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Will God give us a second chance after we die?

Will God give us a second chance after we die

I have often heard God described as “the God of the second chance,” and I know that to be true because of the many second chances He has given me. God has been incredibly gracious toward me and you and everyone else, so it is not surprising that many of us believe that our loving God has made arrangements for all of us to go to heaven.

Some of us are convinced that evil people are made ready for heaven in some kind of purgatory. Others believe we are in a karmic loop and are reincarnated until we get it right.

The idea behind the belief in a second chance after death is that hell is full of people saying, “If I only I knew then what I know now. I was so blind. If God gave me another chance, I would repent and do whatever He says.”

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Tribal

Tribal spiritual community

Photo credit: Matt via Flickr

Centuries of history have taught us that human beings are tribal by nature. Of course, most of us don’t need a history book to tell us that. We’ve spent much of our life trying to get in, fit in, and stay in the tribe of our preference.

If you want a reminder, think about your high school daze and how desperately you wanted to be identified with a particular group. I remember the options when I was in school:

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Why hope is essential

Why hope is essential - despair eternal life

God intended our lives to be journeys into the unknown. Like Abraham, we are called out of the life we have known to a life we could never have dreamed existed. And I’m not talking about heaven or the afterlife. I’m talking about here and now. And even folks who don’t believe in an afterlife, at least believe in an “after now.”

All of us need something to look forward to, even if it’s just tomorrow. When we have nothing to look forward to, we end up in despair (a word that means “without hope”). We need hope like we need the air we breathe. Hope pulls us into the future, and when we realize how incredibly uncertain the future is, we can see why hope is so valuable. Yet, as essential as hope is for life, we live in a world that is constantly trying to rob us of it. Because of this, hope has become a rare commodity in our culture.