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Postmortem Opportunity: A Biblical and Theological Assessment of Salvation After Death
One of Jesus' most basic commands to his disciples was to tell the world about the good news of his life, death, and resurrection. From the earliest days of the church, Christians have embraced this calling.
But for those Christians who emphasize the need for an active response to the gospel in order to be saved, this raises some difficult What about those who did not hear the gospel before death? Or what about those who heard an incorrect or incomplete version of the gospel? Or what about those who were too young or who were otherwise unable to respond?
In light of these challenging questions, theologian James Beilby offers a careful consideration of the possibility for salvation after death. After examining the biblical evidence and assessing the theological implications, he argues that there is indeed hope for faith—even beyond death.
But for those Christians who emphasize the need for an active response to the gospel in order to be saved, this raises some difficult What about those who did not hear the gospel before death? Or what about those who heard an incorrect or incomplete version of the gospel? Or what about those who were too young or who were otherwise unable to respond?
In light of these challenging questions, theologian James Beilby offers a careful consideration of the possibility for salvation after death. After examining the biblical evidence and assessing the theological implications, he argues that there is indeed hope for faith—even beyond death.
- GenresTheology
359 pages, Kindle Edition
Published March 23, 2021
10 people are currently reading
48 people want to read
About the author
James K. Beilby
16 books12 followersJames K. Beilby (PhD, Marquette University) is professor of systematic and philosophical theology at Bethel University in St. Paul, Minnesota.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
May 13, 2022
Helpful book. It outlines the biblical and (theo)logical issues of final salvation with clarity and precision. It is persistently held back, however, by its confusion of Calvinism with monergism, and its weird but indicative conclusion that Congdon's non-competetive account of divine and human agency is "novel" rather than normal. Much of the book is nonetheless persuasive. In the end, its evangelical self-distancing from universalism is culturally understandable but (happily) unconvincing.
May 8, 2021
A tremendously helpful, encouraging, accessible, and thorough treatment on the subject that changed my mind to some degree. While I see little direct evidence of post-mortem opportunity in the Biblical data, I also do not see the biblical data ruling it out. Much like our inclusivism of children who die before the age of reason and the mentally handicapped, post-mortem opportunity may be a speculative or uncertain hope.
July 7, 2022
4.5 stars. Very, very, well put together argument. Beilby's idea is quite compelling and thorough and his writing fairly accessible. Not sure I'm fully on board, but I also don't have any particular quibbles or alternate ideas on this topic.
February 27, 2026
A DETAILED STUDY OF THE POSSIBILITY OF A ‘POSTMORTEM OPPORTUNITY’ FOR SALVATION
James Beilby is professor of Biblical and Theological Studies at Bethel University. He wrote in the Preface to this 2021 book, “The destiny of the unevangelized is one of the perennial questions in Christian theology… it is the question of how we should think about the salvation of those who had no opportunity to respond to the gospel in this life. This book is a defense of a version of the theory of Postmortem Opportunity, or the idea that those who die without a genuine opportunity to hear and respond to the gospel will receive an opportunity after death to do so… My goals for this book are twofold. My first goal is apologetic in nature… I want to provide what I think is a good answer to the question… The second goal is theological… I seek to explain the theological commitments that underlie … Postmortem Opportunity.” (Pg. ix) He adds, “I make two claims. The first is that Christians are permitted to believe that God will provide a Postmortem Opportunity to the unevangelized… My second claim is that, for synergists at least, the theory of Postmortem Opportunity is better than other answers to the question…” (Pg. xiv-xv)
