Randy Alcorn's Blog, page 153

Where Is Heaven, and What Are Some Major Misconceptions About Heaven?

Over the years, I’ve found that it’s a common misconception even among Christians that the present Heaven, where Christians go when we die, is the same place we will live forever. In fact, when we die we go to be with Christ, which is wonderful, but we are incomplete, in a pre-resurrected state, anticipating Christ’s return to earth, and our resurrections. As I develop in my book Heaven, the place we’ll live forever will be where God comes down to dwell with us, on the New Earth (Revelation 21:1-3).

I share more about this in the following video, filmed earlier this year when I visited Watermark Community Church. Pastor Todd Wagner and I sat down and discussed “Where is Heaven?”, as well as some common misconceptions about Heaven.

Photo credit: Elijah Hail via Unsplash

Our Recap of 2015, and Looking Ahead to 2016

Hope you enjoy this recap of our ministry’s past year, and our plans for the coming one. Happy New Year! —Randy

Randy’s 5 Most Read Blog Posts of 2015

A Plea to Christian Men - “Recently, in the wake of yet another Christian leader found to have committed immorality, Tim Challies posted a response, actually a plea to Christian men, written by his wife Aileen. I found it both concise and powerful.”

Pastoral Reflections on Gay Marriage: A Series of Five Short Videos – “Much has been said presenting a Christian response to same sex marriage. I’ve posted in previous blogs some excellent perspectives from others. But I haven’t heard anything better than the five brief videos below from Dan Franklin.”

Some Thoughts for Those Who Are Considering Divorce – “This is NOT an attack piece on the divorced. It is written for the many believers who may be considering a divorce too soon because it is a cultural norm.”

The One Thing My Daughter Remembered Most about My Parenting – “Some years ago, I sat with my daughters at a wonderful father/daughter banquet at our church. Someone at the table asked my youngest daughter, Angela, what I’d done that made the biggest impression on her.”

Should We Leave Our Children Inheritances? – “I think in order to understand the principle behind Proverbs 13:22, we need to compare what an inheritance meant in biblical times, versus what an inheritance means in this culture today. “

Randy’s 5 Bestselling Books through EPM’s Store in 2015

The Treasure Principle - God owns everything. I'm His money manager. What I call my money is really His. The question is, what does He want me to do with His money?

The Purity Principle - Impurity will always destroy us; purity always leads to higher pleasures! Choose wisely.

Why ProLife? - Infused with grace and compassion, and grounded in medical science and psychological studies, Randy Alcorn presents a solid case for defending both unborn children and their mothers.

Managing God’s Money - God cares a great deal more about our money than most of us imagine. The sheer enormity of Scripture’s teaching on this subject screams for our attention.

God’s Promise of Happiness - We know that we’ll experience unimaginable joy and happiness in Heaven, but that doesn’t mean we can’t also experience joy and happiness here on earth.

5 of the Many Ministry Projects We Supported through Book Royalties in 2015

Hope for Orphans – Support and training for Korean and Cuban orphanages.

Run Ministries – Iraqi refugee relief efforts.

Far Reaching Ministries - Chaplain Cadet training in South Sudan.

Elisha Foundation - Biblical encouragement for families of special needs kids.

Biblica - Equipping Chinese house churches with biblical resources.

5 of EPM’s Plans for 2016

Post more resources for those who read and speak other languages. We hope to impact more readers worldwide with resources about Heaven, giving, happiness, and more.

Spread Randy’s writing and teaching on the biblical truth about happiness. Through his books Happiness and God’s Promise of Happiness, blog posts, a DVD series on happiness, and a limited number of speaking engagements, we want to share the joyful news of God’s call for us to delight in Him.

Impact more prisoners through our book ministry. Each year, EPM sends thousands of Randy’s books to inmates in facilities across the United States. In 2015 alone we sent over 6,400 books. This outreach to those who are often forgotten by society is bearing much fruit for the kingdom! 

Connect more individuals to Bible-believing churches. Randy believes it’s essential for people to find Christ-centered churches to help them in their spiritual growth. In 2015, we sent referrals to 46 individuals seeking to find a church home.

Reach more people with Randy’s teaching about the importance of an eternal perspective. Through social media, including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube, we have the opportunity to provide free resources on Heaven, sexual purity, suffering, and other topics that will help readers in their walk with Christ.

Would you like to join us in impacting eternity in 2016? Learn more.

Photo credit: Joshua Earle via Unsplash

What Will My Happiness Look Like in Heaven?

