what do you think heaven is like?
- Thread starter Ithilien
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I don't think Heaven is a place of rest, but rather of relief. Relief from one's inclinations and talents being mismatched to the world about. A place where one is productive but never overtaxed, challenged but not stressed.
Art Linkletter once succinctly put it that a Heaven of sitting for eternity under an apple tree with a harp would be Hell.
It makes no sense for eternal beings..which is what our souls are..would live for 80 years and then "retire" for eternity. No, rather, I believe that we will enter a fulfilling relationship with God that brings beauty and goodness into being.
John
Art Linkletter once succinctly put it that a Heaven of sitting for eternity under an apple tree with a harp would be Hell.
It makes no sense for eternal beings..which is what our souls are..would live for 80 years and then "retire" for eternity. No, rather, I believe that we will enter a fulfilling relationship with God that brings beauty and goodness into being.
John
NarnianofGryffindor
Active member
The Bible does describe Heaven. In Revelation chapter 21. Heaven is described as a great city on a mountain. There are twelve gates of pearl, at the gates are twelve angels (symbolizing the twelve tribes of Israel). It also says that the walls are made of jasper and the city was gold. Also there were twelve foundations, symbolizing the twelve apostles, the twelve foundations are made of jasper, sapphire, chalcedony, emerald, sardonyx (onyx), sardius (similar to carnelian), chrysolyte (olivine), beryl, topaz, chrysoprasus, jacinth, and amethyst
As for what we do in Heaven, I believe that we will worship God all the time and enjoy it. When you talk about the singing all day and being bored, you're looking at it through the point of view of ignorance. I'm not trying to be mean, I've thought the same thing you have, but think about it. We have never experienced the glory and majesty of a God who spoke the world into existence. A God so perfect that sin cannot enter into His presence. We've never experienced facing someone like that, when we enter into God's presence we will have new, perfect bodies, and we'll be so awed that we will want to sing praises. And remember there is no time in heaven, it's hard to understand but there will no feeling of time passing. Revelation is a marvelous book to study, every time I read it I can't wait to go to Heaven and see God.
NarnianofGryffindor
Active member
I have heard this question many times, and I've wondered about the same thing myself. How could someone be truly happy in Heaven, when they know that someone they know and love will die and burn in Hell for all eternity? Answer: Sorrow is something associated with sin and sin has no place in Heaven. Therefore, I'm sorry to say this but your grandmother can be very happy in Heaven. Regret, sorrow, pain, sadness, sin, those are all tossed out when someone enters Heaven. So now the question isn't of her happiness, it's of yours. Will you be happy when you're not with your grandmother? I'm sorry to be blunt but if you haven't accepted Christ, you will be the one regretting the choice you could've made. If you are saved now, than praise the Lord and be assured that you will be with your Grandmother. As for the other question, the age of accountability is a big debate among Christians. My opinion is that until the child reaches the age where he can understand the Salvation message, and understand what it takes to be a Christian, he will go to Heaven. What is the age? It depends on the child. For example, I was saved at the age of 4, I knew a kid who was saved at the age of 3 (and fully understood what he did), but I also knew a kid who didn't really understand the Salvation message until he was 7. So it depends on the child.
God is the very ruler and master of Heaven, and if he can feel sadness, sympathy and wrath, why not us? We are made in his image, and I treasure my ability to be like him in feeling sorrow at loss, anger against injustice. If I could not, part of the image of God would have been stolen from me, a part I treasure, a part that teaches me the value of relationships and justice. I would feel mind-controlled, enslaved to a happiness I could not control, which would make the happiness meaningless. Unless you could feel sad if you wanted to, endless happiness is a mild form of insanity.
When Jesus saw Lazarus body in the tomb, he wept. When he saw the moneychangers in the temple, he angrily whipped them, telling them they had made their father's house into a den of thieves. I pray...I beg...Jesus that I might never become blind to the need for sympathy or righteous indignation. I want to stand next to Jesus and weep for Lazarus. I want to drive the moneychangers from the temple. I love the justice of God, and the mercy of God. I love the compassion of God, the tenderness of him. To experience those fully, I must be intact.
In my viewpoint a person who couldn't regret their own grandchild's loss to death and hell would have been too shallow, too callous to belong in the Kingdom of God. I'm not accusing you or anyone else of this, especially not your Grandmother who I'm sure is in bliss with God. I'm only saying that the understanding you expressed is incompatible with people having learned anything from their experiences on earth...lessons about compassion, sympathy, comfort, caring, and sacrifice. And I feel those lessons are essential to being a full man or woman. One way or another you'll find out when you're there. Personally I hope to be intact, not some Stepford Husband on Prozac. I want the right to feel sad when someone is hurt or loses their way. I want the right to be angry at sin and injustice.
