Suppose you are a devout Christian, and you die, and you go to heaven, and it's not what was advertised? It's more like hell. What would you think of your prior beliefs?

I’d be wanting to be turned into a pillar of salt so I could stop being in or even knowing about this stupid universe created by a tormenting ass-butt. Give me sweet oblivion.

One adapts or gives up.

Heaven is a hell of a place to live in heh…

The way you put it, it would look like I was good to get to Heaven, rather than for the sake of being good. If someone was truly religious, s/he wouldn’t think of a supposedly deserved eternal award for his soul. It’s actually a form of pride, which is a sin.

If I lived my life thinking “Ooh, I’m such a good person and such a devout Christian, can’t wait to be awarded for being so great and obedient. I’ll laugh my ass off when I look from above at all those sinners”, then Heaven isn’t a place for me. It’s for people who were good for the sake of being good, not for the ones who were good just to get an award.

Imagine yourself and your fight with God because you got to the place you “weren’t promised”. He’ll probably be like “Kiss my divine, abstract, cosmical ass. This is what you deserve for being an asslicker and trying to get to Heaven via shortcut. You don’t like what you were promised? Who promised you this? I said Heaven was for good people. Were you a good person? Not according to my report here. Did you expect prayers before the meal and reading Bible every day will get you to Heaven? Bitch, please, Heaven is for those who deserve it, not for those who think they do.”

I’d get what I’d deserve anyways, since God does not make mistakes and is the ultimate judge with divine mind and righteousness. If I really was religious while alive, I shouldn’t complain. I’d probably say “Well, if this is how God wanted me to end up, then I have no complaints. He knows better than me what sins I’ve done to get here and what I deserve”.

I can only imagine that I won’t be the first person to arrive in that place. Other previous souls must have somehow built some sort of civilization throughout the time, regardless of how harsh the environment. Your scenario might also proves that other living things beside human (i.e. plants and animals) could have ended up in the same place as human, so life goes on even in the after life. Would there be death and life after the-after-life? Now that would debatable hypothesis. People don’t need heaven or God in the first place, they can be happy and thrive on their own if left on their own devices.

Well, seedy motels have their own sort of charm… where dem hookers at?

I can’t really answer this as I have never been a devout anything but I “pray” there is no after life, I have always thought that “heaven” was already a nightmare, with the notion that we will be reunited with dead people from our past. Noooo!
There is nobody I ever want to see again in some netherworld for all of eternity. Talk about the stuff of nightmares.

Please send me to pet heaven where I can be reunited with my past pets not my ex-husband and bitchy dead relatives. lol

Will the circle be unbroken? Hell, no.

If I end up in a Christian version of heaven, which I heartily hope not to do, I doubt that much thinking will be going on there.

There does seem to be an expectation, though, that “we’ll understand it all by and by”—it’ll all make sense and we won’t have any more questions. (A pity. I believe questions are a life force. Questions, not answers.)

If there’s any sort of awareness to be had in continued existence, I think I’d rather have it as good, honest dirt.

With a few sharp rocks.

I’m not sure just what is being advertised. Pavements of gold? They don’t appeal to me now and won’t when I am dead.

As I said, as a Christian, I think Heaven means to be with God. It isn’t harps and clouds.
I really don’t know what to expect, but God isn’t known for being an underachiever.