Curious about what the afterlife might entail?
For those who have led a virtuous life, the afterlife promises something delightful. However, for those who haven’t, the experience might be less than pleasant…
Reverend Chris Lee explains that heaven and hell are very different, with the latter being a place you’d want to avoid.
Regarding heaven, Reverend Lee describes it as a place that will be ‘glorious and happy’.
Although ‘we’re not told everything about heaven,’ Lee notes that Christ provides a strong sense of ‘what it will be like and it’s really lovely.’
“He talks about going ahead to prepare a place for disciples, so it will be a place prepared for us. St Paul’s in his Thessalonians, he talks about the way a fish has flesh and the way a bird has flesh are different, and the way we have flesh on this Earth will be different from the way we have new flesh in the heaven to come.”
“What is sown in the natural, will be sown in the spiritual. What is shown perishable will be imperishable,” he added.
To clarify, Lee assures that we won’t be ‘floaty spirits’ in some ‘heavenly mist,’ but rather, you’ll be ‘recognizable as yourself’.
“You will be truly you. You will know you,” he explained.
Moreover, those who reach the heavenly realm will have a ‘glorious body’, which sounds quite appealing.
If you’re wondering what you might do in the eternal afterlife, there appears to be plenty planned.
“Jesus also talks about feasting and eating, and there being animals in creation in time to come,” he said.
“It is a new creation in which there will be no suffering… So yeah, glorious and happy.”
As for hell, brace yourself.
“Hell is difficult because while Jesus does speak concretely about imagery in heaven, it’s more metaphorical when it comes to hell,” Lee said.
“He talks about Gehenna, which is like a rubbish pile in which things are in flames. In villages and in places around the world in developing countries, they have these big places outside villages where they burn it, and sometimes it’s like that idea of hell.”
“If you push me, I think I do believe in some sort of separation from God. But do I believe in eternal torment? I don’t know.”
Reverend Lee admits that there are various interpretations of what hell entails.
One is ‘annihilationism’, which suggests that rather than eternal torment, ‘you are separated from God and just gone, wiped’.
Overall, hell seems like an undesirable destination.
With this in mind, it might be wise to focus on doing good in this life…