In Chapter 1, he outlines three categories of ‘unevangelized’ persons: “those who never hear the gospel because of geographic or temporal isolation from anyone who could tell them about Jesus… the second category are those who, at the time of death, lack the cognitive capacity to grasp the gospel message [e.g., infants]… however the idea of the ‘age of accountability’ is understood, it is pretty clear that there are many who die before being able to understand the gospel… The third category … are those who, due to various types of disabilities, never develop the cognitive capacity to grasp the gospel.” (Pg. 4-9)
He adds, “there are more barriers to truly hearing the gospel than merely failure to hear or failure to understand… [e.g.] the version of the gospel he/she had heard is bastardized… [or] or she/he has had experiences [e.g., sexual abuse] that have left her/him unable to trust…. [or] people who are on a trajectory toward faith… interrupted by an untimely death.” He calls such cases ‘pseudoevangelized.’” (Pg. 11-14)
He suggests, “the issue… can be helpfully stated … [in] the following three statements: 1. God desires that the gospel be universally accessible. 2. Responding to the gospel of Jesus Christ with explicit faith is necessary for salvation. 3. Some die without hearing the gospel. The incompatibility between these three statements (at least on the surface) is clear.” (Pg. 20) Later, he adds, “it is possible to remove the theological incompatibility by adding… 4. Those who die without receiving a genuine opportunity to hear and respond to the gospel will receive a Postmortem Opportunity to do so.” (Pg. 32-33)
Later, he asks, “What would be the ‘best possible opportunity’ to be saved look like[?]… I am not sure, but I am confident that God does.” (Pg. 45) He asserts that “Jerry Walls [in his books ‘Purgatory’ and ‘Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory’] has argued … persuasively that persons might undergo a process of purgatorial purification or preparation for their Postmortem Opportunity… But… my claim here is only that an understanding of postmortem preparation fits nicely with Postmortem Opportunity; I am not claiming that Postmortem Opportunity REQUIRES postmortem preparation.” (Pg. 54)
He clarifies, “I am neither an optimist nor a pessimist on how many people will respond affirmatively to the Postmortem Opportunity… because … [I cannot claim] that there is any human person unsaveable by God… [or] that there is any particular person that will certainly be saved by God.” (Pg. 56-57)
He summarizes, “My argument … is as follows: 1; God desires that all people be saved… 2. Being saved requires an opportunity to be saved… 3. Therefore, God desires that all people receive an opportunity to be saved… 4. There are some who do not receive an opportunity to be saved in this life… 5. There are no good … reasons to think that death is the end of salvific opportunity… 6. Therefore, God desires that those who do not receive a PRE-mortem opportunity … will receive a POST-mortem Opportunity… 7. There are no good reasons to think that God’s desire to provide a Postmortem Opportunity will be thwarted... 8. Therefore, we have good reason to believe that God will provide a Postmortem Opportunity to those who do not receive a pre-mortem opportunity.” (Pg. 79-80)
He acknowledges, “There are a number of passages that have been marshaled to support the notion that one’s salvific status is fixed at death… The text most commonly cited … is Hebrews 9:27 [‘people are destined to die, and after that to face judgment’]… The point… is to reinforce the idea that death occurs only once… even if this passage could be interpreted to teach that the day of judgment followed IMMEDIATELY after death… it is possible to believe that the judgment an unevangelized person experiences includes an opportunity to hear the gospel and that they are judged by their response to that offer.” (Pg. 108-109)
