With someone from our church dying this week it has made me think about a few things. One of them is the issue of eternity and where the deceased person goes when they breathe their last.
I am not speaking about the person who was in our church who passed away. I am talking about people in general.
Why is it that when someone dies the people around them automatically give the deceased person a free pass into Heaven? Oftentimes nothing is brought up about Christ or if that person repented of sin and trusted in Christ. I suppose that this is meant to comfort themselves and others as to the whereabouts of their dead relative/friend.
But let's be honest. Just as no preacher can preach someone into Heaven; family or friends cannot wish or speak someone into Heaven either. It is sad when we as believers let down our convictions and think or assume that God will let someone "slide" into Heaven by the "skin of their teeth." There is no such thing as that. God has never nor will ever allow someone into Heaven except through the sacrifice of His Son Jesus.
Then we descend further into our worldly thoughts on eternity.
It is awful when we discuss Hell and how we want to avoid it because it is such a bad place. Nevermind that we have sinned against a holy God or that we have lived a life of wanton pleasure of self. We just don't want to go because it is such a bad place and we would not be happy there.
So Heaven is a place that want to go to because we will be happy there. We're going to get a crown or catch up with relatives that we have not seen in a while or ever.
So Hell is a place to be shunned because we will not be happy there. We're going to be tortured there without our iPods or Facebook. Horrors!!
It should be about God's glory. Hell exists so that judgment is shown. Heaven exists for grace and mercy to be shown. In the end, it is all for His glory.
Let's not cheapen Heaven by allowing, preaching, wishing, or speaking someone out of Hell and into Heaven just because we want it.
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9 comments:
Well said, DT.
Hope you've been well!
It's nice to know that the good wishes of people are just as authoritative as the Catholic Church's power over Heaven and Hell. The Catholic Church can determine who is sentenced to hell with excommunication, whose soul springs from purgatory, or who becomes a saint shortly after their death. I don't remember where it says in the Bible that man's soul goes wherever his peers want him to go.
But for all my Catholic friends and Christian well wishers, here is a verse for you:
"Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell" - Matthew 10:28
Hi DT,
Your post is spot on.
Having just completed a time of two years ministering in a nursing home (literally today), it is indeed cruel to lie to people about eternity. Reading from Rev. 20 and 21 about the 2 versions of eternity made me tremble. Apart from Christ's mercy, we people are in great eternal danger.
We need to speak the truth with love to people about those who stand on the doorstep to eternity.
I can attest to one witness where several elderly people openly expressed their disdain of the Lord Almighty. Many people simply do not desire to spend eternity with God. They love their sin all the more.
Our making papal pronouncements not based on God's authority is wrong and cruel-hearted by giving false smugness to those who reject Christ.
S Bogom,
SPQR
Thanks Steve. I have been well, just busy.
Hope you and your bride are doing well.
DT
Careful Joshua. The mother church may condemn you to eternal purgatory.
DT
Stuart,
Thanks for the kind words. I totally agree with you.
Do you have a blog?
DT
We're here to praise? It's called free will. Hell is an eternity away from the being that made me solely for the purpose of praising it?...that must be where I am right now.
I believe God is glorified when his children are righteous and therefore able to return to him, not just when people say verbally, "God is Good".
Wickedness is not happiness. I don't picture Hell as a place of torture, but a constant state of the guilt such as you you get when you sin.
Either way, I don't think it's for us to determine who is going to Hell or not upon someone's death. That's what the judgement is for (The judgement where God judges, not us.) What we should do is celebrate life, and how much one may be missed, no matter what his or her estate will be after mortality.
DT - I think it is interesting how you don't really think - but just regurgitate what has been fed to you over all your years.
If you thought for yourself, you'd realize that there is zero evidence for any god(s), zero evidence for Hell and zero evidence for Heaven. You would also realize that the only reason you believe this stuff is because you have been indoctrinated.
If you had been born in Iran, you would believe in Allah and the teaching of Mohammed. If you had been born in ancient Scandinavia you would believe in Thor or Wotan. If you had been born an Aztec, you would believe in Ilamatecuhtli, the Aztec god of death.
Therefore, your belief is arbitrary and not thought-out.
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