How do you know you'll still be you when you get to heaven?

[Chad32]

I've heard that you can't have free will without sin. That's why sin exists. Except that implies there is no free will in heaven. You can't have it both ways. If free will exists in heaven, and there's no sin, then eradicating sin on earth shouldn't effect free will.

Removing "sins", i.e. the parts of you that god doesn't like, sounds a lot like reprogramming you. Heaven doesn't sound all that pleasant once you get past the mansions and streets of gold. You get everything you want. As long as it's ok with god. Which unfortunately excludes a lot of things humans like to do.

I can't quite recall from whom I heard this idea, I think Matt Dillahunty, but I find it a great thought experiment. It goes something like:

"It could be that nobody we know goes to heaven. According to a huge portion of Christians, I (an atheist) am going to end up in Hell or be destroyed after I die. My mom, being a devout Christian, ends up in heaven. She knows that I'm being tortured forever or at least that she'll never get to see me again and that I can't enjoy the best possible existence God has to offer. Being a loving mother, she'll suffer and be hurt because she knows her son is enduring horrible agony. However, suffering is supposedly not possible in heaven, as it's supposed to be perfect. That means that wherever my mom is after she's dead, it isn't heaven since she's allowed to suffer, or if she is totally happy with the fact I'm being tortured, it's not my mom, and is instead some facsimile of her with parts of her personality removed."

That's a good way to put it too. I'm afraid that if I am myself in heaven, I won't enjoy it, and if I do totally enjoy it for all eternity, I'm not really me anymore.