The life after death.

My life right now. Life then. Life after death?

Today you are in college. You have a aged between 18 and 24 years old. But tomorrow?

You finish college. Get a job. You're getting married. You have kids. Change a few services. You buy a house. And then what's next?

Go to soccer with your kids. Are you trying to be a parent and a good partner. See how your children grow up and reach high school although it seems like only yesterday they were in diapers. You do and say the same things that they did and they told your parents, although you swore you would never do so.

Go through a mid-life crisis. Your children finish college. You become a grandfather. Someone's calling you grandpa or grandma. You live your life in peace, the pension you coming home. You walk in the morning. I work the garden. You read the newspaper. You look at the tv. Talk with your children and grandchildren on the phone. Travel.

Okay, and then?

Well, one day, die. If you're lucky, you live a relatively long life, somewhere between 70 to 90 years. That is, if you don't die earlier from cancer or a car accident. But in the end you still die. Death is the Tomorrow that awaits us, that Then inevitably we can't escape any of us.

But is that all? Is there anything?

In a day, you'll be just a corpse. I will bury his body in the earth. Or you will burn and you will put the ashes in an urn. The big question is: where it ends? I still exist somewhere in a conscious way? Is there really life after death?

In reality, probably all hope there is something after death. Probably deep in our hearts we make plans for this.

But what kind of plans? Plans for a kind of life after death. Some call it paradise. Others call it the sky. Others talk about hell.

Another thought that I have many people in life, often unconsciously, is this: I am a good person. Therefore, one day I will go to heaven.

Was this really how things stand?

Many people think that they are "good enough" to go to heaven. This is an assumption that we do. If I'm not robbing banks, if I have not killed anyone or if I'm not wrong the payment of the tax, we believe that we are exactly the kind of people who seek God in order to populate the kingdom. That's it, we're pretty good.

We bought the entrance ticket in the sky by the fact that we were good people throughout our lives.

But if this kind of thinking is wrong? What do we do THEN? To be wrong just in a matter so important? What a misfire!

If you think you're good enough to go to heaven, you have to take into account two things:

(1) If heaven is a place of perfection, how can anyone be good enough?

Many of us recognize that we did something that we're ashamed of. At least one thing. And hopefully no one will alpha about that thing. Maybe it's a mistake from the past. A wrong decision. A moment of weakness or of stupidity that we prefer not to think about it.

This is an extreme. But there are many other ordinary things that don't really want others to know or notice them at us. Maybe it's "little lies" that we tell them. Or the fact that I talk on the others in the back. Or the fact that the school copy homework from other colleagues. Or the ugly words that you say to others. Or the bad thoughts we have about other people.

If we carefully analyze our lives, we will see that there are more events on the ask for regret, and this shows a bad pattern of behavior. Often we don't do what we believe is right and do what we believe is wrong.

All of us, even those whom we consider good, we are fundamentally selfish and imperfect.

God sees everything we do. This means that we can't fool you. He knows very well all the good I've done (and on which I could do) and all the evil that I have done. He knows us even all the thoughts and all the motives.

Here is the second thing that you have to take into account if we think that we are "good enough" to go to heaven: (2) it Is possible to be a good person and still have rejected God?

To think about Radu. He is a "good" person. Acted according to the standards at the place of work. I had never stolen even a paper clip. He was a father and a devoted husband. He took care not to miss anything of the children. He made sacrifices for them and for his wife (which he never cheated on her). Even gave money to some charities.

Although he was a good man, Radu not has "never left the God inside of his life". Many times she felt the desire of God to enter into his life. He felt like God was knocking on the door of his heart. But Radu didn't open the door again. Every time she'd have an excuse to refuse Him. Ironically, one of the excuses repeated was: I was a good person all my life. I'll go to heaven.

Radu wanted to go in the sky. Everyone wants. But in reality, Radu did not want to know God. And didn't even took the time to analyze the implications of the huge that you got that decision (the decision to leave God out of his life).

Think about this. The sky is the house of God. If Radu didn't want to know God here on earth, during life, why would he want to know God in the life beyond? In other words, Radu did not take into account how much you'll DETEST the sky.

Heaven is a place where God is present. Probably every thing in the sky will remind us constantly of God. What a horrible place for Radu!

Radu has always assumed that heaven will be a very comfortable place. But he did not take into account how uncomfortable it will be for him since he didn't want to know God nor have a relationship with Him. For Radu, the sky will not be clear, but a kind of hell.

Would you let someone enter your house if you knew that that person would not want to have to do with you? You leave him in there knowing that wherever they would go back and would remind me of you?

Many people are like Radu. They want to go to heaven, but I don't want God. And they don't realize that, because God is there, heaven would be a dreadful place for them.

Maybe the truth is that heaven is for those people who know that they are not good enough to be there – but who, nevertheless, want to be there only because God is present there. They want to know God and want to be with Him for eternity. The prize of life after death is not heaven, but its main Occupant.