Heaven has widely been thought of as the place where good people go when they die. I say good people because many religions talk about heaven as the place where good people go, although it has been associated the most with Christianity. I have many thoughts about heaven, but for the sake of time (and people's sanity) I shall discuss my thoughts based off of a recent status update that I had. The status update was: "If we go to heaven when we die, evil wins because we have not delt [sp; dealt] with it, but have run from it. If we stand against it, evil will loose!"
In this regard, heaven has been greatly understood. We have this idea that if we are good and escape this life, that evil will be dealt with because "there is no evil in heaven" but this view is more pagan than Christian. If a person holds this view, it allows that person to not care about what is happening in the here and now, not only to the Earth, the plants and animals, but also to the people that fill the planet.
Does this view actually deal with the problem of evil? To save time the answer is "no". Let us look at it in this way, if you are in a war (I have in mind the movie "Braveheart" and I do not intend this example to be construed as my views on war, because I assure you, I am against war, but that is a topic for another blog), so if you are in a war, you do not "win" that war by hiding and being passive, but rather by standing up and fighting. If you are following my metaphor going to heaven is the hiding, but living in the now, bringing justice to the world, we are defeating evil.
A person once said to me, "Only God can bring justice to the world" and I say that that is not wrong, but is an incomplete idea. Our role from the beginning is to be stewards over creation, working along side the Creator to restore creation, but it is only through the Creators power that we can do that in the first place. If we run from that role, evil wins, however if we fulfill that role, evil is defeated and creation is brought back around to its intended purpose.
"All that is required for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing." -Edmund Burke May you help bring heaven to Earth in the purest form.
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Heaven, the Coward's Way Out
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Christianity,
Earth,
Exegesis,
Heaven,
Hermeneutics,
Human,
Justice,
Religion,
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John 14:1 "Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. 2 In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. 4 And you know the way to where I am going."
-Doug Tharp-
There is a heaven and it is not on this earth and not of this earth. Christ has prepared the place and we will go there.
John 18:36 Jesus answered, "My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world."
Heaven is not a place for the physical to inherit, thus it cannot be the here and now:
1 Corinthians 15:50 I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.
Only those chosen by God, who believe in Him, have any hope of heaven, which Christ himself prepared for us as He has raised us up:
Epesians 2:1 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience- 3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. 4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ- by grace you have been saved- 6 and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus,"
Our struggle is NOT against the "evils" of this world, but darker powers:
Ephesians 6:12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
Heaven is:
Mt 5:11 as a great reward
Rom 8:18 present suffering not worthy to be compared with future glory
2 Cor 4:17,18 eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison
Eph 2:7 surpassing riches of His grace towards us
Eph 3:20 beyond all we could ask for or even think of
That is, if you believe the words of Christ and trust the Scripture as the word of God.
Also, on dealing with evil we are taught:
Resist the devil and he will flee from you... not run away so he can't catch you; We stand not fight or run.
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