Heaven is where you could feel sad or angry if you had a good reason, but good reasons are hard to come by.
When Jesus saw Lazarus body in the tomb, he wept. When he saw the moneychangers in the temple, he angrily whipped them, telling them they had made their father's house into a den of thieves. I pray...I beg...Jesus that I might never become blind to the need for sympathy or righteous indignation. I want to stand next to Jesus and weep for Lazarus. I want to drive the moneychangers from the temple. I love the justice of God, and the mercy of God. I love the compassion of God, the tenderness of him. To experience those fully, I must be intact.
In my viewpoint a person who couldn't regret their own grandchild's loss to death and hell would have been too shallow, too callous to belong in the Kingdom of God. I'm not accusing you or anyone else of this, especially not your Grandmother who I'm sure is in bliss with God. I'm only saying that the understanding you expressed is incompatible with people having learned anything from their experiences on earth...lessons about compassion, sympathy, comfort, caring, and sacrifice. And I feel those lessons are essential to being a full man or woman. One way or another you'll find out when you're there. Personally I hope to be intact, not some Stepford Husband on Prozac. I want the right to feel sad when someone is hurt or loses their way. I want the right to be angry at sin and injustice.
Heaven is where you could feel sad or angry if you had a good reason, but good reasons are hard to come by.
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NarnianofGryffindor
Active member
What you said is right. On earth we feel sad, angry, hurt. All those things, but in heaven there is no room for that. In Revelation 21, it said that God will wipe away the tears from our eyes. In Heaven we will be with God and we won't need to feel sad or regret the things we could've done. That's why now we need to witness to our loved ones who aren't saved. Because once they're in Hell, that's it they're there. Why do we have to feel regret when they have already "passed the point of no return". My grandmother died a year before I was born. She wasn't saved, in fact my Dad had just left her house after talking to her, she was sitting in her favorite chair. She was sat there for a while after my Dad left, then she stood up and she died. As far as we know she didn't accept Christ as her Savior. When I go to Heaven and she's not there, I will feel nothing for her. It doesn't sound right but it's true, I will basically forget her. And why should I? I will be in the presence of the Almighty God. God gave my Grandmother many chances to accept Him. It sounds cold, but it's true. In Heaven I, my Dad, and my Mom will have eternal happiness. But on Earth, we still feel sad for the fact that she is not with God. So it makes us want to witness even more. It makes us witness more to our other relatives, so that they don't have the same fate as my Grandmother. Heaven is the place where we can be with God and have eternal happiness, Earth is the place where we have the chance to witness to those who aren't saved.
anna.the.gentle
New member
For me, Heaven is the end of our journey on Earth. It's what you'd call "paradise".
C.S. Lewis based Aslan's Country on Heaven becuase:
1.) In The Silver Chair, when Caspian asked Aslan for five minutes on Earth, Aslan said "You cannot do anything wrong anymore now that you have died, my son." This means that obviously, if you are in Heaven, you cannot want to do anything wrong anymore, because you're in Heaven. Would you do go to Heaven if you loved to do wrong things?
2.) In The Last Battle, Lucy (I think it was Lucy, or Digory.. I'm not sure. It's one of them, for sure.) described the land they entered was "majestic; the mountains were higher, the grass was greener, the skies were bluer.." And for me, maybe that's what Heaven is. It's like our world, but more different and better.
C.S. Lewis based Aslan's Country on Heaven becuase:
1.) In The Silver Chair, when Caspian asked Aslan for five minutes on Earth, Aslan said "You cannot do anything wrong anymore now that you have died, my son." This means that obviously, if you are in Heaven, you cannot want to do anything wrong anymore, because you're in Heaven. Would you do go to Heaven if you loved to do wrong things?
2.) In The Last Battle, Lucy (I think it was Lucy, or Digory.. I'm not sure. It's one of them, for sure.) described the land they entered was "majestic; the mountains were higher, the grass was greener, the skies were bluer.." And for me, maybe that's what Heaven is. It's like our world, but more different and better.
Paradise. Certainly. Of course.
Loved, seated at a table with all one's favorite foods, perfect weather, absolute joy, and a big red button that says "End it all forever!" on it. Nobody would be so stupid as to want to hit the button, but it would not be impossible to do so. Satan did. We must never forget that. Adam and Eve had the bliss of the garden...they muffed it too.
You're right...we won't WANT to. But we are also faced with the thought that someone did want to...for his own reasons.