The following is an edited transcript of my interview with Tony Reinke, who invited me to be a guest on Desiring God’s “Ask Pastor John” podcast. You can also listen to the audio of this interview.

Randy, you wrote the bestselling book,  Heaven . Now you’ve written Happiness . How will joy in eternity be similar or different from the joy that we can experience right now?

I think joy in eternity will be the same sort of thing we know as joy and happiness and delight right now. But it will be purified and absolute in the sense that, as Paul says, right now we are “sorrowful yet always rejoicing” (2 Corinthians 6:10). We live in a world under the curse. And so even as we rejoice with those who rejoice, we weep with those who weep (Romans 12:15). And that is right and it should be.

We don’t just paste on a smiley face as we look at a world of tremendous need, of children suffering. And there’s sex trafficking going on and you have all of these different things. So right now our happiness in Christ is something that can and should be very real. But at the same time we recognize we can’t be absolutely happy all the time. In fact, it would be inappropriate if we were, given the condition of the world.

But in eternity we will enter into our Master’s happiness (Matthew 25:21). I just love that the Master doesn’t say to His servant, “Muster up your own happiness and bring it here, and it is your duty to make yourself happy all the time.” Rather, He says, “Enter into my happiness.” And what makes Heaven such a desirable and wonderful place is that it’s permeated by the person of God. It is where God is. We shouldn’t want to be in a heaven without God.

First of all, it wouldn’t really be Heaven because it’s God who brings His nature to it—all of His attributes, including His happiness. So I think in this life here and now, we do get foretastes of the complete and total bliss, the utter happiness, of Heaven. And we can be happy even in the midst of great difficulty, just as The Valley of Vision, the book of Puritan prayers, models. It is full of words such as “happiness” and its synonyms. Yet it’s just so deep with the burdens and realities of a sin-defiled world—but always with the sense of hope, of blood-bought hope, of hope with substance and expectation that one day God is going to wipe away the tears from every eye, as Revelation 21:4 says. There will be no more suffering, no more pain. There will be no more separation. We will experience all of the realities of who God is, and every day will be better than the one before.

The old fairy tale ending—happily ever after—that’s not a fairy tale. That is God’s unfolding drama of redemption, the greatest story ever told, the ultimate redemptive story. And He promises us we will never pass our peaks. And we’ll live happily ever after in His presence, to His glory and for our good. And that magnificence should permeate our lives and our thinking today. We should not wait until we die to discover a taste of all that. We should be experiencing it daily even now.

photo credit: Christ Ford via photopin (license)

The Valley of Vision

Nanci and I love The Valley of Vision, which is a collection of brief and profound Puritan prayers compiled by Arthur Bennett (I love the leather edition linked to. It’s one of the few books worthy of having in leather!). We find them powerful and penetrating.

If you haven’t discovered the Puritans, I highly recommend that you do. They speak with an amazing biblically-based depth. They have been stereotyped as legalistic and impersonal and believing in an impersonal God, but in many hours of reading them I believe nothing could be further from the truth! While writing my book on happiness I was struck again and again with the Puritans’ belief in a happy God who called them to a life of happiness in Jesus.

They are a great corrective to the health and wealth gospel, in that they endured great suffering but trusted the God of sovereign grace and His providence and personal love and provision. This is the first entry in the book, but what follows is just as good:

The Valley of Vision

Lord, high and holy, meek and lowly, Thou hast brought me to the valley of vision,
where I live in the depths but see thee in the heights; hemmed in by mountains of sin I behold thy glory.

Let me learn by paradox
that the way down is the way up,
that to be low is to be high,
that the broken heart is the healed heart, that the contrite spirit is the rejoicing spirit, that the repenting soul is the victorious soul, that to have nothing is to possess all,
that to bear the cross is to wear the crown, that to give is to receive,
that the valley is the place of vision.

Lord, in the daytime stars can be seen from deepest wells, and the deeper the wells the brighter thy stars shine;
Let me find thy light in my darkness, thy life in my death,
thy joy in my sorrow, thy grace in my sin,
thy riches in my poverty thy glory in my valley. 

photo credit: Theophilos Papadopoulos via photopin(license)

One Couple’s Story of Finding Great Happiness in Investing in Eternal Things

One of the things closest to my heart is seeing the lives of God’s people changed as they are touched by His grace and learn the joys of generous giving. Statistically, the sad fact is that most western Christians do not experience its joy. In fact, many unbelievers have discovered the relationship between giving and happiness that countless believers still do not understand.

