What do you think happens to a person when he or she dies? Words cannot express the foreboding which comes over me when I enter into a conversation with another pastor who speaks of hell as simply a state of alienation. People who think “alienation” is a good analogy for missing the joy of heaven should try spending several months being three thousand miles from home not seeing spouse, children, friends, or congregation. That is alienation. Being a stranger in a foreign land is not hell, it is merely being a long way from home and loved ones and as long as one knows they are going home it is certainly bearable.  However, being away on an extended trip whatever its main purpose has the side benefit of seeing things in a new way and I will share a few at this time.

I spent three months in Germany doing research in 2008. While being able to talk to my wife often on the phone, trade daily emails, being able to be together for about ten days midway helped considerable with the loneliness. Yet there is something about being so far away from your family and living where communication does not come easy because the language is not your own which makes for an appreciation of the seriousness of separation. It makes it somewhat easier to imagine eternal separation. Of course, more solitude provides additional time to think and pray. There were many times that I would lay down to sleep and think about my wife and son and contemplate the remainder of life. I could not help but think about wanting to be with her forever, and I would think about forever. This caused me to pray even more about these things. I would like you to imagine you are in a similar circumstance with enough solitude that you are driven to pray more about eternity during which you consider this question very seriously: What do you think happens to a person when they die?

In this three months I was not lonely per se because I had an enormous task ahead of me in my research for the writing of a thesis and a book for which I felt I was not equal. While it was of sufficient interest to occupy my mind, still I had time to think, and think I did about it seems like everything, especially the things I loved including my congregation and its crisis in regards to leaving its denomination over the loss of sound teaching. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America has many teachers of the faith who do not believe the Bible when it speaks of hell. How widespread this belief is was driven home for me when I was at a luncheon with the pastors of my conference. One of them let it drop while at table waiting for our orders that he did not believe there was a hell and another agreed with him. Out of curiosity, I asked if everyone else felt the same way and three quarters quickly agreed. They gave variations of the theme of alienation for their understanding. The result was my alienation from them! With that and the many other opinions I have heard expressed in the “Journey to Faithfulness” in the ELCA, which was in effect a decade of controversy, I had plenty of time to think about the nature of faith and how we teach it, and this too, of course, drives us to prayer.

I had to learn to monitor my loneliness on my sabbatical as I have learned to do with all feelings. In my youth there was a song with a line, “Everything is strange when you’re a stranger.” This is without a doubt a universal experience. Sure, when you travel and the sun is shining, the food is delicious, and everyone is smiling and treating you with respect, it is very nice indeed. However, after a while you notice how often it rains, the people are not nearly as friendly as back home and it sure would be nice to have some home cooked food. You have to tell yourself not to judge people in a foreign land. Of course, I have to tell myself this in my own country too, things becoming so strange and all.

I remember reading an interview with a movie director who is famous for making horror movies. He gave out the trick. Horror movies do not start with the strange and get stranger, they purposely create normalcy and then change one thing. We notice that one odd thing whatever it is, it creates a sense of unease in us, which turns into foreboding, and when a figure suddenly jumps out of the shadows, unease turns into horror.

In the town in which I did my research, Halle, a university town in the former East Germany, I never saw any tourists and only knew one or two other Americans. I settled into a normal routine, was surrounded by people who looked very much like us, got used to things, but because of having to use a different language I think I always had a sense of mostly normal, but not normal. They have everything we have, I went to Church on Sunday and it was very much like what we have and do in America, except they didn’t stand for hymns, and they don’t show much of a reaction. For example, they don’t laugh or say “Amen” in the sermons. On reflection, I felt like a tourist more in church than anywhere else in Germany.

Anyway, the point is, always a little off guard, alienation only really sunk in when I lay down at night, and coupled with the fact that I missed my wife, I did pray quite often for her health, my health, for our faith, for a long life together and very, very specifically that we spend eternity together. I prayed that my family would be permitted a long life together and that we would be in heaven together and so this too drove me to pray. I would pray for my son that no matter what he be a good man, knowing that this is not a certainty as there are so many today who could lead him astray. The ability to express this in prayer and be able to trust God in the most important things in life led me to an even deeper appreciation for the gift of faith to trust He heard my prayers when it truly mattered to my soul.

I imagine that almost everyone reading this thinks this is what one should do and to thank our heavenly Father for certainty in faith. Therefore, we should agree that this is what we all need, to go deep into prayer, and realize our complete dependence on the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Thinking through the mysteries of faith is not the same as what we mean by having a living faith, but a necessary part. Many who write on faith today seem to promote ambiguity and give people the impression that only a fundamentalist thinks certainty is a desirable goal. We should not keep silent when we hear this expressed, but rather than get all preachy, in humility we can state simply one is incomplete without thinking deeply about eternity. One must enter this process in order to realize the meaning of eternity. This cal allow us to see our utter dependence on God for the hope for eternal life. It is everyone’s business to see to it that they devote enough time to thinking this issue through and coming out on the right side of it. Faith without certainty is not always but can be due simply to not contemplating one’s need for salvation. Without it somehow sinking in that God is God and we are not, that God provided the solution and rescued the human race by throwing us a lifeline as it were, we are as individuals as lost as the world was before the death and resurrection of His Son. Without that, everyone, no matter what their good intentions are will not move forward to certainty in salvation but instead is forever plucking petals off a daisy, “Yes, He loves me. No, He does not, Yes, He loves me. No, He does not.”

Let’s praise God right now that God so loved the world that He gave His Only Begotten Son, that whosoever, whosoever, whosoever, believes in Him will not perish, will not die, but will inherit eternal life. Amen. This, of course, is the Gospel.

The Evangelical Church’s health lies in its members proclaiming their praises. An ambiguous faith has nothing to praise, nothing to proclaim. As we support each other in the faith and urge each other on, we can be confident not only in our own salvation, but that our Church shall prosper as well.

Eric Jonas Swensson

® 2010

For more reflection, from 1 Timothy 4:1, 6-16: “Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons… be a good servant of Christ Jesus, being trained in the words of the faith and of the good doctrine that you have followed. . .train yourself for godliness; ⁸ for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come. . . to this end we toil and strive, because we have our hope set on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe. . . set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity . . . devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation, to teaching. Do not neglect the gift you have, which was given you by prophecy when the council of elders laid their hands on you.  ¹⁵ Practice these things, devote yourself to them, so that all may see your progress.  ¹⁶ Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers.