Live Now Live Later

Imagine for a moment that you desire to take a vacation from work. In the past you’ve either stayed at home or gone to places relatively close to home, but let’s say this time you desire to go some where far away from home. Somewhere that you’ve never been. So you decide to contact a local travel agent named Ruth. You tell Ruth your desire to go to a different country from yours. The most popular destination in the world that people are wanting to go these days. Hearing your request, Ruth gets REALLY REALLY excited and mentions a place on the other side of the planet that you’ve never heard of. She tells you MANY people call her everyday wanting to go. She tells you that the King of this country is AMAZING and she begins to tell you a lot of information about the King and how prior to Him becoming King no one was allowed to enter, but now anyone is allowed to enter if they are willing to pay the cost. Ruth says the cost to enter is very high and when most people find out how much, they eventually change their minds. Ruth says if you decide to go and are willing to pay the price, it will be the best investment you’ll ever make!

Now by this time you have mixed feelings. On one hand you’re SUPER EXCITED because a lot of people want to go and meeting the King sounds very intriguing, but on the other hand Ruth has told you about this really high cost and you still have NO CLUE what you’re going to do when you get there. So you ask Ruth to give you details of this country and the people who have gone what do they do when they get there? Ruth pauses for a moment…..Ruth says she doesn’t know hardly any details other than she’s heard it’s a beautiful place and that there’s no crime, everyone is happy all the time and you get to spend time a lot of time with the King.

Now even though all this sounds nice “on the surface”, you still don’t really know anything about what you’re going to be doing or any real details of this “beautiful place”. There are a lot of other beautiful places that the cost to enter would be FAR less than trying to go to this country. Why should you invest SO MUCH in going to a place you know SO LITTLE or NOTHING about?

So is the case for many when it comes to the subject of Heaven. I’ve had the opportunity to share the gospel with many people in the last 11 years. Most people during that time frame professed that they were christians and on their way to heaven. Pretty much the norm living in the southern part of the United States in what is known as the “bible belt”, but in the last 4 years I personally started thinking about “the destination” and not just ONLY about the one who I am “destined to be with”. Now don’t think for a second that I am not longing to be with Christ for eternity. Matter fact there are days that I ponder while not even reading my bible about just beholding his presence for the first time face to face. Being in awe of the Holiness and Beauty of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. I believe this should be our ULTIMATE focus as christians, but I don’t believe it should be our ONLY focus.

Now some reading that last statement would say that is blasphemous and in response like we see with the Pharisees throughout the gospels are probably ready to stone me. Before you do, the reason I say that is because then why does Jesus mention other things for me to think about throughout the scriptures?

For instance,  just a few hours before Judas would come to betray him, Jesus has his final talk with his disciples and says this

“There are many rooms in my Father’s house; I would not tell you this if it were not true. I am going there to prepare a place for you. After I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me so that you may be where I am. You know the way to the place where I am going” (John 14:2-4).

 

Now you’re probably thinking that I’m about to discuss some of the words and phrases that I made in bold, but actually I’m going to come back to that later. I want to give you the reason for this particular topic that I’ve studied in the last few years and decided to write on.

Like I mentioned earlier in the last 4 years I started thinking about “the place” called Heaven Jesus referred to in the passage above. I remember thinking:

“If I’m going to be there with Jesus for ETERNITY, what are we going to be doing there? The people who have already died and gone to Heaven, what are they currently doing now?

I mean the average human life expectancy is around 75 years of age with the advancement of modern medicine, but let’s just say everyone lived to be 100. Even if we all lived to be 100, what is that in comparison to billions and billions of years times billions and billions of years times billions of billions of years and so on and so on (MY fingers were starting to get tired). I think you get the point.

So I started asking other Christians who had been in the faith longer than I, who I expected to quickly fill me in with plenty of information about Heaven. I started asking my close family members who are all christians, some friends, a few church members, and then just randomly when sharing the gospel. I started noticing a trend…

95% of the time I would get a brief 5 to 10 second pause

I double dog dare you to try it some time. I remember getting the sense It was kind of like the “forbidden topic” you weren’t supposed to ask questions about. Next, I kid you not the answer would be something like “well we will be with Jesus”. Then something like “There will be no more pain or death or suffering” and then that would pretty much be it. Sometimes I would just get straight honest answers like

“I don’t know. Just enjoy this life while you can”.

Kind of leaving me like “That’s it?” Now don’t get me wrong, not experiencing pain and suffering is very significant, but my family went to church every time the doors were open just like most of my close christian friends which was at least like twice a week every week for 52 weeks a year averaging 2 hours a service which at bare minimum was 104 times totaling 208 hours a year (That’s some serious math :). You would think with that much attendance not to forget personal bible study we would know more than 30 seconds worth of information on Heaven!

Another trend I would notice is that when sharing the gospel and I would come across either an Atheist or someone who doesn’t believe in Heaven. I would get ridiculed of course for believing in such a “crazy thing”, but come to find out they would throw out the same comments that my christian family and friends would throughout about things like “no suffering and pain” sarcastically but still. How is it someone who doesn’t believe in Heaven and has no desire to go, knows the same if not MORE than those who claim to be on there way? It makes no sense.

I remember growing up in church all my life NEVER hearing about the place we all desired to go called Heaven. Don’t get me wrong, I remember hearing a TON of sermons on what we needed to do to make sure we get there.  I also remember hearing a TON of sermons on how we need to conduct our lives while living on earth, but NOTHING about the place itself.

I also remember hearing in a TON of sermons about the alternative place we would go if we didn’t become christians. The other “forbidden topic” that surprisingly gets brought up a lot called Hell. Now if you ask the average christian about Hell, although they might not get into EXTENSIVE details, they can tell you a lot more about that place with ease. Using words like FIRE, BRIMSTONE, TORMENT, DARKNESS, DEMONS, and etc.

How is it, including myself for a long time, we know more about the place we AREN’T going versus the place we ARE going?

Is the bible that vague of information about our future home of eternity?

Does Jesus expect his followers to be virtually CLUELESS when it comes to the place where he currently resides?

I’ll answer these questions and more on our next episode of…..THE TWILIGHT ZONE!

That was a joke. Like I tell my wife sometimes, you were supposed to laugh at that moment. Ha Ha Ha. A little “christian humor” ??? OK. Moving along

Seriously, in Part 2 I want to start listing scriptural details about Heaven. Key word there was SCRIPTURE, not Gavilan’s opinions. Contrary to popular belief, the bible does say a lot about heaven and what we can expect when we get there.

In Closing, I leave you with these words from C.S. Lewis,

“If you read history you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were just those who thought most of the next… It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this. Aim at Heaven and you will get earth ‘thrown in’: aim at earth and you will get neither”