One of my all-time favorite shows is The Good Place. It’s clever, funny, and surprisingly profound for a comedy series. I loved watching the characters wrestle with questions about morality, justice, and what it means to be a good person.
Some friends recently did a podcast episode about the show, and it got me reminiscing about it again.
Point Systems, Grace, and Imputed Righteousness
One of the show’s central ideas is that the afterlife is determined by a cosmic point system. Every good deed adds points, every bad deed subtracts them, and the total decides your eternal fate. It’s a concept that many people subconsciously hold to when they imagine heaven.
But as the characters discover, it’s also terrifying. Nobody actually makes it into the Good Place—not even heroic people like Gandhi. Eleanor Shellstrop, a selfish, moderately terrible human being, is only a few points away from people who outwardly seem much more virtuous. And poor, indecisive philosopher Chidi loses points just for stressing everyone out with his inability to choose a muffin flavor.
The more the characters analyze it, the more hopeless the system becomes. Even buying your friend a tomato can cost you points if that tomato was grown with pesticides, shipped across the world, and harmed the environment. In other words—good luck.
In its own way, The Good Place illustrates what the Bible has said all along:
“None is righteous, no, not one” (Romans 3:10).
If eternity depended on a point system, none of us would stand a chance. As The Good Place demonstrates, we wouldn’t even have a chance if we were merely compared against other people. But our situation is actually far worse than that: we stand before a holy God who is perfectly righteous and just. If we fall short of His perfect standard, no amount of good works can make up for it.
That’s why Christianity offers something so much better: not salvation by points, but salvation by grace.
“For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8).
Something Better Than Eternal Progression
The show eventually tries to fix the problem. The characters persuade Judge Gen—the God-like arbiter of the afterlife—that the system is broken. Their solution is essentially rehabilitation: give people infinite time and chances, and eventually they’ll improve enough to “deserve” the Good Place. It’s a good story development, but it leaves the deeper problem unsolved.
If every action carries unintentional ripple effects that rack up negative points, does it really matter how much better you become? Even your most selfless acts can still generate hidden harm. You might be more patient, kind, or self-aware—but you’re still stuck in a broken system where even a tomato can damn you. And you will never measure up to God’s perfect standard of holiness.
Christianity again offers something far better. It doesn’t just give us more time to improve; it gives us a Savior who wipes the slate clean. Jesus doesn’t say, “Try again until you get it right.” He says, “It is finished” (John 19:30). Our record of sin is nailed to the cross (Colossians 2:14).
Even more amazingly, His perfect righteousness is credited to us. When we are judged, God will not see our record full of sin but the perfect record of Jesus Christ—who only ever earned merit points and never lost a single one. For Good Place fans, it’s like Eleanor being given the record of the “other Eleanor”—only it’s not a mistake or a set up, but a merciful act of sacrificial love.
Heaven isn’t about finally earning enough points, but about being united to the One who has already earned it for us. It’s not about finally becoming good enough and learning how to enter heaven, but about learning to love the One who came down from heaven to save us. Our only way in is to be united with Him and rely on His strength, not our own. And as we do so, our nature is gradually transformed by His wondrous grace—not through endless iteration and effort.
Eternity Without an Eternal God
The show also raises another issue—the problem of eternity itself. Without spoiling too much, even the “Good Place” turns out to have its own problem. Even in paradise, people eventually get bored. Pleasure runs its course, relationships lose their freshness, and even the most exciting activities grow stale.
For instance, Jason Mendoza, the eternal Jacksonville Jaguars fan, even plays a perfect game of Madden NFL—and once you’ve done that, what’s left? Meanwhile, Tahani spends centuries meeting every celebrity imaginable and name-dropping them into conversations. But eventually, even that grows boring.
It’s poignant and funny, but it points to something deeper: if eternity is only about human relationships, human pleasures, or human projects, it will never truly satisfy.
The Christian vision of eternity is radically different. Heaven isn’t just “the best possible life forever.” It is life in the presence of the eternal and transcendent God. Psalm 16:11 puts it this way:
“You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.”
That’s why eternity in God’s presence will never grow dull. His beauty, glory, and love are inexhaustible. The depths of who He is will never run dry.
Ultimately, the true Good Place is only truly good because God Himself is there. The new heavens and new earth will be full of joy, beauty, and redeemed relationships—but what makes them paradise is the presence of the eternal, inexhaustible God. Anything less, no matter how clever or comforting, will eventually fade. But with Him, joy never ends.