Glorifying God in how we use His money and invest it in worthy ministries isn’t merely a duty; it’s a delight! Giving brings great happiness, and our happy God rejoices when our hearts celebrate. In the only statement of Jesus in the book of Acts that’s not in the Gospels, Jesus said, “It is more blessed [makarios, happy-making] to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35). The grace of God is the lightning that produces in our lives the thunder of giving. Where God’s grace has truly touched our lives, generous giving will surely follow.

Several months ago, Spence and Tara Hackney, a dear couple who have been supporters of our ministry, came to Portland to attend a Theology of Happiness class I was teaching. During their time here, they graciously offered to share their story about how my books The Treasure Principle and Heaven have led them to find great happiness in giving. I think you’ll be encouraged as you hear how sending their treasure on ahead has brought them such delight:

Spence and Tara Hackney's Story

We invite you to consider partnering with us in spreading the “good news of happiness” (Isaiah 52:7). If you’d like to be a part of the work EPM is doing to impact lives for eternity, learn more. 

Christian Joy and Feasting

The following is an edited transcript of my interview last month with Tony Reinke, who invited me to be a guest on Desiring God’s “Ask Pastor John” podcast. You can also listen to the audio of this interview.

Randy, what is the relationship between spiritual joy and joy of God-honoring parties and feasts? How should we think about spiritual joys and enjoyment of great food and friends?

Well, it’s amazing. When you look at Scripture. you see all these Old Testament passages about the parties and the feasts (and that is what feasts were—they were parties). They would often involve sacrifices, but most of the time was spent eating and drinking and basically having fun and taking time off. You see in Leviticus 23:40 God says, “You shall take on the first day the fruit of splendid trees, branches of palm trees and boughs of leafy trees and willows of the brook, and you shall rejoice before the LORD your God seven days.” This is a seven-day party of rejoicing in God, and the Old Testament is full of God-ordained celebrations for the Israelites.

God built into Israel’s calendar seven holidays, amounting to about thirty days of feasts per year. Add the weekly Sabbaths, and the total comes to around eighty days of feasting and rest annually. Add the later feasts of Purim (one day) and Hanukkah (eight days), plus weddings and birth celebrations, and the amount of time off for celebration and worship exceeded three months annually!

Deuteronomy 14 is a passage that I was so struck with. In verses 24–26 in the ESV it says, “If the way is too long for you, so that you are not able to carry the tithe, when the LORD your God blesses you, because the place is too far from you, which the LORD your God chooses, to set his name there, then you shall turn it into money and bind up the money in your hand and go to the place that the LORD your God chooses and spend the money for whatever you desire—oxen or sheep or wine or strong drink, whatever your appetite craves. And you shall eat there before the LORD your God and rejoice.”

What strikes me, first of all, is the language. You talk about hedonism—I mean this is God-directed hedonism. He’s saying, “Whatever your appetite craves, get the best of whatever you want to eat and drink: wine, strong drink. And you shall eat there before the Lord your God and rejoice.” And I love that it says “before the Lord your God.” Happiness and joy are not things we’re to experience behind God’s back, as if that were possible! But he calls upon them: “Do it all before me. And I am by implication going to be there with you. I am going to enjoy it with you. And so when you are partying, I will be partying with you.”

Think about the rejoicing that takes place in the presence of the angels of God that Jesus speaks of twice in Luke 15:7, 10. Who is in the presence of the angels? God is. God’s people are in the presence of the angels and, of course, the angels themselves are there. All heaven is throwing a party and rejoicing over conversions on earth. And these are things that we’re to celebrate. In 2 Chronicles 30:21–23 it talks about how the people of Israel kept the feast of unleavened bread for seven days with great gladness. The word “gladness” and the various happiness-related Hebrew words are used for all of these Old Testament celebrations.

How much different it would be if people looked less at the church as a group of always critical, always complaining, always feeling persecuted bunch of curmudgeons—which sometimes we can project that image to the world, no doubt. And we can also project it even to our children growing up in Christian homes. They hear what mom and dad are saying and the critical spirit and the complaining and the ingratitude and all that sort of thing. But what if we as believers were known as the people of celebration and gladness, and the church as the place of feasting?

And it wasn’t just Old Testament—in the New Testament, the church celebrated the Lord’s Supper, the love feast. Now we’ve got the cracker and the juice, you know? And it’s fine symbolically, but we really need to have feasts. What if the church led the way in participating on March 20 in what the United Nations unanimously appointed as the International Day of Happiness, by celebrating the good news of happiness that Isaiah 52:7 talks about?

