Secret admirers are nice, I suppose. I don't know for sure, of course, because if I ever had one the secret was carefully kept. But just yesterday a colleague of my wife's (unknown to me until that moment as a reader of my scratchings) told me to get on with it and finish my wonderings about heaven. "Quit leaving me in suspense," she actually said.
Well, having not quite reached Christopher Hitchens' stature, I'll take whatever adulation that I can muster, along with a much longer life than poor Hitchens was given I hope. So here you go, dear friend--what I deduce about heaven from watching my sainted mother-in-law of four score and fourteen years.
Mom still has most of the marbles she ever had, I would say. They may move somewhat more slowly in the bag, but I don't think many have escaped. She doesn't suffer from senility. She still does some cooking for herself. She reads the local paper to keep up with the goings on in our city in the country. Some tasks, especially mending and helping with food preparation for family events, are still well within her capabilities.
But like most people who reach a certain age, she suffers from short-term memory loss. I'm 30 years younger than Mom is. I was once the proud possessor of the acute Sutherland memory, as was my father before me. But I watched the erosion of Dad's ability to hang onto the remnants of events, and I know that even now my memory is not what it once was. It comes to us all.
Therefore, I find that while Mom can still remember where she was on her fourteenth birthday, she can't always recall what she did yesterday. It sometimes makes me wonder whether it matters that we do something with her, or for her, if soon the pleasure it brought her will slip through her grasp. We still involve her in various events as often as possible, nonetheless, hoping that it keeps her spirits up even if the details are sometimes long gone.
And that brings me to the issue of continuity. Suppose we were to arrive at those Pearly Gates with only very early memories of what we did for our allotted time on earth, with the rest being a blank like my mother-in-law. Or what if heaven were like birth; i.e., we arrive like newborns with no memory of the nine months in the womb (or ninety-four years on earth) as background and context for what happens next. Surely that would make a mockery of all the striving we did on behalf of the Kingdom of God while we were here. Self-denial, putting the kingdom first, etc., etc.--what's the point if it all becomes so completely immaterial that we aren't even permitted the memories of it all? What if we resemble dear old Mom in having no picture of what has gone on before to sustain us or to learn from. What if we didn't even remember who our loved ones were, particularly our parents, siblings, spouse, children, friends? This would be called senility here on earth. Are we to take on celestial Alzheimer's in the eternal state?
There is very little hard biblical evidence to support this speculation. But what there is supports my theory, I think, that we go into the afterlife (better, the next part of life) with memories intact. Consider:
1. Depictions of the followers of God in the heavenly city typically include much praising of God as the Redeemer, and Jesus as the one slain for sin, and such like. None of this would make any sense if one had no idea what one was redeemed from, or what sin is, particularly my own.
2. While one has to be very careful with apocalyptic language, Revelation chap. 6 refers to the souls of martyrs who were asking how long they had to wait to see vindication for their earthly treatment.
3. There are references to the dead standing before a large set of ledgers, which are opened to see if one's name is written there, and so on. Again this is colourful language used for effect, but it still suggests that there is some self-awareness on our part, at least to the extent that we know who we are and the significance of one's name appearing.
4. Heaven is referred to in the Old Testament as Jacob's rest. "Rest from what?", one must ask. Presumably part of the enjoyment of rest is to remember the opposite.
5. St. Paul refers to our actual activity on earth and whether it stands up to certain tests of its usefulness in Kingdom building (1 Corinthians 3:11-13 "For no one can lay any foundation other than the one we already have--Jesus Christ. Anyone who builds on that foundation may use a variety of materials--gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw. But on the judgment day, fire will reveal what kind of work each builder has done. The fire will show if a person's work has any value.) I can't imagine how this would constitute a learning opportunity if we hadn't a clue what is being judged (see also Ecclesiastes 12:14).
While it would be difficult to build a convincing case on the above, I am sufficiently comfortable with the biblical evidence and just sheer logic to assume that there is continuity between our time as citizens of God's kingdom on earth, and the ongoing life of the kingdom thereafter.
