The Destination of Man
According to God’s creation plan, the desired world of man lies in post-death period in Paradise. The pre-death period is only a selecting ground. Those who qualify themselves in this pre-death period will be held deserving of inhabiting the desired world of Paradise.
Man wants a secure world for himself. But the events of the Tsunami in December 2004 in Indonesia and the Himalayan Tsunami in Uttarakhand in 2013, etc., tell us that man has in effect been given a world that is insecure. Man wants an unlimited life for himself. But the event of death reminds him that he has been given a limited lifespan in this world. Man desires a world of ideal happiness, but different kinds of accidents tell man that he can only find a level of happiness which is far below his desired ideal. Man exceptionally possesses the concept of “tomorrow”, but in practice, he is aware only of “today”. Man has unlimited potential, but before he is able to use even one per cent of this potential, he has to leave this world.
Why is this so? The answer to this question lies in human nature itself. While all the animals only live for today, on planet earth, man is the only creature who possesses the concept of “tomorrow”. This is nature’s answer to this question.
The answer is that what man is looking for in his ‘today’, exists in his ‘tomorrow’. What he desires to find in his ‘present’ has been situated in his ‘future’, according to the creation plan of the Creator. According to this creation plan, man’s life is divided into two parts: one is the pre-death period and the second is the post-death period. The desired world of man has been deemed for the post-death period. The position of the pre-death period is that of a selecting ground. Those men and women who qualify themselves in this pre-death period will be held deserving of inhabiting the desired world of the post-death period. Paradise is the name of this desired world.
An event like the tsunami serves as a warning that man cannot build a Paradise for himself in this present world. Although the earth is very beautiful, it is so vulnerable and suffers from such limitations that it cannot be turned into a heavenly abode. Our earth is an initial introduction to Paradise, but not Paradise itself. We need another world for the building of Paradise, a world which is unlimited, free from all kinds of fear. A perfect world is needed for Paradise, whereas the present world is imperfect in every respect, and a perfect Paradise can never be built on an imperfect earth. Man by his very nature is desirous of Paradise. But the concept of tomorrow that man uniquely possesses tells us that Paradise is achievable only in the world of tomorrow and not in the world of today.
Realizing this fact is without doubt the greatest wisdom. Those who build their lives focused on tomorrow are successful while those who build their lives focused only on today are failures. The present world is a thoroughfare for man: it is not man’s final destination. The journey of man in this world finally leads him to the door of death through which man must pass. On the other side of death’s door, there is either eternal Paradise or eternal hell. There is no third place where man can take up his abode after death. This state of affairs is so serious that once man becomes aware of this reality, he will think more of death than of life; he will be concerned more about the Hereafter than about this world.