He continues, “The second most common passage … is the parable of Lazarus and the rich man [Lk 16:19-31]… Most problematic for the idea of Postmortem Opportunity (or so claim the theory’s detractors) is the fact that the rich man is never offered a Postmortem Opportunity to be saved despite seeming to be repentant at least on some level… [his] failure to receive a Postmortem Opportunity can be rather easily explained by the fact that [he was] neither unevangelized nor pseudoevangelized… If this passage places Lazarus and the rich man in the intermediate state, then this would also not rule out a Postmortem Opportunity, for the statement ‘you cannot cross from there to here’ most plausibly only applies to the … inability of persons to move from Hades to paradise. Second, some of the details in Luke 16 are likely to be questioned by most orthodox Christians. The parable describes a scenario where those in ... paradise can peer down into hell… and observe the suffering of the unregenerate. These beliefs were common in the Middle Age… but there is very little to justify these beliefs…” (Pg. 109-112)
Of Luke 13:25 [‘the narrow door’], he asserts, ‘there is nothing about this … ‘once shut, always shut’ argument … that impugns … Postmortem Opportunity… this text … DOES constitute an argument against any view that … there are infinite opportunities to be saved, even while in hell.” (Pg. 113-114) Of 2 Cor 5:10 [‘for the things done while in the body’], he says, “there is no explicit justification … to claim that people are judged SOLELY on pre-mortem factors.” (Pg. 114-115) Of 2 Cor 6:2 [‘now is the day of salvation’] he notes, ‘the message of urgency is delivered to those who have already HEARD the ‘message of reconciliation.’” (Pg. 118) He suggests, “I think the strongest argument against the contention that ‘few will be saved’ comes from … the ‘narrow road’ passages… [which] are indictments of the religious leaders of Jesus’ day who were confident that their lineage assured their salvation.” (Pg. 127)
He then presents ‘Scriptural Evidence for Postmortem Opportunity’: “the passages [Mt 10:32-33; Jn 3:18; Jn 3:36; Jn 15:22] that seem to teach that people are condemned to hell only for explicit rejection of Jesus Christ.” (Pg. 132-134)
More controversially, he states, “While the idea of praying for the dead is foreign to many contemporary ears, it was present in Second Temple Judaism and in the New Testament… there are a number of … obvious examples of prayers for the dead in Scripture: Elijah prays for a child (1 Ki 17:17-24), Jesus prays for Lazarus (Jn 11:41-42), and Peter prays for Tabitha (Acts 9:36-44)… Are there biblical examples or praying for … a dead person?… there is an oft-ignored reference to ‘baptism for the dead.’ [1 Cor 15:29]… this provides additional evidence that some in the 1st century believed that one’s spiritual trajectory was not fixed at death…” (Pg. 137-139)
He considers 1 Peter 3:18-20 (‘Let’s be frank, this is an odd text’; pg. 143) and 1 Peter 4:6 (‘This passage is … the most straightforward… but that does not mean that there is … widespread agreement on how it should be interpreted’; pg. 152-153).
He summarizes, “I have concluded that Scripture might be seen as offering positive evidential support for the theory of Postmortem Opportunity, even if it cannot be claimed to directly and explicitly teach it.” (Pg. 167) But later, he adds, “Let me say unequivocally that if the theory of Postmortem Opportunity amounts to offering a second chance to those that have had a viable first chance, then it should end up on the scrap heap… There is no second chance. For Postmortem Opportunity to be a ‘second chance,’ people would have to hear the gospel… have a genuine opportunity to respond, refuse to do so, but then also be given a second chance to respond in heaven… that is not what the Postmortem Opportunity theorist claims.” (Pg. 218)
He concludes, “I think that there are sound biblical and theological arguments against Universalism. This leaves me, regretfully, with the belief that it is most likely that there will be persons who reject God’s offer of grace and are consigned to hell.” (Pg. 317) But he later adds, “While I have considered the arguments for Universalism and found them to be wanting, that does not mean that I know Universalism to be false… it seems very likely that some will reject God and be separated from him for an eternity, [but] I do not pretend to know these people will be.” (Pg. 336-337)
This book is probably the most DETAILED presentation of the Postmortem Opportunity theory, and it will be of great interest to Christians studying Hell, Universalism, Conditionalism, and related topics.
