Heaven is For Real

For the past three or four weeks, my best friend and I have been going to the youth group Fuel on Sunday nights.  It was out first time to this specific youth group; we heard it was really fun so we decided to go and check it out.  It's at the Sunrise church off Scott Road by Deer Ridge Elementary School and all middle and high school age students are invited to attend.  I was a little hesitate of going because the last youth group a went to was boring and I never understood what was going on.  At Fuel, they have an area called "The Garage" where we worship and the youth pastor gives us our weekly lesson. Anyways, my friend and I really enjoyed it and she was happy that I enjoyed it because she, "wants [me] to get closer to God and [my] faith."  It was touching because I've never really had anyone do something that extensive for me or thought about trying to help me improve my life.  Usually it is the other way around; I give advice and my opinions about life to my friends and I usually never talk about myself.  I don't know why I don't; probably because there is not enough time in the world for everyone's problems.  But it was so comforting that my friend thought of me when going to this weekly event and wanted me to come with her so I can learn something and understand her beliefs at the same time.  It is a "win win" situation and I will never think about regretting to attend Fuel with my best friend.  It has brought us closer as friends and now we can fully talk about anything.  Because of this, at school, she gave me a book called Heaven is For Real by Todd Burpo.  She explained to me that this was a good book to read to help me with life.  I was skeptical at first, but I trust her with my life so I took the book hoping that she was right.  She excitingly gave me the book and told me to read one chapter every night.  The chapters are only around four to five pages long, so I thought, "Yeah I can do this."
     As I begin to read, the prologue is just introducing in medias res of what is happening to this specific family.  The story is written on first person accounts and the speaker is also in first person.  The first three chapters talk about this family where the father [author and narrator] takes his wife, daughter, and son (both very young) to the Craw-le-seum and their experience with different creepy crawlies.  Knowing me, I was trying to find things right away that would help me improve my life; so far, this was just another regular story about some family with two kids and their problems.  I asked my best friend a couple days later, "How is this book suppose to help me?"  She replied, "You have to wait until the middle of the story."  So I guess I was being impatient and now I'm continuing to read this book and see what's next for this family.

To be continued...