More feasts in either case. Thank you, Randy. In our circles, we like to say that external circumstances of life do not determine our happiness. This is helpful for those who are suffering, and it’s an important pushback to our world that says outward circumstances in life are essential for true happiness. That’s false. But it also seems disingenuous to say that outward circumstances play no role in our God-glorifying happiness. How do we talk about joy in God in God-glorifying circumstances of life?

Well, I think, first of all, we see Paul rejoicing over circumstances. Consider the Greek verb kairo and the noun form korah that are translated “rejoicing” and “joy.” Those words are associated with Paul when he finds out that Epaphroditus, who these people were very deeply concerned about, was better (Philippians 2:28–30). He came close to death, but now they’re rejoicing that he is well. That is a circumstance. That’s a good friend who was in trouble and now is okay, so they’re rejoicing in that. It’s fine to rejoice in circumstances. If you get a raise, great! Rejoice. Be happy. That is circumstantial. But at the same time it’s a blessing of God. Many of God’s common graces are circumstantial.

However, we cannot rest our ultimate joy and happiness upon the circumstances in our lives. I remember as a young Christian when I was a teenager reading Richard Wurmbrand’s Tortured for Christ, Corrie Ten Boom’s The Hiding Place and Brother Andrew’s God’s Smuggler, and all of these great stories of people in huge tribulation. They went through horrific things, yet in the midst of them, experienced a transcendent joy, happiness, gladness, delight, pleasure in God.

Usually when we think of circumstances we’re almost kind of dismissive about them. But Scripture says to give thanks in all circumstances in 1 Thessalonians 5:18. And Paul says, “I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me” (Philippians 4:11–13).

But I also think we need to focus on what I would call our true circumstances—not all circumstances are visible. To start with, we’re created by a good and happy God. We were created in His image. He gave us the capacity to be happy. We’d have plenty to contemplate about what Scripture says about our true circumstances if we just took Romans 8 alone. Think of verse 1: “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

In Jesus I’ve been set free from sin and death, and God sent his Son to save me (verse 2). I can set my mind on the Spirit, and that is life and peace (verse 6). God’s Spirit indwells and empowers me (verse 11). God has adopted me, and I can call him, “Abba, Father” (verse 15). I am an heir of God and a fellow heir with Christ (verse 16). The sufferings of this present time aren’t worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed in us (verse 18).

Creation will be delivered to the freedom and glory of God’s children. The world itself, the universe itself, will be ultimately redeemed during the redemption of our bodies (verse 23). The Spirit prays for us in our weakness (verse 26). Christ Himself intercedes for us (verse 34). They indwell us. We have been called to a life in which God promises that He will cause all things to work together for our good (verse 28).

We are more than conquerors through Him who loved us (verse 37). And how much more will God, who gave us His Son, give us all things (verse 32)? And then finally, to top it all off, nothing shall separate us from the love of Christ (verses 35, 38–39). Those are the true circumstances of the Christian life. Let’s meditate on those circumstances which are a true ground for eternal and present happiness.

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His Sovereign Work in Sending the Light

The angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord.” (Luke 2:10-11 NIV)

Read Luke 1 and 2, and marvel at the sovereign work of our Father, sending His Son, our Savior, into this world. He did it for us, to be our Redeemer. Weep at the sheer power of God’s amazing grace and the greatness of His eternity-shaping plan. When you celebrate Christmas this year, may you enjoy His sovereign grace, and clearly sense His steadfast love for you.

“…there’s nothing like creating the real Christmas spirit by focusing on just why you need a Savior—why you desperately need Jesus.  Oh, thank you Jesus for coming and bringing your light into our dark world.” —Joni Eareckson Tada

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from Nanci and me, and from all the staff at Eternal Perspective Ministries!

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Gospel Doctrine Creates Gospel Culture

Sometimes I read something that is beautifully worded and right on target. These insights from Ray Ortlund, on churches as gospel culture, is terrific. This, I think, resonates with Scripture, and should be the goal of God’s people everywhere. Gospel doctrine is absolutely necessary, but it is not sufficient. When it has the effect God intends, Gospel doctrine creates gospel culture and that’s what draws people to Jesus.

Gospel doctrine, gospel culture

Gospel doctrine creates a gospel culture. The doctrine of grace creates a culture of grace, as Jesus himself touches us through his truths. Without the doctrines, the culture alone is fragile. Without the culture, the doctrines alone appear pointless. But the New Testament binds doctrine and culture together. For example:

The doctrine of regeneration creates a culture of humility (Ephesians 2:1-9).