James Beilby is professor of Biblical and Theological Studies at Bethel University. He wrote in the Preface to this 2021 book, “The destiny of the unevangelized is one of the perennial questions in Christian theology… it is the question of how we should think about the salvation of those who had no opportunity to respond to the gospel in this life. This book is a defense of a version of the theory of Postmortem Opportunity, or the idea that those who die without a genuine opportunity to hear and respond to the gospel will receive an opportunity after death to do so… My goals for this book are twofold. My first goal is apologetic in nature… I want to provide what I think is a good answer to the question… The second goal is theological… I seek to explain the theological commitments that underlie … Postmortem Opportunity.” (Pg. ix) He adds, “I make two claims. The first is that Christians are permitted to believe that God will provide a Postmortem Opportunity to the unevangelized… My second claim is that, for synergists at least, the theory of Postmortem Opportunity is better than other answers to the question…” (Pg. xiv-xv)
In Chapter 1, he outlines three categories of ‘unevangelized’ persons: “those who never hear the gospel because of geographic or temporal isolation from anyone who could tell them about Jesus… the second category are those who, at the time of death, lack the cognitive capacity to grasp the gospel message [e.g., infants]… however the idea of the ‘age of accountability’ is understood, it is pretty clear that there are many who die before being able to understand the gospel… The third category … are those who, due to various types of disabilities, never develop the cognitive capacity to grasp the gospel.” (Pg. 4-9)
He adds, “there are more barriers to truly hearing the gospel than merely failure to hear or failure to understand… [e.g.] the version of the gospel he/she had heard is bastardized… [or] or she/he has had experiences [e.g., sexual abuse] that have left her/him unable to trust…. [or] people who are on a trajectory toward faith… interrupted by an untimely death.” He calls such cases ‘pseudoevangelized.’” (Pg. 11-14)
He suggests, “the issue… can be helpfully stated … [in] the following three statements: 1. God desires that the gospel be universally accessible. 2. Responding to the gospel of Jesus Christ with explicit faith is necessary for salvation. 3. Some die without hearing the gospel. The incompatibility between these three statements (at least on the surface) is clear.” (Pg. 20) Later, he adds, “it is possible to remove the theological incompatibility by adding… 4. Those who die without receiving a genuine opportunity to hear and respond to the gospel will receive a Postmortem Opportunity to do so.” (Pg. 32-33)
Later, he asks, “What would be the ‘best possible opportunity’ to be saved look like[?]… I am not sure, but I am confident that God does.” (Pg. 45) He asserts that “Jerry Walls [in his books ‘Purgatory’ and ‘Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory’] has argued … persuasively that persons might undergo a process of purgatorial purification or preparation for their Postmortem Opportunity… But… my claim here is only that an understanding of postmortem preparation fits nicely with Postmortem Opportunity; I am not claiming that Postmortem Opportunity REQUIRES postmortem preparation.” (Pg. 54)
He clarifies, “I am neither an optimist nor a pessimist on how many people will respond affirmatively to the Postmortem Opportunity… because … [I cannot claim] that there is any human person unsaveable by God… [or] that there is any particular person that will certainly be saved by God.” (Pg. 56-57)
He summarizes, “My argument … is as follows: 1; God desires that all people be saved… 2. Being saved requires an opportunity to be saved… 3. Therefore, God desires that all people receive an opportunity to be saved… 4. There are some who do not receive an opportunity to be saved in this life… 5. There are no good … reasons to think that death is the end of salvific opportunity… 6. Therefore, God desires that those who do not receive a PRE-mortem opportunity … will receive a POST-mortem Opportunity… 7. There are no good reasons to think that God’s desire to provide a Postmortem Opportunity will be thwarted... 8. Therefore, we have good reason to believe that God will provide a Postmortem Opportunity to those who do not receive a pre-mortem opportunity.” (Pg. 79-80)
He acknowledges, “There are a number of passages that have been marshaled to support the notion that one’s salvific status is fixed at death… The text most commonly cited … is Hebrews 9:27 [‘people are destined to die, and after that to face judgment’]… The point… is to reinforce the idea that death occurs only once… even if this passage could be interpreted to teach that the day of judgment followed IMMEDIATELY after death… it is possible to believe that the judgment an unevangelized person experiences includes an opportunity to hear the gospel and that they are judged by their response to that offer.” (Pg. 108-109)
