For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. John 3:16
As he listened to a radio program about heaven, a young South African named Musa pondered an important question: “Where are all these dead people going?”
Musa’s question is the kind of question people ask in hospital rooms, in quiet moments, and anytime life feels fragile.
A highly trained neurosurgeon once lay in a hospital room. He had contracted a rare form of bacterial meningitis and fell into a coma. For several days, doctors said his brain showed almost no signs of measurable activity. When he recovered, he wrote that his experience convinced him the end of the brain is “not the end of consciousness, but a transition.” His conclusion was simple: we do not simply stop existing when we die.[1] But his story still leaves questions unanswered. If life continues, where does it continue? And how does anyone get there?
Musa took questions like these to the broadcaster of the program he heard. He shared that he had been trying to win God’s heart, hoping to go to heaven one day through good deeds. But “today’s message,” he said, “gave me information, and I resolved to have a [new] relationship with God.” Musa learned that heaven is something God offers, out of love, to those who follow Jesus. He heard these words from the Bible: “For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16).
Musa had never heard those words before, but they changed everything for him. You can help share these words of good news by sending devotionals like this to millions around the world in their own languages. Give a gift today at guidelines.org.
[1] Eben Alexander, Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon’s Journey into the Afterlife (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2012).