Consequently, I dismiss the idea that everyone shows up in the great hereafter on identical terms. I believe that exclamations will range from (to quote Simeon in Luke 2:30 as he held the baby Jesus), "...my eyes have seen your salvation", to "Who the hell's the big guy and what's he doing sitting on that enormous white armchair."
If we start our next phase as Kingdom of God citizens with different understandings of God's character, will, and ways with his people, what comes next?
Be patient. I'll try to think of something.
Mom still has most of the marbles she ever had, I would say. They may move somewhat more slowly in the bag, but I don't think many have escaped. She doesn't suffer from senility. She still does some cooking for herself. She reads the local paper to keep up with the goings on in our city in the country. Some tasks, especially mending and helping with food preparation for family events, are still well within her capabilities.
But like most people who reach a certain age, she suffers from short-term memory loss. I'm 30 years younger than Mom is. I was once the proud possessor of the acute Sutherland memory, as was my father before me. But I watched the erosion of Dad's ability to hang onto the remnants of events, and I know that even now my memory is not what it once was. It comes to us all.
Therefore, I find that while Mom can still remember where she was on her fourteenth birthday, she can't always recall what she did yesterday. It sometimes makes me wonder whether it matters that we do something with her, or for her, if soon the pleasure it brought her will slip through her grasp. We still involve her in various events as often as possible, nonetheless, hoping that it keeps her spirits up even if the details are sometimes long gone.
And that brings me to the issue of continuity. Suppose we were to arrive at those Pearly Gates with only very early memories of what we did for our allotted time on earth, with the rest being a blank like my mother-in-law. Or what if heaven were like birth; i.e., we arrive like newborns with no memory of the nine months in the womb (or ninety-four years on earth) as background and context for what happens next. Surely that would make a mockery of all the striving we did on behalf of the Kingdom of God while we were here. Self-denial, putting the kingdom first, etc., etc.--what's the point if it all becomes so completely immaterial that we aren't even permitted the memories of it all? What if we resemble dear old Mom in having no picture of what has gone on before to sustain us or to learn from. What if we didn't even remember who our loved ones were, particularly our parents, siblings, spouse, children, friends? This would be called senility here on earth. Are we to take on celestial Alzheimer's in the eternal state?
There is very little hard biblical evidence to support this speculation. But what there is supports my theory, I think, that we go into the afterlife (better, the next part of life) with memories intact. Consider:
1. Depictions of the followers of God in the heavenly city typically include much praising of God as the Redeemer, and Jesus as the one slain for sin, and such like. None of this would make any sense if one had no idea what one was redeemed from, or what sin is, particularly my own.
2. While one has to be very careful with apocalyptic language, Revelation chap. 6 refers to the souls of martyrs who were asking how long they had to wait to see vindication for their earthly treatment.
3. There are references to the dead standing before a large set of ledgers, which are opened to see if one's name is written there, and so on. Again this is colourful language used for effect, but it still suggests that there is some self-awareness on our part, at least to the extent that we know who we are and the significance of one's name appearing.
4. Heaven is referred to in the Old Testament as Jacob's rest. "Rest from what?", one must ask. Presumably part of the enjoyment of rest is to remember the opposite.
5. St. Paul refers to our actual activity on earth and whether it stands up to certain tests of its usefulness in Kingdom building (1 Corinthians 3:11-13 "For no one can lay any foundation other than the one we already have--Jesus Christ. Anyone who builds on that foundation may use a variety of materials--gold, silver, jewels, wood, hay, or straw. But on the judgment day, fire will reveal what kind of work each builder has done. The fire will show if a person's work has any value.) I can't imagine how this would constitute a learning opportunity if we hadn't a clue what is being judged (see also Ecclesiastes 12:14).
While it would be difficult to build a convincing case on the above, I am sufficiently comfortable with the biblical evidence and just sheer logic to assume that there is continuity between our time as citizens of God's kingdom on earth, and the ongoing life of the kingdom thereafter.
Consequently, I dismiss the idea that everyone shows up in the great hereafter on identical terms. I believe that exclamations will range from (to quote Simeon in Luke 2:30 as he held the baby Jesus), "...my eyes have seen your salvation", to "Who the hell's the big guy and what's he doing sitting on that enormous white armchair."
Be patient. I'll try to think of something.
