Five Minutes After You Die: How Then Should You Live?

by David Chadwick

If hell exists, and if Jesus’s teachings about hell are true, then unbelievers who live apart from Jesus will spend eternity there. If this is true, how then should these truths impact how we live as followers of Jesus today? This is the most important question that every single believer should ask.

The reality of hell should make evangelism to the lost the urgent and primary task of the church. Is it for you? How should you be ready to share the gospel? Does the thought of people spending an eternity away from the Father grip your heart?

Today, I want to exhort you to consider the importance of evangelism. What should your life look like toward a lost and hurting world? How then should you live in light of the Gospel message?

First, pray regularly for your lost friends and for this lost world. Ask God to bring people into your life who don’t know Jesus.

Secondly, learn how to share the gospel. Know the Ten Commandments as they show our sin and brokenness before a pure, perfect, and holy God. Share the gospel in light of this reality. All have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory (Romans 3:23). The consequence for sin is death (Romans 6:23). Because of God’s love, Jesus absorbed all of our sin on the cross as perfect God and man and offered us eternal life (John 3:16). As a man, he lived a perfect and sinless life, and he took our place on the cross. As God, he forgave us, because only God can forgive our sins.

Third, be willing to JUST GO. Wherever God may send you, say “yes.” Be willing to live on mission to serve a dying world. Be ready to give your life away practically and spiritually. Be willing to forgive others just as Christ has forgiven you. Be excited to give your resources to places around the world that are reaching other people for Jesus, especially in what is called the 10/40 window. These are the specific places around the globe that are most resistant to the Christian faith.

If you do this, you will hear Christ’s, “Well done!” one day when you die. If you’re a follower of Jesus, the judgment seat is not a place to fear; it’s a place of victory where you will meet your Savior face-to-face and finally spend an eternity with him.