A common mindset of the current era is that our physical well-being is somehow more important than anything else. You can see this if you look at all of the people exercising and eating so that they can "live longer." How long is it possible to live, anyway, and how much longer can your life get if you exercise like a maniac and eat only the very best things? It seems clear that no matter what we do, we all still die. Because of this, we have to get into a mindset for what comes after death. Obviously if you are an atheist then nothing comes after death for you so the point is moot, but if you are a Christian then you believe that there is something else and you believe that this something else will last forever. Therefore, the life we have after death is what matters and this life is of importance only as far as it has an impact on that life after death.
This concept is entirely biblical. In fact, the idea that this life matters at all for its own sake is just utter nonsense from the Bible's point of view.
For what is the hope of the godless when God cuts him off, when God takes away his life? Will God hear his cry when distress comes upon him? (Job 27:8-9) If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell. (Matthew 5:29-30) For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul? (Matthew 16:26)Jesus turns on its head the idea that our peace and safety here means anything at all by pointing out that it is better for us to have no peace and no safety here (plucked out eyes and chopped off hands) as long as we can follow him to heaven. This thought for our life after death should permeate our lives here. It should form how we treat our jobs, our things, and most especially how we bring up our children. Too often our thinking for them is of their physical and material safety. As long as they have a roof over their heads and enough to eat we determine that they must be fine and we must be good parents. Such thinking is nonsense in the context of an afterlife. It is strange that many Christians have such a materialistic mindset for their children even if they do not have it for themselves. Their own peace and safety here on earth is, like ours, secondary to the safety of their eternal souls. If we understand Christ's lesson and do not forfeit our own souls but we forfeit theirs in a warped reading of the Word then how much mercy can we as children expect from our own Father in heaven who has chosen never to abandon us, even when we were worth abandonment?
