Five Minutes After You Die: A Sober Warning

by David Chadwick

What will happen five minutes after you die? Today’s topic is truly a sober warning.

While there will be many wonderful things that take place after death for those who follow Jesus. There is also a sober reality of what death looks like for those who are far from God and have not put their trust in the grace and mercy of Jesus Christ.

Solid, biblical preaching must always include a warning. A “woe,” as it is sometimes called in the Bible. The prophets practiced it. As did Jesus.

Jesus made it very clear in John 14:6 and other places that he is the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through him, and outside of his grace, there is an eternal separation from God.

When you awaken from death, it will be in heaven, where you will stand before the judgment seat of God (Romans 14:10). Please note this: for those who love Jesus, they will never experience the judgment of this dreadful seat, for our judgment has already been made secure through Jesus. Upon receiving Jesus as Lord, we are declared “not guilty” from all our sins. Christians please “Jesus” before the Father and are welcomed into heaven.

But for those who have rejected Jesus or have been faux followers of him, pretending to be “religious” without a true, living, dynamic relationship with Jesus, these people will spend eternity in hell. The measure to which you do or do not embrace the fullness of the message of Jesus’s grace will determine your eternal destiny.

Look forward to heaven, believer in Jesus! But take seriously the call to warn those around you of what may be awaiting them. For those of us who have placed our trust in Jesus, the first five minutes after death will be glorious, beyond all description in beauty and splendor. But for those who don’t accept his gift of salvation, may today serve as a loving but sober warning for you to get right with God.

Please run to Jesus. Receive his forgiveness. Develop a personal relationship with him. If you do, you will never fear death again!

Death becomes the entrance into Jesus’s glorious presence and into eternal life with him and our loved ones who have gone to him before us.