On Stereotypes of Heaven

I remember back when I was a kid, and my mom was complaining about my hair. I have extremely thick, unruly hair, and as a young child, I had a perpetual cowlick. I never used a comb unless severe action was threatened against me. "Just you wait," my wise mother said, "one day when you're 17, you'll part your hair without me asking, because you'll want it to look nice for the girls."

Of course, at 10, I thought that ridiculous. Not me, not ever! Of course, by 17, I was parting my hair. Because I wanted it to look nice. She was right.

This got me started thinking about inevitablility, and how some things change whether we like it or not. When I was younger, I used to build huge imaginary worlds and the idea of being grown up and having to go to work and do schoolwork all day was horrible. I still have an active imagination, but no longer in the same way. Everything I thought would be so boring when I was a kid is what I live for now.

This brings me to the real point of this muse -- heaven. Maybe, you've read the book of Revelation and seen it described a little bit, inasmuch as the English language is a terribly clumsy tool for that purpose.

Heaven, the way it's described often, sounds boring to many people. For those who bother with stereotypes, sitting around on a cloud with a harp (not an image you'll find in the Bible, by the way) sounds horrendously dull. On a more Biblical level, Heaven sounds like it'll be one long church service: nothing but worship and basking in the presence of God, forever. Jesus said there would be no marriage there, and in fact, from all descriptions given, it sounds like Heaven is missing a lot of things that we really enjoy here on Earth.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that: things change. I'm a different person now than I was when I was younger, and I'll be infinitely more different than I am now when I'm in God's rest. And yet, I'l still be me -- and in many ways, I'll be more me than I am now, because I'll finally become what He originally created me to be. It's a process I'm continually going through, and I'll have to wait for then for its full fruition..

So, like my mother said to me so long ago, just you wait. I think that when we finally enter Heaven, living in His presence will be so awesome and overwhelming that everything that we enjoy here will be a dim memory.

One more thing, before this gets too long... never forget that we can enjoy much of Heaven here on earth. We can worship God, we can enjoy His presence, we can take comfort in His unfanthomable love, and know that all those things will not pass away with this life. We have an eternity of praising to do. Let's practice, eh? (-: