Many if not most of those who have profound near-death experiences have seen their “lives in review.”
Call it “judgment,” if you prefer. They describe it more as a learning process.
Yes, there is hell. There is purgatory.
And yes: we will be shown not just everything we have ever done from the perspective of God, but from the perspectives of others, and also: the repercussions.
There is no “time” in eternity. It’s a flash: an entire existence in a moment. One man described seeing thousands of tv-screen-like things replaying different moments of his life, all at the same time.
Said another: “During this review which lasted about one second or less, I saw all that I had previously seen while living on earth. I relived every conversation I had had. I saw each pet I had owned. I saw again each piece of clothing I had worn. I relived every class I had attended in school. I saw everything again. It was here in this building, looking much like a library, that my life’s review ended.”
That’s in a book called The Crossover Experience by D. J. Kadagian, Dr. Pim van Lommel, and Gregory Shishan, PhD. It’s a secular work, written by researchers, and though it is in the main Christian, it does include some interpretations that veer off (in our view, very unfortunately) into reincarnation-like interpretations. Thus: discern. Take only what is valid.
Nonetheless, much of it confirms the many hundreds of other such experiences we have heard with our own ears, viewed on YouTube, or read in literally dozens of books (a number written by doctors, psychiatrists, and surgeons; more and more of the latter seem to be coming aboard).
“I did find out about the so-called ‘Judgment Day’ I feared so much as a child,” recalled another who testifies. “We judge ourselves and that at first was a big relief but our life is still our job. I was shown what is now called a ‘life review.’ I was shown in living color, like in certain movie situations, both good and bad, in my life. I was able to see and hear exactly how it was. But the kicker was as I was watching this situation unfold right before my eyes, I was forced, for the lack of a better word, to feel the other person’s feelings at the time, not mine. Besides all the life situations shown me, I was given the capability to hear every single significant thing that has ever affected me during my life.”
Chew on that.
“This recounting of the deeds of one’s life is not what you would think in terms of this life. Because what was important were the choices I made. And what was more important than the choices I made were my motivations and my intent, and really the state of my heart in doing any single action.”
In Catholicism, we call it “purity of intention.”
That’s yet more upon which to masticate and digest as we move rapidly into the crux of Lent.
[resources: books on the afterlife]