The doctrine of justification creates a culture of inclusion (Galatians 2:11-16).

The doctrine of reconciliation creates a culture of peace (Ephesians 2:14-16).

The doctrine of sanctification creates a culture of life (Romans 6:20-23).

The doctrine of glorification creates a culture of hope (Romans 5:2).

The doctrine of God creates a culture of honesty (1 John 1:5-10). And what could be more basic than that?

If we want this culture to thrive, we can’t take doctrinal short cuts. If we want this doctrine to be credible, we can’t disregard the culture. But churches where the doctrine and culture converge bear living witness to the power of Jesus.

Churches that do not exude humility, inclusion, peace, life, hope and honesty—even if they have gospel doctrine on paper, they undercut their own doctrine at a functional level, where it should count in the lives of actual people. Churches that are haughty, exclusivistic, contentious, exhausted, past-oriented and in denial are revealing a gospel deficit.

The current rediscovery of the gospel as doctrine is good, very good. But a further discovery of the gospel as culture—the gospel embodied in community — will be infinitely better, filled with a divine power such as we have not yet seen.

I expect it’s what revival will look like next.

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If God Is Happy, Why Does He Seem Bad-Tempered?

The following is an edited transcript of my interview with Tony Reinke, who invited me to be a guest on Desiring God’s “Ask Pastor John” podcast. You can also listen to the audio of this interview.

Randy, as you know, God is happy. Scripture tells us that. So if God is so fundamentally and essentially happy all the time in Himself, why does He often seem ill-tempered in the biblical stories?

Well, I think we need to realize that sin and the consequent suffering that comes out of it is a reality in this world. We’re under the fall and the curse. Even though Christ has become a curse for us who believe in Him, we recognize that we still face the realities of sin and suffering in this life. And this sin that infiltrates the world is a temporary condition. I think this is the key to understanding how it is that God could be from eternity past utterly happy within Himself—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit delighting in each other.

I developed this theme of the union of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in the book and others have developed it, of course. (John Piper develops it tremendously in The Pleasures of God and somewhat in Desiring God as well.) The Father says, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:17). And Luke 10:20–21 says that Jesus then rejoiced in the Holy Spirit after telling his disciples to rejoice that their names are written in heaven.

But He has always been happy. He will always be happy. And He is predominantly happy now. Sin is a temporary condition. So the causes for God’s unhappiness are themselves temporary. His primary identity is as a happy God, not an unhappy one.

Sin is so prevalent and the Bible is written to point out and deal with the sin problem. Hence, we often do see a God with anger and wrath, and it’s easy to overlook all of the lovingkindness passages and all the passages about God delighting in His people and God being pleased. We can miss the master, in Jesus’s words, saying to the servant, “Well done, my good and faithful servant. Enter into your master’s happiness.” Enter into a happiness far more ancient than the world itself—a happiness that preceded all creation, a happiness that goes on undaunted and will continue forever (see Matthew 25:21).

And God not only says this to us so that at the end of our life we might be welcomed into His happiness, but also so that we can frontload, so to speak, that happiness into our life right now because of His redemptive work. But even then people will say that Jesus is called “the man of sorrows.” And I heard this from a lot from people when I told them I was writing a book called Happiness.

By the way, unbelievers would always think it was great when I’d tell them I was writing about happiness. But when I’d say it to believers they’d scrunch up their faces and say, “Oh, wait a minute. Did you mean joy? What are you doing talking about happiness?” I received a letter from a pastor telling me why I shouldn’t write on the subject of happiness. But for unbelievers they see the appeal of it, because that’s what they long for.

But look at Jesus. He’s called “the man of sorrows,” which people point out, but that’s in Isaiah 53:3—and it’s specifically in relationship to his redemptive work: “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.” And He is pierced for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities and all of that (verse 5). But even that redemptive work was done for the joy set before him according to Hebrews 12:2.

So if we picture Jesus going around in perpetual sadness or anger, grumbling, and looking to condemn more than to extend grace, then we’re really not seeing the Jesus of the Bible. And children were attracted to Him, by the way. And who are children attracted to? They’re not attracted to unhappy people.

People today sometimes say, “I’ve got the joy of Jesus way, way deep in my heart, even though my life is pretty miserable.” It’s like, “Well, you know what? I think that joy needs to work its way to your face once in a while.” After all, we’re called to “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice” (Philippians 4:4). And if God weren’t happy, He wouldn’t call us to be happy. And furthermore, if God were not happy, He couldn’t be the source of our happiness, because God can’t give us what He doesn’t have. We’re to value joy, happiness, gladness, delight precisely because our God is characterized by them, and the gospel we preach to people should be a gospel of a holy God, yes, but also of a happy God.

