Charles Williams said, "Our experience on earth makes it difficult for us to apprehend a good without a catch in it somewhere." We all know that nothing is free right? Wether right or wrong, some people feel like God has strings attached to His promises. It could be viewed that the "catch" to eternity is life on earth.
It may be, no... it probably is just me, but... it is harder for me to envision myself in the future, which I really don't comprehend, verses spending my time recalling unfulfilled dreams, and disappointments. I don't have to work at the unfulfilled dreams they just show up. I don't have to muster up dsiappointment. It shows up all on its own and whenever it wants.
For people who are trapped in pain, or in a broken home, or in financial despair, or in agonizing fear - for all those people, for all of us who have been there at one time or another, heaven is the promise of a time , way beyond and more substantial than the time we will spend on this earth. Health, wholeness, pleasure, and peace will all be experienced the way God intended. But there are many who can not or will not accept heaven as the equalizer, and for them.... well as Paul put it... "there is little reason to believe at all."
What we feel now, we will not feel forever. Disappointment is itself a sign, an aching, a hunger for something else, something better. And at this point as much as I wish there was more or another answer, I can only agree with Philip when he says, "Faith is, in the end, the answer to our longings. Faith is the longing to return home, to a home that we have never visited.
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
T.S. Eliot
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Now the dwelling of God is with men, and He will live with them. They will be His people, and God Himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.
Faith forces us to accept what is often referred to as "pie in the sky." This earth, and all it's unanswered questions is simply the road to a final destination. It is not meant for us to get caught up here. We "break down" so to speak and end up feeling stranded in a place we never intended to be other than to just pass through on our way to somewhere more glorious. For me personally Lincoln Nebraska is such a place. Many years ago the motor in our car blew up in Lincoln Nebraska and we were stranded there for what seemed like a life time. We lived in a "pop-up-camper", in the "summer" in what was "called" a camper park. I will never willingly plan a trip that takes me through Lincoln Nebraska. I knew that Lincoln Nebraska would not last forever but it sure felt like it would at the moment. Today I do not remember the specifics of Lincoln Nebraska, only that I do not want to go back and do it again. If thirty years on this earth, removes the specifics of the suffering, pain, and financial stress that we experienced in Lincoln Nebraska, what will eternity do for my recollections of life here on earth?
"PIE IN THE SKY?" I sure hope I can get vanilla ice cream to go with my pie?
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