After leaving the Giant Blue Whale, the Ugly Little Blue Bus took the group to a nearby campground just outside of Tulsa Oklahoma. Some of the kids came to the Leader and complained and said, “We have had a lot of fun on this trip and learned a lot about God and about our country, but everything we have seen is old. Isn’t there anything on Route 66 that is new?” The Leader told the kids that Tulsa has a new park, and in the morning, they would go and spend some time in the new park. The kids were not happy with that answer, and they grumbled as they went to bed.
The next morning, they got in the Ugly Little Blue Bus and took a short drive into Tulsa and stopped at the new park, and…the kids could not believe their eyes! The Park was awesome! There were wooden towers to climb on that were 3 stories high.
There was an elephant slide.
There were huge metal birds with slides coming down their wings.
There were rope bridges and climbing nets.
There was a water park, and there were free canoe, kayak, and paddle boats to use! The canoes were even decorated by local artists!
There was something for everyone to do, and the best part was that everything was free (except for food)!
The kids played all day in that park and had a wonderful time! Before they knew it, it was evening and time to go back to the campground.
That night around the campfire, the Leader told the kids the story about the wonderful park that they had visited. For many years Tulsa had been a city filled with a lot of anger, hatred, and bitterness. There were five different racial groups that lived in Tulsa: the Native Americans, the African Americans, the Latinos, the Asians and the white people. Over the years there had been a lot of violence, many people had been hurt and many people had died just because they were different from other people. The city of Tulsa decided that it was time to end the violence and do something new! They wanted to try to heal some of the hurt between the groups of people, so they built a huge city park and called it The Gathering Place. This Park was designed so that everyone could come and use the park and get to know other people and have a good time with them. The Park cost $465 million dollars to build and opened in 2018. The Park was not finished at that time, there was still much left to be built. In 2021 The Gathering Place was voted the Best City Park in the United States.
The Leader told the kids that God is also in the business of doing ‘something new’. Sin and Satan are trying to destroy individual people and the human race! God is patient with us and allows evil to continue for a while because He wants people to have the chance to turn to Him for salvation. In the Bible in II Peter 3:9 it says:
The Lord isn’t really being slow about His promise, as some people think. No, He is being patient for your sake. He does not want anyone to be destroyed, but wants everyone to repent.
One of the things that God is doing new is that He transforms a person who prays to be saved and have their sins forgiven into a totally new person! In the Bible in II Corinthians 5:17 it says:
This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!
A time is coming when God’s time of patience with sin and Satan will be over. At that time, God will deal with sin and Satan, and all the people who chose not to believe in Jesus and pray for forgiveness will be brought into judgment. Satan and the unbelievers will be punished forever in the lake of fire.
In the Bible in Revelation 20:10 it says:
Then the devil, who had deceived them, was thrown into the fiery lake of burning sulfur, joining the beast and the false prophet. There they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.
And in Revelation 20:15 it says:
And anyone whose name was not found recorded in the Book of Life was thrown into the lake of fire.
The people who have believed that Jesus died on the cross for their sins and rose from the dead then prayed and asked for forgiveness will not be thrown in the lake of fire because their sins are forgiven, and God writes their name in His Book of Life! Only those who have their name recorded in God’s Book of Life will escape being thrown into the lake of fire.
In Revelation 21:3-6 it says:
I heard a loud shout from the throne, saying, “Look, God’s home is now among His people! He will live with them, and they will be His people. God Himself will be with them. He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. All these things are gone forever.” And the one sitting on the throne said, “Look, I am making everything new!” and then He said to me, “Write this down, for what I tell you is trustworthy and true.”
The people of Tulsa are trying to heal the pain and scars from the past by doing something new; making the awesome park called The Gathering Place. God is also in the business of making things new; He is making every Christian into a new person, and at the end of time He will judge Satan and the unbelievers and throw them into the lake of fire forever, then make everything new, with no sin! The believers (Christians) get to enjoy this new creation forever! Have you asked Jesus for forgiveness for your sins? If not, please do it today!