The Professor, Shane, and Shelly were on their way to adventures in the flying bus! The Professor was hoping to find God! He knew a lot about God but did not know God personally. This adventure is the Professor’s Quest for God!
The Professor wrote on the wall of the flying bus the things that he has learned. So far, the Professor has learned:
- The beauty of nature points people to God. Nature so is awesome it just could not happen by chance, God created it.
- God has a plan for everything and everyone. God has a time for everything in His plan.
- God is kind. He shows His kindness to all people. No one deserves God’s kindness because we are all sinners. God’s greatest kindness was sending His Son Jesus to die on the cross to pay for our sins.
- God is just. Every sin must be punished. Jesus died on the cross and rose from the dead to pay for all the sins ever committed. We must choose to accept Jesus’ payment for our sins or pay for our sins ourselves by being punished in the lake of fire forever.
- God pays attention to every detail. He knows every detail of your life and He loves and cares for you.
- God is faithful all the time. He will never leave you or give up on you. Even the best people are unfaithful some of the time.
- God’s wisdom is not like the wisdom of the world. The world says, ‘Put yourself first, go after fame, fortune, and things.’ God’s wisdom says, ‘Fear (greatly respect) God first, and your attitude and thoughts should be about helping others’.
- God has the greatest power in the whole universe. He made the universe and everything in it, and God’s power keeps the whole universe going. But God does not use His great power to crush us, He speaks gently to us with love.
- Having great knowledge about God and about the Bible does not impress God. If our knowledge does not lead us into a relationship with God, then it will make us proud.
- Being around God’s people and enjoying fellowship does not give you a relationship with God.
The next morning the Professor said, “I think it is time to leave. I feel like I am so close to discovering the key to having a friendship and relationship with God, I want to hurry!” Josiah said, “It has been great traveling with you the past couple of days, but I need to stay here with my people, you get so mixed up and lost that you probably could never get me back here again!” The Professor, Shane and Shelly were sad that Josiah could not go with them, he had been a good friend and they would miss him! They got ready to leave and the Professor said, “I’ll start the motors.” Then it happened…actually nothing happened, the flying bus would not start! The Professor said, “Ooops”! They could not figure out what was wrong. Josiah said, “There is a repair shop just down at the bottom of this hill, the hill is not too steep and if we can get the flying bus moving, it should coast down the hill to the repair shop. This seemed like a good idea, but how were they going to get the flying bus moving down the hill? The Professor had an idea, “We could use bicycle/time machine to pull the flying bus and get it moving.” This seemed like a good idea, but Shelly warned the Professor, “Remember that the handle on the time machine has been wound up, if you shift the bicycle/time machine into high gear we will take off through time! So be careful not to shift into high gear!”
The Professor, Shane, and Shelly got on the bicycle/time machine after it had been tied in front of the flying bus (remember this bicycle had three seats and three sets of pedals), Josiah and his friends got behind the flying bus and began to push. It worked! The flying bus began to move slowly down the hill and the bicycle/time machine was easily able to keep ahead of it. Finally, they could see the repair shop up ahead, there was only a little way to go! Then it happened…the hill got a little steeper and the flying bus began to roll faster! Shelly yelled, “Professor! The bus is going to run over us! Pedal faster!” They pedaled as fast as they could, but the bus kept going faster! Shane yelled, “The flying bus is about to kill us! Our only chance is to shift the bicycle/time machine into high gear! The Professor shifted the bicycle/time machine into high gear.
Then it happened… The bicycle began bouncing like a toad in a washing machine! There was a blinding flash of light and a loud noise like a turtle singing! Suddenly the road, the hill, and the repair shop disappeared…
They were on a different hill! There was no road, but there were some big rocks and pieces of wood on the ground! The flying bus was just about to run over the bicycle/time machine when the front tire of the flying bus hit a large piece of wood! The flying bus came to an abrupt stop! The bicycle/time machine reached the end of rope and stopped so fast that the Professor, Shane, and Shelly flew over the handlebars and landed in the dirt. Fortunately, the dirt was soft and there were no rocks or logs in that spot! The Professor said, “Ooops!” They got up from the ground and Shelly said, “I’m going to turn the crank on the time machine so that we can get away from here fast if we need to.” Shane added, “All we have to do is pull the piece of wood away from the bus tire, and the flying bus should start to go down hill again.”
