.
John White
Rockwall, Texas
John N. White 
Leave a comment