Think about it. The time you spend in this life is less than a blink, compared to the eternity that awaits you on the other side.
It’s like making the smallest dot you can with the smallest pencil point (smaller than this period mark). This dot represents your current life on Earth (no matter how long you live—centuries, even). Then draw a straight line that continues on forever in your mind. That represents your eternal life. Here’s a little graphic to illustrate this concept:
Can you see the tiny red dot on the left, separated from the line by a small gap? That gap represents death. For some, death has already been longer than their life on Earth was. For others, there will be no death at all (a very tiny number of people). The passage from life to death seems to be seamless, instantaneous and imminent.
This time of death-life (if I can call it that) is a temporary arrangement (its doctrinal name is “the temporary state”). This is where what is called “heaven and hell” come into play. Most people will go into what is called “hell” (a place of solitary confinement for a time), while a lucky few will enter into what is commonly called “heaven” (a place of peace, joy, fulfillment, fellowship, satisfaction). Either way, the place you end up in will be like a waiting room, where you await Jesus’ judgment upon you. At that final judgment event, He will either condemn you to an eternity away from His presence and blessings (called the Lake of Fire[1]), or He will welcome you into eternal happiness in His family. But the way that He decides this might surprise you.
Common thought on this seems to be that “good people” go to heaven and “bad people” go to hell, forever. This is simply not true. In the first place, no human being who is descended from Adam and Eve (which is everyone ever conceived, except Jesus) can be called “good”. Every single one of us humans (again, except for Jesus) is a corrupted being at our core. (See my tract, post, or T-Shirt on The DNA of Imperfection.) This is because the first two humans made by Jesus (He is the eternal God, after all according to Colossians 1) corrupted their nature all on their own and received a new nature from God that includes death (an expiration date).
Death is both a curse and a blessing. It’s a curse (literally) from God because of what Adam and Eve did (they ruined their perfect relationship with Him). So He cursed them and the rest of creation and introduced death into their makeup. If He had not added death to their essence, they would still be alive today—separated from God forever in that fallen state. And since this would have rendered all of His efforts meaningless, Jesus gave them a way to be purified from their own evil nature. For, it is by killing the body, with its mind and heart, that the soul and spirit of man can live on. It’s almost like using distillation to purify water. We go from being material, mortal beings into something else. This is the blessing of death—a second chance at life—Real Life.
But not everyone will enter into life through Jesus. In fact, the majority of people will not. Which begs the question: How do we enter into this eternal life through Jesus? Well, since it is Jesus Who will judge us (either giving us eternal happiness or not), doesn’t it make sense to ask what HE says we need to do to receive it? I mean, it really doesn’t matter what anyone else says about this, since only He decides what happens to our eternal souls. This is why I only listen to Jesus about life, death, and eternity. No one knows better than Him. No one has authority over Him to change His ruling, either. His decision about you will be final (eternal).
If you listen to what Jesus and His apostles have said about this, and accept His terms, then He will transform you (upon His return to Earth) into a new kind of person. Think of the Transfiguration, spoken of in the Synoptic Gospels: Matthew 17; Mark 9; and Luke 9.
“As the men watched, Jesus’ appearance was transformed so that His face shone like the sun, and His clothes became as white as light.”
(Matthew 17:2, NLT)
This is referred to as having “glory”, or being “glorified”. So people who are saved by Jesus from Jesus will share in His glory when He returns and transforms us into a kind of super human (I call it Humanity 2.0—look for a tract, post, or T-Shirt on that). Paul describes this for us in 1 Corinthians 15 and in 1 Thessalonians 4, as he speaks of the resurrection of the dead and the rapture of the living saints.
“Our earthly bodies are planted in the ground when we die, but they will be raised to live forever. Our bodies are buried in brokenness, but they will be raised in glory. They are buried in weakness, but they will be raised in strength. They are buried as natural human bodies, but they will be raised as spiritual bodies. For just as there are natural bodies, there are also spiritual bodies.”
(1 Corinthians 15:42b-44, NLT)
And about those few who do not die, he said this: “We tell you this directly from the Lord: We who are still living when the Lord returns will not meet him ahead of those who have died. For the Lord himself will come down from heaven with a commanding shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet call of God. First, the believers who have died will rise from their graves. Then, together with them, we who are still alive and remain on the earth will be caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. Then we will be with the Lord forever. So encourage each other with these words.” (1 Thessalonians 4:15-18, NLT) So, all who die in Jesus before His return will wait with Him in “heaven” until He returns to earth. Those who are still alive on planet Earth will join Him when He is orbiting the Earth with the newly resurrected saints. On the same day, all followers of Christ (up until then) will be given eternal, spiritual bodies. These are to carry you through your “Real Life”.
Just to clear up some possible confusion on this passage, when he says that we will be caught up into the clouds (Earth’s atmosphere) with Jesus and the resurrected believers who have just joined Him there, he doesn’t mean that we will be in “heaven” forever. In fact, there is no indication that the saints (called the Bride of Christ, and the Body of Christ) will return to heaven at all after being glorified in Earth’s atmosphere. We (glorified believers) will come back down to earth with Him and reign on earth for a thousand years (see Revelation 20:4). After that millennium the Great Judgment will come. After the Great Judgment everything that now exists, the Physical Realm and the current Spirit Realm, will be obliterated by God (only sentient beings will survive). A new Earth and a new Spirit Realm (heaven) will be created for people to either enjoy or suffer in. From this point on, we will be inseparable from Jesus. And for those who reject Jesus, they will never see Him again. It’s white or black; no grey. You’re in or you’re out.
Since the stakes are so high, and you will live forever in one form or another, and the options are so very different—eternal bliss, versus eternal solitude, regret, sorrow, and pain—isn’t this topic worth a lifetime of devoted study? Or will you go the way of shrugging it off as more religious gobbledygook?
You didn’t ask to be born into this life, but this life is just the interview process for the Real Life that has yet to be seen. For some, Real Life will be wonderful; for the rest, it will be absolute hell (worse, even, because it will not end as hell does).
Here are Jesus’ terms for passing Real Life’s interview:
- Acknowledge Him as God, Creator, and Savior. 100% man; 100% God.
- Acknowledge your fallen nature—that you are not the perfect person He wants you to be—and there is nothing that you can do about it without Him.
- Believe that only His death on the cross is sufficient in paying for your fallen nature before Him. Believe that nothing else will do what the cross does, and that you cannot add to or take away from it. (Religion won’t save you.)
- Accept His death as atonement on your behalf. If you don’t accept it, it won’t count for you.
- Give yourself over to Him, as your Master, forever. Submit to His Lordship over your soul. If you don’t want to be with Him, He won’t force you. You’ve got to really want to be with Him.
After this, He will spiritually live inside you (heart, mind, and body). His Holy Spirit will live in you too. And the Father will welcome you into His family as an adopted child of God. With imminent death always over our head, the time to act is now.
Be blessed and keep an eye on the big picture. Real Life has yet to begin.
Gary
Related Posts:
Humanity 2.0 — God’s own super humans
[1] Also called the Lake of Burning Sulfur, Eternal Punishment, and a few other things.