He continues, “The second most common passage … is the parable of Lazarus and the rich man [Lk 16:19-31]… Most problematic for the idea of Postmortem Opportunity (or so claim the theory’s detractors) is the fact that the rich man is never offered a Postmortem Opportunity to be saved despite seeming to be repentant at least on some level… [his] failure to receive a Postmortem Opportunity can be rather easily explained by the fact that [he was] neither unevangelized nor pseudoevangelized… If this passage places Lazarus and the rich man in the intermediate state, then this would also not rule out a Postmortem Opportunity, for the statement ‘you cannot cross from there to here’ most plausibly only applies to the … inability of persons to move from Hades to paradise. Second, some of the details in Luke 16 are likely to be questioned by most orthodox Christians. The parable describes a scenario where those in ... paradise can peer down into hell… and observe the suffering of the unregenerate. These beliefs were common in the Middle Age… but there is very little to justify these beliefs…” (Pg. 109-112)
Of Luke 13:25 [‘the narrow door’], he asserts, ‘there is nothing about this … ‘once shut, always shut’ argument … that impugns … Postmortem Opportunity… this text … DOES constitute an argument against any view that … there are infinite opportunities to be saved, even while in hell.” (Pg. 113-114) Of 2 Cor 5:10 [‘for the things done while in the body’], he says, “there is no explicit justification … to claim that people are judged SOLELY on pre-mortem factors.” (Pg. 114-115) Of 2 Cor 6:2 [‘now is the day of salvation’] he notes, ‘the message of urgency is delivered to those who have already HEARD the ‘message of reconciliation.’” (Pg. 118) He suggests, “I think the strongest argument against the contention that ‘few will be saved’ comes from … the ‘narrow road’ passages… [which] are indictments of the religious leaders of Jesus’ day who were confident that their lineage assured their salvation.” (Pg. 127)
He then presents ‘Scriptural Evidence for Postmortem Opportunity’: “the passages [Mt 10:32-33; Jn 3:18; Jn 3:36; Jn 15:22] that seem to teach that people are condemned to hell only for explicit rejection of Jesus Christ.” (Pg. 132-134)
More controversially, he states, “While the idea of praying for the dead is foreign to many contemporary ears, it was present in Second Temple Judaism and in the New Testament… there are a number of … obvious examples of prayers for the dead in Scripture: Elijah prays for a child (1 Ki 17:17-24), Jesus prays for Lazarus (Jn 11:41-42), and Peter prays for Tabitha (Acts 9:36-44)… Are there biblical examples or praying for … a dead person?… there is an oft-ignored reference to ‘baptism for the dead.’ [1 Cor 15:29]… this provides additional evidence that some in the 1st century believed that one’s spiritual trajectory was not fixed at death…” (Pg. 137-139)
He considers 1 Peter 3:18-20 (‘Let’s be frank, this is an odd text’; pg. 143) and 1 Peter 4:6 (‘This passage is … the most straightforward… but that does not mean that there is … widespread agreement on how it should be interpreted’; pg. 152-153).
He summarizes, “I have concluded that Scripture might be seen as offering positive evidential support for the theory of Postmortem Opportunity, even if it cannot be claimed to directly and explicitly teach it.” (Pg. 167) But later, he adds, “Let me say unequivocally that if the theory of Postmortem Opportunity amounts to offering a second chance to those that have had a viable first chance, then it should end up on the scrap heap… There is no second chance. For Postmortem Opportunity to be a ‘second chance,’ people would have to hear the gospel… have a genuine opportunity to respond, refuse to do so, but then also be given a second chance to respond in heaven… that is not what the Postmortem Opportunity theorist claims.” (Pg. 218)
He concludes, “I think that there are sound biblical and theological arguments against Universalism. This leaves me, regretfully, with the belief that it is most likely that there will be persons who reject God’s offer of grace and are consigned to hell.” (Pg. 317) But he later adds, “While I have considered the arguments for Universalism and found them to be wanting, that does not mean that I know Universalism to be false… it seems very likely that some will reject God and be separated from him for an eternity, [but] I do not pretend to know these people will be.” (Pg. 336-337)
This book is probably the most DETAILED presentation of the Postmortem Opportunity theory, and it will be of great interest to Christians studying Hell, Universalism, Conditionalism, and related topics.
April 10, 2023
The question of what happens to those who have never heard the Gospel has intrigued me for many years. I've never really seriously looked into it, but when I heard James Beilby preach at an online service, I thought I should get the book.
