Sermon Illustrations
TV Show Depicts Access to Heaven on a Point System
NBC's show The Good Place, is a humorous depiction of life after death. The creator Michael Schuur said it's based on "the idea of an omniscient [point] system, like we're all playing a videogame that we don't know that we're playing. And someone's keeping score, and the 10 highest scores out of every 10,000 people get rewarded."
After her death, the character Eleanor Shellstrop finds herself with this small minority of the world's best people in the good place. There's just one problem: she doesn't belong there. She was actually a pretty awful person. When Michael, the architect of the Good Place, finds out she is there by mistake, he gives her a questionnaire to determine her worthiness.
Did you commit murder?
Did you commit arson?
Did you take off your shoes and socks on an airplane?
Did you ever have a vanity license plate?
Did you ever reheat fish in an office microwave?
Have you ever cared about The Bachelor and any of its attendant spinoffs?
Michael lets Eleanor know that they are going to watch some highlights from her life as Michael tries to determine if she is good enough to stay in the Good Place. Eleanor says, "It doesn't make me look great, so don't judge me." To which Michael replies, "That's literally the purpose of this entire exercise."
Possible Preaching Angles: We won't be able to tell God, "So don't judge me" because his judgement day is coming. And his judgement will involve our real moral failures, not just trivial offenses. But our worthiness in the kingdom of God is not something we deserve, but something we receive as a free gift.