I greet you in Jesus' precious name! It is Tuesday morning, the 24th of October, 2023, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today. 

We start in the Book of Ephesians 2:8: 

"For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God,…"  

Then we go straight to the Book of Hebrews 7:22. 

"…by so much more Jesus has become a surety of a better covenant." 

A surety means "a person who guarantees that somebody else will do something or pay a debt." Now, that is exactly what Jesus Christ has done for us who believe; therefore, we cannot let Him down or disappoint Him. We cannot get to Heaven by trying to live a better life, by earning "brownie points" because we fail miserably every single time, don't we? Jesus Himself has become our guarantee! Isn't that beautiful? A guarantee that we will make it.

I remember a story that I heard so many years ago. It was one of my favourite stories about a cowboy preacher. He was a circuit preacher, riding his horse, going to all the small towns in the prairies in North America. He was a seasoned old man, and as he was riding along on his horse one day, a big dust storm came up from the horizon and he knew what he had to do. He stopped immediately, hobbled his horse, put his saddle down, took his saddle blanket, put it on the ground, got underneath it, pulled his cowboy stetson hat over his head and waited out the sand storm, and he went to sleep. He had a dream that a huge angel was standing in front of him. The angel was holding a book, and the cowboy said, "What is in that book?"  

He said, "This is the Book of Life, and everyone who's name is in this book goes to Heaven."  

The old cowboy said, "Well, my name must be in that book because I am a preacher of the Gospel."  

The angel looked it up in the book, and he said, "No, sorry, your name is not in this book."  

The old cowboy was angry. He said, "It must be!"  

He said, "It's not here. What is your name?"  

"My name is John Smith."  

He looked it up, but he couldn't find the name there. 

"I demand to go to Heaven. I want to speak to God and find out why my name is not written in the Lamb's Book of Life." 

The angel said, "Okay, jump on my back, hold tight, and let's go."  

So they flew into the universe, in through the blackness, twice the speed of sound. Eventually, they saw a little light in the distance. The angel said, "That is Heaven. Get ready, we are going to be landing shortly." The light got brighter and brighter and brighter until they arrived in Heaven. The angel landed on a floor of pure gold. He let the cowboy down gently. The cowboy was absolutely petrified by this time. He was lying on his face on this floor of gold, and he heard a voice like a thousand rivers saying, "Who are you? What do you want here?" The cowboy was petrified. He couldn't move. A second time, this voice came. "Who are you? What do you want here?" At that time, he heard footsteps coming from behind him. A beautiful robe was swishing back and forth. He could hardly lift his head. Feet that wore sandals walked up next to him, and big, strong arms bent down and picked the cowboy up from underneath his chest and stood him to his feet, and the voice said, "It's okay, Father, he's with Me. He is My friend."

I want to say to you today, make sure that Jesus Christ is your friend. He is the only guarantee you will ever have. 

Have a wonderful day,
Goodbye.