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If you’re idle as if motorless
Travel the wide way
The highway of eeriness.
You’ll get kicked on Route 666!
- pop song popularized by The Hellions

Route 666 doesn’t appear on maps anymore as people have been deluded into believing themselves inherently good and therefore don’t believe they can be lost. This original highway is now hidden in plain site, though well traveled. There was a time, though, a time before the superhighways when everyone knew of this highway and most knew that, though the way seemed wide, and the destination like one big party, it only ended in death.

Now days you can travel even wider roads at breakneck speeds ignoring your neighbors entirely except when you pass them, or crash into them, or cut them off in traffic and vice versa. Still, no matter what the road signs promise, if the road does not lead to God, it’s still ‘ole Route 666.

Finding Route 666 is easy. It’s found anywhere once you turn away from God. It’s rumored to have been built when someone first said to God, “No.” The new superhighways often travel over the original route. It’s not called Route 666 anymore, that’s not political correct, but for those with eyes, it’s the same wide road to destruction.

SheepTrax Undercover decided to retrace the original Route 666, the famed Highway to Hell.

I turned momentarily from God and quickly found myself traveling a wide dark and dangerous road. Eeriness settled over me like when you know you are alone, yet sense that non-human eyes are watching with interest from the shadows.

With the top pulled down I called to a speeding car of college girls, “What’s your destination?” They were looking for Partytown. I warned them they were going in the wrong direction but they laughed me off, cranked up the music to drown out my warning, and sped on towards destruction. I shook my head and drove on.

Route 666 always feels like the fading twilight yet daybreak never seems to come. Amid the shifting shadows and tumbleweeds and curious mounds of almost human looking salt I saw a light in what looked like an abandoned mining town, now a ghost town. Against my better judgment, I pulled in and parked.

The dive was called The Caca Café. There was an annoying buzzing in the background and the pungent smell of, well, like a herd of diuretic cattle had passed through or a sewer line had erupted. I wore my boots and decided to be careful where I stepped.

I pushed open the creaky saloon doors and stepped in to the feasting and darkness.

“Whoa. A living human!” said the waitress. She looked like a dung beetle with a bouffant. Her stained uniform had embroidered the name Sludge. “Is that your name?” I asked. She smirked said it was the special of the day.
I blinked. Inside were all manner of unclean things. Beasts of this world and some not. A scorpion made a bee line for my foot, its stinger glistening with poison. I said, “I remind you that in Him I have the authority over snakes and scorpions.”

There was a moment of relative quiet against the din and someone, or something, muttered, “He knows who he is in Christ.” Fearfully, the scorpion slowly backed away. The snakes ceased their slithering.

I made for a table swarming with flies with the dung beetle waitress following me. It smelled like they were cooking up the souls of the damned. I didn’t look inside Hell’s kitchen but the smell of burning brimstone sickened me. I had to ask. “Don’t you have a dish washer for this filth?” She smirked again. “Why bother? Everything in here is unclean!”
What passed for laughter in this loveless place erupted. What the flies were feasting on was revolting. “What is that crap?” I asked realizing I had answered my own question. Then I understood. They feed on sin and darkness.

And then it got quiet as the saloon doors opened. All but me fell on their faces in fear. The lord of the flies had come to dine. Since I knew what flies were instinctively attracted to, it all made sudden perfect, if perverted, sense. His was a kingdom built on refuse.

He stared at me, and then shone radiantly, seductively as if an angel of pure light. “Not many come willingly, knowingly to my domain but you are most welcome, traveler.” Suddenly the crapulent platter on the table was transformed into a feast for a king. “Follow the lusts of your eye and you’ll eventually get used to the taste,” he said, smiling a seducing smile.

And for a moment that seemed to last an eternity I wanted to believe him, to rest, to end my weary travels. The Caca Café was transformed into a resplendent 5 star restaurant, the waitress into a big boned beauty named Sally, and my host glowed with a perfection that suggested he was the Son of God Incarnate. I nearly knelt before him in adoration. It all looked so inviting, so perfect, so beguiling that I wanted desperately to yield. Still, I hesitated.

A small, still voice deep inside me whispered, “You are on the broad road to destruction. Return to the narrow way.” The fog dissipated, my eyes opened and I was back in the stink of The Caca Café. The masquerade of light that surrounded my host evaporated leaving only the glaring venom of the devil himself.

Knowing his time was short, but not yet, I smiled at the prince of darkness and began to praise the Living God whose presence began to fill the room. The poo poo platters fell to the floor as all scrambled to hide themselves from the presence of the One from whom even the heavens and earth flee away. My host shrieked, and demanded of me, “No, not for Him. Me. Praise me. ME!”

With my hands raised, I shook my head and worshipped the Living God with abandon as I walked through the vile waste and returned to my car. As I turned the key, a haunting, familiar voice began to accuse me of all my failures and unworthiness before God. Unable to resist a parting shot, I replied, “All you say is true, but the grace and forgiveness of God have eased my past and altered my future. Your past remains and your future,” I laughed, “is looking mightily bleak! Be gone you foul spirit in the mighty name of Jesus!”

It was good to see the light again.

There was no need to continue traveling Route 666. I knew its final destination: it always and only ends in death. Pointing myself back towards God, I was instantly removed from the infamous Highway to Hell and was returned to the narrow road that leads to life. Sure, the narrow way twists and turns and often you have to drive by faith as you can’t see but an inch before you. Yet I know where this road ultimately leads: to a river that makes glad the city of God, to the Father’s throne; to He who is The Way, The Truth, and The Life!

If you’re traveling Route 666, fascinated at the attractions, ghost towns and endless stretches of road that seem to lead to nowhere but offers endless promises of thrills and fulfillment, take some advice from a fellow traveler: stop, turn from the darkness, and surrender your life to Christ. In Him alone is life everlasting. Route 666 will take you anywhere except where you truly need to go.

Bryan Hupperts © 2008 – 2009

www.sheeptrax.com/xpress

This material maybe forwarded without cost provided the copyright and contact information remains intact. For knowing more about Jesus, radio interviews (I’m an ex-DJ) or, to subscribe to this once a week tabloid, contact bhupperts@sheeptrax.com

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