Obedience and faithfulness will always be virtues. If we were suddenly deprived of free will, they wouldn't be virtues any more than gravity and Newton's three laws of motions are virtues. We don't praise a dropped hammer for faithfully falling to the Earth. It had no choice in the matter. There can be no righteousness where there is no free will. Is a racketball righteous because it faithfully bounces off the wall as it ought? When our acts become as automatic and determined as this, they are no longer righteousness. My two cents.
Loved, seated at a table with all one's favorite foods, perfect weather, absolute joy, and a big red button that says "End it all forever!" on it. Nobody would be so stupid as to want to hit the button, but it would not be impossible to do so. Satan did. We must never forget that. Adam and Eve had the bliss of the garden...they muffed it too.
You're right...we won't WANT to. But we are also faced with the thought that someone did want to...for his own reasons.
Obedience and faithfulness will always be virtues. If we were suddenly deprived of free will, they wouldn't be virtues any more than gravity and Newton's three laws of motions are virtues. We don't praise a dropped hammer for faithfully falling to the Earth. It had no choice in the matter. There can be no righteousness where there is no free will. Is a racketball righteous because it faithfully bounces off the wall as it ought? When our acts become as automatic and determined as this, they are no longer righteousness. My two cents.
Lioness_Aslan
Active member
At school they always tell us that Heaven isn't a place were we find many food and lots of nice things,it's more a 'state' of being. Don't know how to actually explain it...but I've always imagined heaven as full of light and people smiling...Happiness... 
I don't think of Heaven as Disneyland either...or as Church. I think of it as a state of being. My literalisms in my previous post were exaggerated for effect.
NarnianofGryffindor
Active member
How can Heaven be a state of being when the Bible describes it as a literall place?
It is both a place and a state just as Christ became all God and all Man.
As a place, Christ has gone to prepare a place for you.
As a state, the full experience is not something you could inadvertantly stumble upon like explorers finding ancient ruins.
If marriage was merely a place, then you, some woman, a house, a picket fence and maybe a friendly collie could all be put in one place and that would be your married life. All the spatial elements would be there. But would you kiss this person? Would you let her see you without your shirt on?
Heaven is like that. It is both a relational state and a place where things can occur.
As a place, Christ has gone to prepare a place for you.
As a state, the full experience is not something you could inadvertantly stumble upon like explorers finding ancient ruins.
If marriage was merely a place, then you, some woman, a house, a picket fence and maybe a friendly collie could all be put in one place and that would be your married life. All the spatial elements would be there. But would you kiss this person? Would you let her see you without your shirt on?
Heaven is like that. It is both a relational state and a place where things can occur.
Gwendolyn
New member
How can we say who will go to heaven or who will go to hell? It is not my place to judge. I don't think we are in the right to point the finger and say "You will go to hell." God is so much greater and wiser and He is the only one who can take life away, give life back and deterimine what will happen. His plan is so much greater than ours and I am learning that slowly. There are people who say there are Christian, who get baptized, who go to church, read the bible and follow all the "rules". But their heart is hollow. They have lost the joy and the vivid life that God brings. Like Shift and Ginger the Cat. But then there are those who have not be baptized, who know "nothing" of God, but who have already settled a place in Heaven. Like Emeth, who was a child of Aslan but didn't know it. I am in no place to say who will go to heaven and who will go to hell, for I know not what lies in their hearts truly. Only God knows, and I will let him do what he does best. Be God.
I agree with the Magister, that to juxtapose heaven being a "state" against heaven being a "place" is to misunderstand the language the Scripture uses. Heaven is a "place" in the sense that it is an objective place external to all of us (as opposed to an "internal" place, like the scene of a dream), but that does not mean that it is a "place" in this space-time matrix, as Times Square is.
What kind of room does an angel hang out in? Answer that, and you'll probably be moving toward an understanding of what kind of "place" heaven might be. Our minds, which are bound to three-dimensional space and linear time, cannot imagine anything outside that framework - yet heaven will be outside both, as we understand them. That's why it can only be spoken of in metaphorical and symbolic language.
But neither is it inappropriate to speak of heaven as a state, for that is part of it, too. Let me try by using an analogy: I have lived in my present house for 22 years. I have been married for 26 years. I can speak of living in this "home" for 22 years, but there would be more to it than just this wooden frame. A home is a mix of place and relationships. Were we to move to a different house, there's be a sense of continuity because my family would still be intact but the place would differ. One of us might speak of missing our old home, and nobody would think it strange, because there would be an aspect of newness to our new abode even if the people were the same.
I think heaven can be thought of something like that. It's an objective place, beyond question, but it's also a state - a state of unity with the Blessed Trinity, being adopted into the Divine Life (while still remaining, by nature, human.)
With respect to the question of whether someone can be truly happy in heaven if even one of their loved ones wasn't there: first off, Gwendolyn, I think you're misunderstanding narniafan2007's point. He wasn't saying anyone in particular was guaranteed not to be in heaven, he was simply saying that the possibility of someone not being there is a real.
As to the question itself: Lewis addressed this quite well in The Great Divorce, particularly the example of Sarah Smith of Golder's Green. She tried to persuade her emotionally abusive husband to give up his self-absorption and join her in bliss, but he chose to cling to his posturing. In the end she rejected his emotional blackmail by saying, "I am in love; I will not go out of it." She (and all heaven) grieved that he would not accept her invitation to eternal happiness, but she was so totally enraptured by love that grief could cast no shadow on her joy.
That's a state we can't understand in this life because for we can still lack things - in fact, lacking something is usually the cause of our suffering. In heaven we will have God, the source of all good, so we will truly have all good things. We will lack nothing - all other goods will simply be "icing on the cake", so to speak. If you were the only person in heaven, you would be content and in bliss, because you would have God Himself. Of course, having your family and loved ones there would only add to your joy, but their absence would not detract from your contentment.
What kind of room does an angel hang out in? Answer that, and you'll probably be moving toward an understanding of what kind of "place" heaven might be. Our minds, which are bound to three-dimensional space and linear time, cannot imagine anything outside that framework - yet heaven will be outside both, as we understand them. That's why it can only be spoken of in metaphorical and symbolic language.
But neither is it inappropriate to speak of heaven as a state, for that is part of it, too. Let me try by using an analogy: I have lived in my present house for 22 years. I have been married for 26 years. I can speak of living in this "home" for 22 years, but there would be more to it than just this wooden frame. A home is a mix of place and relationships. Were we to move to a different house, there's be a sense of continuity because my family would still be intact but the place would differ. One of us might speak of missing our old home, and nobody would think it strange, because there would be an aspect of newness to our new abode even if the people were the same.
I think heaven can be thought of something like that. It's an objective place, beyond question, but it's also a state - a state of unity with the Blessed Trinity, being adopted into the Divine Life (while still remaining, by nature, human.)
With respect to the question of whether someone can be truly happy in heaven if even one of their loved ones wasn't there: first off, Gwendolyn, I think you're misunderstanding narniafan2007's point. He wasn't saying anyone in particular was guaranteed not to be in heaven, he was simply saying that the possibility of someone not being there is a real.
As to the question itself: Lewis addressed this quite well in The Great Divorce, particularly the example of Sarah Smith of Golder's Green. She tried to persuade her emotionally abusive husband to give up his self-absorption and join her in bliss, but he chose to cling to his posturing. In the end she rejected his emotional blackmail by saying, "I am in love; I will not go out of it." She (and all heaven) grieved that he would not accept her invitation to eternal happiness, but she was so totally enraptured by love that grief could cast no shadow on her joy.
That's a state we can't understand in this life because for we can still lack things - in fact, lacking something is usually the cause of our suffering. In heaven we will have God, the source of all good, so we will truly have all good things. We will lack nothing - all other goods will simply be "icing on the cake", so to speak. If you were the only person in heaven, you would be content and in bliss, because you would have God Himself. Of course, having your family and loved ones there would only add to your joy, but their absence would not detract from your contentment.
NarnianofGryffindor
Active member
What I meant by that statement is that while the person's grandmother is truly happy in Heaven, it is now a question of this person's happiness. I am assuming that he is not saved because he said
So if he is not saved the question is not of his Grandmother's happiness but of his happiness. Will he be truly happy knowing that he will not spend eternity with her. Knowing that the question was posted a few months ago I thought of the possibility that he may have gotten saved so I said
I believe people in Heaven are capable of feeling grief that their loved ones did not make it. However I also believe that God will help them put it into perspective and get past it, the same way people in this world grieve over the loss of a loved one, but then put things together and go on.
What I see happening is as simple as it is effective. The grandmother that loses a beloved granddaughter basically adopts a girl that lost a beloved grandmother. God finds someone appropriate to fill that hole in your life.
What I see happening is as simple as it is effective. The grandmother that loses a beloved granddaughter basically adopts a girl that lost a beloved grandmother. God finds someone appropriate to fill that hole in your life.
NarnianofGryffindor
Active member
How can that be? Grief is a result of sin and sin has no place in the presence of God. In Revelation 21:4 it says: And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.(KJV) This clearly says that once in Heaven all sadness, sorrow, and grief will be gone. We'll be in God's presence, and be truly happy.