The Professor noticed that they could hear a lot of angry voices. The sound seemed like it came from the other side of the hill. The Professor led them up to the top of the hill and then they could not believe what they saw! There was a big crowd of people, but the Professor hardly noticed them. Right in front of the Professor was something awful! The Professor was right behind three wooden crosses and there were three men hanging on those crosses! Shelly whispered to Shane, “We need to stay here and let the Professor go ahead by himself. This is what he has been looking for.” So, the Professor slowly walked ahead by himself. He was behind the crosses, so he carefully went in front of the crosses and he could not believe his eyes! The man hanging on the middle cross had been punished worse than the other two, his body was bruised and swollen and there was blood all over his body and dripping onto the ground! The Professor knew that this was Jesus, the Son of God. Shane and Shelly had told the Professor many times about how Jesus died on the cross to pay for our sins, and now the Professor was seeing it with his own eyes!
Then an amazing thing happened! While the Professor was looking at Jesus on the cross, Jesus looked right into the Professor’s eyes! The Professor had never seen anyone with so much love and compassion in their eyes! Suddenly the Professor understood that Jesus loved him! Jesus loved Professor Ooops just as he was! The Professor did not have to do anything to earn the love of Jesus! The Professor did not have to know everything in the Bible! The Professor did not have to stop being clumsy to earn the love of Jesus! Jesus loved him and wanted to forgive him for all the sins that he had done during his whole life!
Professor Ooops sank down onto his knees and kept looking at Jesus. The Professor said, “I believe in you Jesus, now I see with my own eyes how much you love me. You chose to die this death on the cross because you love people, and this is the only way to pay for their sins. Jesus, I want to live for you the rest of my life, I want to be your friend! Please forgive all my sins and help me to live for you!” At that moment, the Professor knew that his sins had been forgiven and that he had finally found the relationship with God that he had been looking for!
The Professor stayed on his knees in front of the cross of Jesus for a few hours, then Jesus gathered his strength and yelled, “It is finished!” Jesus said, “Father, into your hands, I give my spirit!” Then Jesus died. There was a violent earthquake at that moment and Shane and Shelly came running and helped the Professor to get back to the flying bus.
The Professor, Shane and Shelly were all crying as they got back to the flying bus, they had just seen the most amazing demonstration of love that there ever was. The Son of God, Jesus Christ had just allowed himself to be killed on the cross because God loves us so much that He gave His only Son so that we could have our sins forgiven and be saved! The payment for all the sins in the whole had been paid for, Jesus’ job on earth was done, that is why He yelled, “It is finished!” just before He died!
Later that evening the Professor said, “Shane and Shelly, thank you for coming with me on this adventure! I set out to find God, and now I have found Him! Thank you so much for helping me!” Shelly answered, “Yes, I know you found God at last. We would not have missed this adventure for anything!”
The Learning Corner:
In the Bible in the book of John in chapter 3 verses 16-17 it says,
“For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through him.”
In the Bible in the book of John chapter 14 verse 6 it says:
Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
In the Bible in the book of John chapter 1 verse 12 it says:
“But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God.”
In the Bible in the book of Acts in chapter 16 verse 31 it says:
They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved…”
In the Bible in the book of Ephesians chapter 2 verses 8-9 it says:
God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it.”
As the verses say, Jesus is the only way to get your sins forgiven and to have a friendship with God. Jesus died on the cross to pay for the sins of the whole world, it is a very special gift from God to you. Think for a moment about the best Christmas present that you ever got, if you had never opened it and made it yours, you never could have enjoyed it. It is the same with God’s great gift; if you never accept God’s gift of forgiveness it will never do you any good.
If you have never believed in Jesus and given your life to Him, why don’t you pray right now and give your life to Jesus. You can pray a prayer like the prayer that Professor Ooops prayed:
“I believe in you Jesus, now I see how much you love me. You chose to die on the cross because you love people, and this was the only way to pay for their sins. Jesus, I want to live for you the rest of my life, I want to be your friend! Please forgive all my sins and help me to live for you!”