The View of Heaven from Earth

Thanks to John for the chance to post on his blog. This has been on my mind lately and I appreciate the chance to write some things down.

Our view of Heaven is an important aspect of our Christian life. As the Gospels of Matthew and Luke both say, "where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." Is Heaven our treasure?

I know until recently I hadn't given Heaven a huge amount of thought. Even now my thoughts go to the standard vision of puffy clouds and people in white robes with halos and harps. The sarcastic jibe "pie in the sky" is not so far from how I tend to think about Heaven.

The clouds-and-harps view may, for all I know, be close to literally accurate. However it's important to reflect on the idea of Heaven. Is it just a really nice place that we like so much we don't want to fight? I believe this had been my idea of Heaven for a long time: a place which has such lovely scenery and such nice music and activities that it will make us happy to reside there forever. War, pain and suffering would not exist there for the same reason that civil strife doesn't erupt on the beach in Hawaii.

However I've come to think of this as a very limited view of Heaven. How often have we ever been truly happen for very long? When has anything really made us happy for longer than a week or so? If a really fantastic resort is the best Heaven can offer, how long could it possibly be before we got bored?

The main impetus of my changed thinking on the subject has been the great 20th century Christian writer, C.S. Lewis. If you're thinking "The Narnia guy?" then you've got the right man. If you weren't aware he wrote a series of brilliant Christian books, you are now, and I recommend a visit to your local book store.

In The Problem of Pain, Lewis describes his view of Heaven like this:

There have been times when I think we do not desire heaven; but more often I find myself wondering whether, in our heart of hearts, we have ever desired anything else. You may have noticed that the books you really love are bound together by a secret thread. You know very well what is the common quality that makes you love them, though you cannot put it into words: but most of your friends do not see it at all, and often wonder why, liking this, you should also like that. Again, you have stood before some landscape, which seems to embody what you have been looking for all your life; and then turned to the friend at your side who appears to be seeing what you saw - but at the first words a gulf yawns between you, and you realize that this landscape means something totally different to him, that he is pursuing an alien vision and cares nothing for the ineffable suggestion by which you are transported. ... Are not all lifelong friendships born at the moment when at last you meet another human being who has some inkling (but faint and uncertain even in the best) of that something which you were born desiring, and which, beneath the flux of other desires and in all the momentary silences between the louder passions, night and day, year by year, from childhood to old age, you are looking for, watching for, listening for? You have never had it. All the things that have ever deeply possessed your soul have been but hints of it - tantalizing glimpses, promises never quite fulfilled, echoes that died away just as they caught your ear. But if it should really become manifest - if there ever came an echo that did not die away but swelled into the sound itself - you would know it. Beyond all possibility of doubt you would say 'Here at last is the thing I was made for.'

I find the idea of a "secret thread" connecting all the things we love to be very profound, and it rings true in me very deeply. I imagine a mosaic, in which every great beauty or love we've ever experienced is simply a tiny tile. We experience only the smallest glimpse of this mosaic at a time, and only in the most powerful of our experiences; yet if we were to see the whole we would know with certainty what it was.

This leads me to wonder, if humans are mere "moist robots" (as the atheist Scott Adams, of Dilbert fame, calls us) what need is there for this mosaic? Where does it come from? Why should we each have differing interests? Wouldn't society be easier to hold together if we all shared the same loves, if we could express ourselves fully and be understood fully? The Christian answer, as I see it, is this: We are each a unique expression of some infinitesimal part of God, unique and valued equally in the eyes of the Creator.

This mosaic, the perfection we yearn for, is not to be found on this Earth. What we desire is the fulfillment of our unique souls, to attain finally and fully the beauty and love we feel for these objects. And where do beauty, goodness, and love come from? They all find their ultimate expression in God, from whence they came. Thus to attain the beauty of the mosaic is for our uniquely shaped souls to be filled to the brim with the God who is the source of beauty.

I believe this answers a possible concern about Heaven -- what place or experience could constitute perfect happiness for everyone? Perhaps being with God uniquely satisfies each soul, in the way that is perfect for each. Lewis, in a different book, compares each soul to a lock which God fits into in a unique way. God represents an infinite set of keys, one for each soul.

I find this to be a truly amazing thought. Imagine the sense of awe you felt at the sight of an amazing vista, or the transcendental feeling you get from certain music -- if these are just glimpses through dirty glass at the source, how awesome must the source be!

Heaven, then, far from being a particularly nice resort, is instead the ultimate expression of the desires of each soul. This brings me to a few final questions that seem to be answered by this view of Heaven.

With the resort image in mind, I wondered why there would be no marriage or family in Heaven. Wouldn't you want to spend time in the perfect place with the people who you care about most? Now, though, I believe that there is no need for marriage or other sorts of special relationships because all the needs and desires which give rise to our most intimate relationships (the need for companionship, or to be special to another person) will find their complete and perfect fulfillment in God Himself.

I've also wondered how there can be people with no strife or pain between them. All acts of evil, however, come from some sort of need or desire -- the desire for money, or safety, or companionship, or even the desire for pleasure itself. If all our needs were truly fulfilled, then we would have nothing to fight about.

I certainly can't say for sure that this view of Heaven is the correct one; God grant me that if I'm wrong that I should find out. Still, I think it helps me to understand the ideas involved. A man lost in a cave who sees the tiniest spot of light is joyful for the light itself and the respite it provides from the darkness; but how much better to see the sun!