“In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.” - John 14:2-3.
One of the most pervasive errors made by people regarding life after death is the idea that God could condemn no one to an eternity in hell regardless of the state of their souls at the time of death. And this has been the case throughout history, though not in the numbers we see today. Today, the popular culture suggests that each individual can personalize their own designs in everything from cosmetics, to diet, to body sculpting, to God and the hereafter.
They hold to the erroneous belief that God is simply too good to do such a terrifying thing. In most cases the people who believe this nonsense are people who have never read the Bible or who have meticulously cherry-picked the Holy Scriptures for words they can use to convince others that God’s greatest attribute to the exclusion of all others is His love. There is no such isolated Scripture that guarantees this to be the case. It is poor exegesis and false teaching that inspire such unfounded delusions.
Their alternatives are the heresy of universalism or the equally fallacious idea that the dead are simply annihilated. The Bible itself is abundantly clear as to the fundamental flaw in their understanding of the afterlife. “And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.” - Daniel 12:2.
The Bible tells us that those who die Jesus will be raised to eternal life in heaven. “Because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” - Romans 10:9.
On the other hand, the Bible tells us in many passages of Scripture what the alternative is - “But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.” - Revelation 21:8.
There it is in plain and articulate language. There is life after death and it is not the same for sinners forgiven or unforgiven.
The idea of annihilation is simply made of whole cloth for people who remain uncommitted to Jesus Christ in this life. Such notions reek of pride, autonomy, and outright sin! Suggestions that unrepentant and unforgiven people will somehow merit the same afterlife as those who have died in Christ are ludicrous. They suggest that both unrepentant serial murderers and St. Paul will either completely disappear from existence (annihilation) or that they will share the same dinner table in the afterlife (universalism). The latter assume these murderers turned to Christ in the moments before their deaths.
We simply cannot customize or design our afterlife experience; there are only two! The Bible has gone to great lengths to describe God the Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit as our one triune God. There is no other design for, or version of, God. There is only one!
As we consider our lives in both this world and the next, let our faith in Jesus assure us we have a home in the glory that is Jesus Christ. “In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.” - John 14:2-3.
This is the promise of Christ, not the meanderings of those who have no hope and no place of salvation.
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