Beilby discusses three categories of people who have never heard the Gospel.
1.) The who never hear because of geographical or temporal isolation from anyone who can tell them about Jesus.
2.) Those who at the time of their death lack the cognitive capacity to grasp the gospel message.
3.) Those who have heard the name of Jesus, and have some information about Jesus, but the Gospel that they heard was certainly not good news. He would call these people "pseudoevangelised". As examples he talks about black slaves owned by Christian slave owners, victims of sexual abuse, sex-trafficking, etc. conducted by Christian pastors, leaders or families members, and those who were on the trajectory towards faith but their lives were interrupted by an untimely death.
Have identified who he is talking about Beilby begins to discuss, often in great detail, the various views regarding postmortem opportunity - both those in favour and those opposed. He deals with theological arguments both pro and con, Scriptural arguments and historical arguments.
I believe he treats the various arguments in favour and against postmortem opportunity fairly. He makes it clear where there is no clarity in the Scripture for various arguments and perspectives - even when they make his position less tenable.
If you are interested in this topic, and you want to read about it from someone who supports a version of postmortem opportunity, then this is an excellent reference book, and I would strongly encourage you to get it, read it and put it into your library for future reference. The book is well written, detailed, extensively footnoted and written humbly.
Beilby discusses three categories of people who have never heard the Gospel.
1.) The who never hear because of geographical or temporal isolation from anyone who can tell them about Jesus.
2.) Those who at the time of their death lack the cognitive capacity to grasp the gospel message.
3.) Those who have heard the name of Jesus, and have some information about Jesus, but the Gospel that they heard was certainly not good news. He would call these people "pseudoevangelised". As examples he talks about black slaves owned by Christian slave owners, victims of sexual abuse, sex-trafficking, etc. conducted by Christian pastors, leaders or families members, and those who were on the trajectory towards faith but their lives were interrupted by an untimely death.
Have identified who he is talking about Beilby begins to discuss, often in great detail, the various views regarding postmortem opportunity - both those in favour and those opposed. He deals with theological arguments both pro and con, Scriptural arguments and historical arguments.
I believe he treats the various arguments in favour and against postmortem opportunity fairly. He makes it clear where there is no clarity in the Scripture for various arguments and perspectives - even when they make his position less tenable.
If you are interested in this topic, and you want to read about it from someone who supports a version of postmortem opportunity, then this is an excellent reference book, and I would strongly encourage you to get it, read it and put it into your library for future reference. The book is well written, detailed, extensively footnoted and written humbly.
May 8, 2026
Super interesting and mostly well reasoned. Lots of things I’ve never considered before. Ultimately, I think he’s pretty convincing. But it seems like the argument, when taken to logical conclusions, has to result in Universalism. He tries to argue against that in the last two chapters but I think those were the weakest chapters. It read like someone who already assumed universalism was wrong and needed to reason their way to that conclusion. (He was better off not even including the section about “total bliss” in the second to last chapter, that was really weak)
The book isn’t about Universalism and focusing only on that topic would be a book in itself, but I read the first 8 chapters thinking “this has to end in Universalism” only to be left pretty disappointed in why he thinks it doesn’t.
Which makes me wonder if other people, who are more studied in some of the other topics he covers, feel the same about those sections of the book.
The book isn’t about Universalism and focusing only on that topic would be a book in itself, but I read the first 8 chapters thinking “this has to end in Universalism” only to be left pretty disappointed in why he thinks it doesn’t.
Which makes me wonder if other people, who are more studied in some of the other topics he covers, feel the same about those sections of the book.
November 19, 2022
So the best book I have read that looks at whether a person can receive Christ after death. He does not believe in Universalism, but does show why Biblically God will attempt to win people after they have died if they are not Christians.
June 10, 2022
Solid defense. In my opinion, this book cements postmortem opportunity as a legitimate option for an orthodox Christian, though it falls short of showing the doctrine to be sufficiently probable.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews