Shouldn’t religion provide assurance of life after death?
A good many people are concerned about what comes after this life. They have deep uneasiness about where they are going after death.
I don’t blame them. Death comes knocking for all. Some day each one of us will have a little obituary in the local paper.
Where does religious faith play into this? Shouldn’t religion, above all else, be concerned with life after death? Now don’t get me wrong, belief in God should encourage the doing of good to other people. But, what if we really are creatures who shall live forever? Should not our religious worldview give us certainty as to our future state after we’ve been planted in the earth?
But, no, surprisingly enough the major religions of our day do not give such assurance. Ask any follower of the major Eastern religions if they have assurance. I have personally asked this question of many. They will say, more or less, all we can know for certain is that the soul does not die with the body. It shall live on and come back as another life form. This new life may be better or worse than the former—they just don’t know. But do they have a definite assurance of going to heaven? No, they make no such claim.
Another major religion, a very large one, also has not the tiniest shred of assurance. I have personally spoken to a number of its followers. The response has been the same: We can’t know for sure until we are judged on the basis of our actions. If we have done more good than evil then, yes, we will go to heaven. If not then we will go to the other place.
Now to be fair, many of those who claim allegiance to the Christian faith also have no certain hope of eternal life after death. They were taught their good deeds must outweigh the bad before God will reward them with eternal life.
But what if this teaching is fundamentally flawed? What if Jesus actually taught a person can have certainty about eternal life, right now, in this life? Wouldn’t that be something quite amazing?
Some time ago I had an amazing conversation with a cashier while paying for my gas. I had asked him if his belief system gave him any assurance of heaven upon his death. Not surprisingly, he said it doesn’t. Then, when I told him that as a Christian I had absolute assurance that when I died God would accept me, and usher me into heaven, he was astounded. He asked how you would know that you have done enough good deeds so that you deserve to go to heaven?
It was a great question, and perfectly logical if you believe that good deeds will buy your way into heaven. But what if the premise is wrong? What if our nature is so corrupted and so far from God that no quantity of good deeds could ever buy our way into heaven? Not even the best of us is good enough to be acceptable to God by our good deeds. But we must not despair.
Historic Christianity has always believed in grace. Grace simply means, “undeserved favour.” It means that Jesus shows mercy to people who don’t deserve it.
Christian teaching is unique—it points to a person, Jesus Christ, as being the basis for our finding acceptance and favour with God. Personal faith and trust in him are paramount in the Christian way of thinking. Yes, good deeds are still important. But, if eternal life was granted to me and you on the basis of our good deeds, we could never, never have any kind of assurance. We would always have a niggling anxiety about the future.
But God set up a different and wonderful plan. The Bible says, “And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son…I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.”
Published in The Guelph Mercury, June 8, 2012
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