Heavenly Reflections

When was the last time you heard a sermon on heaven? How often are you prompted to ponder the glories that await you when God calls you home? If the Bible speaks often of heaven, why don’t we?

Throughout Christian church history until modern times, God’s people largely cherished the promises and glories of heaven much more so than most of us reading this blog. I contend this has to do with the relative ease of life we have. Beginning with the New Testament-era church, Christians were shunned and persecuted, eventually leading to many being martyred for their faith in Christ. For the next two hundred years of church history until AD 313 when Roman emperor Constantine issued the Edict of Milan, Christians suffered persecution by emperors Trajan, Marcus Aurelius, Maximus, Decius, Valerian, Aurelian and Diocletian. From the fourth century to the present time, untold numbers of Christians have continued to live under adverse conditions that include oppressive governments, imprisonment, hunger, famine, lack of clothing, sickness, disease, plagues and poverty as their normal way of life. It’s not hard to fathom that a lack of earthly comforts necessarily magnifies people’s anticipation of heaven. Apart from relatively brief experiences of tragedies and trials, the opposite can be said of most of us.

In countries with unprecedented historical wealth, such as ours, the influence of modern western society has greatly reduced the church’s focus on the eternal rewards awaiting God’s people. Our daily lives are inundated with material comforts of every kind. Even most of America’s poor have shelter, clean water, food, clothing, access to education and even TVs! Our eyes and ears are constantly assaulted with marketing campaigns via TV, newspapers, magazines, billboards, mailers, radio and the internet. Most marketing messages present the same basic plea, “you need _____ to make your life better.”

It may seem less compelling to contemplate the glories of heaven when so many of us are comfortably pursuing and enjoying the lesser glories of earth. When there’s no discernable statistical difference between the debt levels of professing Christians and non-Christians, there appears to be an alarming Biblical disconnect from Matthew 6:19-20 which tells us to ‘lay up’ treasures in heaven and not earth. Others of us have so mastered the Dave Ramsey Plan that we don’t seek the Lord’s wisdom or guidance concerning our wealth. Through means of debt or abundance, money can become a functional savior from pain and need, replacing our reliance on God and thankfulness to him. We lose sight of the truth that everything we have is from Him, it is all His, and should be used for His glory.

Although many of us find ourselves in this situation, there is very good news! We don’t necessarily need poor health, poverty or persecution in order to fix our eyes and hearts of heaven because the greatest reward of heaven doesn’t lie in the restoration and perfection of our bodies, the absence of sin and sickness, or the delights of mansions and magnificent God-made wonders. The great reward is what some have termed the ‘beatific vision,’ when we see our risen Lord and Savior Jesus, exalted and ruling! Even though we don’t really know what this experience will be like since the Father and Holy Spirit don’t have a physical bodies, the Bible says we will also see God (Matt 5:8, 1 Cor 13:12, 1 John 3:2, Rev 22:3-4)! Regardless of the circumstances God has given us during this earthly life, there can be no greater desire, hope or joy than this!

So, let us encourage each other with this truth as we look fix our spiritual eyes on the unfathomable joy that waits us. May our pulpits abound with heavenly utterances because the following statement is true: Preaching the glories of heaven makes straight the path that leads to its gates.