Well, since there was no bogeyman behind the corner, I thought there wouldn't be devil and hell too. Just followed the analogy.
Of course I might be wrong but that's what I'm trying to figure out in this thread.
Some things get planted in our mind, some things that are true and some things that are false.
After being planted, some take root, and grow. They are more difficult to remove, regardless whether they're true or false.
Others never really do much, and simply stay as they were planted, decaying after time.
It's really about the soil, the climate, the environment of who we are, and if that changes over time .. and somewhat about the "farmer(s)".
There may be a few things that could grow anywhere .. not sure ...
Regardless, I wonder how we're supposed to know the difference, between those that are true and those that are false.
I also wonder if we'll truely get rewarded/punished for knowing/not-knowing the difference when the "time" comes.
I like to believe that life cannot be so wildly unstable that we'd receive anything either way for being able/unable to differentiate between true and false, considering our mind simpy has no way of really knowing for sure on its own.
But maybe that's the clue .. at least it was for me: the mind, on it's own, simply can't know .. and many things just have to be transcended.
For me, that transcendence occurred when I let go of my mind, journeyed to my heart, experienced through my heart the pain I felt in my soul, healed that pain, and everything changed.
For me, a key moment in that transcendence was when I experienced that either Jesus was indeed a God and thus, by scripture, I was too, or neither of us were.
In letting go, I came to the latter conclusion.
I received peace from that.
Hopefully God will continue that peace when the time comes.
But I can't imagine that, all things considered, I would recieve hell for honestly doing the best that I can.
As receiving hell for doing the best that I can only occurs in dysfunctional families .. at least, so I was taught.