Passages like 1 Timothy 1:11 and 6:15 explicitly tell us God is happy, or “blessed” as most translations put it. I heard you recently argue, in another interview, that all the times in the Bible that talk about God seeking to delight in someone or something, means that God is essentially joyful, because He is always postured to delight. That’s a fascinating point.

Exactly, because who delights? A person who has the capacity to delight and the desire and orientation to delight, a person who delights in delighting, who is pleased by pleasure, who is happy in happiness.

So insightful. And some theologians say that God’s wrath is the flip side of His love. No love, no wrath. Can we say that God's anger against sin is the flip side of His desire for his creation to rejoice?

Yes, absolutely. I think the very fact that He’s unhappy with sin is an indicator that sin is what robs people of happiness. So He’s happy with that which is not only in conformity to His holy standards, but also that which is in conformity to His happiness and delight. He wants the best for us. He sincerely wants for us to participate in His happiness and His joy and His delight. And sin is the enemy of all that.

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A Happy Invitation to Invest in Eternity

Many thanks to all of you who’ve supported this ministry through your prayers, your giving, your time or your interest in who we are and what we do. Nanci and I are deeply grateful to God and to you. Merry Christmas to all! —Randy

At Eternal Perspective Ministries, we’re dedicated to investing in eternity and joyfully helping others do the same. This perspective is the heartbeat behind all we do.

But we can’t do it alone! Since 90% of Randy’s royalties are given away to other worthy ministries, and only 10% given to EPM (to help offset the costs related to writing and editing the books), we’re not a self-supporting ministry. (If you wonder why we do this, learn more here.) Therefore, we’re deeply grateful for the generous partnership of our donors, which allows us to continue our work for Christ. Your eternal investment in EPM’s general fund assists us in the following ways:

- Enables us to continue providing quality, Christ-centered content. Through our ever-expanding audience on Randy’s blog, our website, and social media, we have the opportunity to provide free resources on Heaven, sexual purity, suffering, and other topics that will help readers in their walk with Christ. We’re also seeking to provide more resources in other languages so we can impact readers worldwide.

- Helps fund Randy’s writing of books, and the EPM staff’s work as they assist him. Writing a book is a team effort. Not only does much work from Randy go into researching and writing a book, but also various EPM staff are involved in the editing process (as well as others who free Randy up by taking care of numerous ministry responsibilities). Through these books, many are introduced to Christ and others are encouraged to seek a deeper walk with Him. We receive many testimonies of this. One reader wrote:

My sister had cancer and she passed away a year ago. My preacher gave her your book Heaven because she was terrified of passing away. This book brought her to Christ and calmed her fears. She passed in her sleep peacefully and she was ready. I thank you for this book! It gave me a biblical view of Heaven.

- Supports EPM’s staff in reaching out in Jesus’ name to all those we come in contact with. Each month our staff has on average over 200 meaningful interactions with those contacting our ministry for help, encouragement, and resources. Each phone call, email, and social media comment is an opportunity to reflect the grace and truth of Christ.

- Provides for our ministry to prisoners. Each year, EPM sends thousands of books to inmates in facilities across the United States. This past year alone we sent over 6,400 books. Sharon, one of our staff members, personally responds to letters from prisoners. This outreach to those who are often forgotten by society is bearing much fruit for the kingdom! One prisoner wrote to say, “I am in an 8-man tank and we take turns reading your books. They are so life changing and spiritually touching. Some have even been saved based on some of your books.”

So we invite you to consider partnering with us in spreading the “good news of happiness” (Isaiah 52:7). Every gift, no matter the size, is an opportunity to make an eternal investment. We pray that doing so will bring God much glory and you great happiness.

If you'd like to make a year-end, tax-deductible donation to EPM, please note that donations postmarked no later than December 31, or received online by 11:59 p.m. PT on December 31, will be included on this year’s tax receipts. If God lays it on your heart to give to our ministry, or to pray for us (the greatest gift you can offer), know that we are grateful. 

Merry Christmas to all!

With great appreciation,

Randy & Nanci Alcorn, and the Staff of Eternal Perspective Ministries

P.S. Here’s a creative 90 second video you might enjoy, about investing our treasures in Heaven. And if you’d like to learn more about EPM’s core mission, beliefs and finances, visit our site.