Think back about what you believed about Heaven as a child?  Perhaps those memories were influenced by conversations with your family or Sunday school teachers as you looked in the Bible together.  Other influences probably included cartoons, TV shows, movies, books, and conversations with friends at school.

Jesus gives us a glimpse into the immediate afterlife in Luke 16:19-31.  But I’d first like to share the context Jesus gave it in – why He gives us this open-window-peek into “Hades”, the immediate destination for our souls in the New Testament, up until Jesus’ Crucifixion.  In the Old Testament, Hades was referred to as “Sheol”.

Everyone has a soul who will spend eternity somewhere, so this does impact all of us and our existence after physical death.  Jesus wants to show us the serious nature and consequences of having our own plans for our life apart from God’s plans for our life.

This conversation begins back in Luke 14.  Jesus is invited to eat in the home of a prominent Pharisee.  The disciples are there, as well as crowds of people following Jesus around.  Jesus honors His host and begins talking about who gets invited to banquets and why, and He then urges them all to invite people, as well, who can’t return the favor.  Then He escalates it to excuses people make that forfeit their invitation to the banquet in the Kingdom of Heaven.  V25 tells us, “Large crowds were traveling with Jesus”, and He turns towards them and begins teaching about being wise, investing your life wisely, and the cost of following Him.

By Luke 15, it says, “Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus.  But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, ‘This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.’”  They’re obviously not liking the crowd, especially since it’s not for them.  This is when Jesus shares the parables of The Lost Coin, The Lost Sheep, and The Lost Son – words of hope for all who would repent, who would let God change their minds, as well as a strong rebuke against self-righteousness.

In Luke 16 Jesus addresses His disciples among the crowd with the parable of The Shrewd Manager, who changed his ways of cheating his master to using his worldly resources to benefit others and make friends, who he might be used to bring along with him in eternity.  After a review of being trustworthy with the truths and resources we have from God, Jesus continues in…

Luke 16:13-18 – 13 “No one can serve two masters.  Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other.  You cannot serve both God and money.”

14 The Pharisees, who loved money, heard all this and were sneering at Jesus [they were basically rolling their eyes at Him, trying to dismiss Him as hopelessly out of touch]. 15 He said to them, “You are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of others, but God knows your hearts.  What people value highly [apart from God] is detestable in God’s sight [it’s what keeps them pacified and separated from God].

The word for “detestable” is the same as “abomination” – It’s figuratively a detestable stench, and a moral horror, an illegitimate choice – like choosing your seat cushion instead of a parachute to save your life if you had to jump from a burning airplane – that would disqualify you from surviving!!

16 “The Law [The Law of Moses] and the Prophets [the recorded writings of the Prophets] were proclaimed until John [Jesus is referring to the entire Hebrew Bible, what we now call the Old Testament, which had been available up until John the Baptist arrived on the scene].  Since that time, the good news of the kingdom of God is being preached, and everyone is forcing their way into it [violently fighting against it to get in by other ways than trusting Jesus alone]. 17 It is easier for heaven and earth to disappear than for the least stroke of a pen to drop out of the Law. [In other words, you’re not changing God or His will.