A Physical Place

I thought the first section was a good treatment of what he calls Christoplatonism.  He begins by addressing the contention that of physical heaven would be less excellent than a purely spiritual heaven.  It reminded me of C.S. Lewis' quote (from I don't know where)... "God likes matter.  He invented it."

He also makes an interesting point about deriving our inferences not from the nature of God, but from the nature of humanity.  The idea is that God (being almighty and all) could dwell just about anywhere.  As humans, we aren't promised all of God's infinite attributes.  Therefore, he reasons, we should think about the possibilities of heaven in the likely limitations of humans rather than the awesome capability of God.  Interesting.

The thought from the second section that jumped out at me was this:  "We should stop thinking of Heaven and Earth as opposites and instead view them as overlapping circles that share certain commonalities."  While Earth is certainly under the curse, it's wrong to think of it as more like Hell than Heaven.  God created Earth as a good dwelling for man.  Despite the pains brought on by sin, it still bears much of its grand qualities.  Similarly, though we are fallen we still bear the image of God.

I'll skip ahead to the section dealing with the rich man and Lazarus.  While I think he ends up at a pretty balanced position, some of his argumentation is bothersome.  Specifically, he supports his point by saying, "Jesus could easily have portrayed the rich man and Lazarus in other ways.  He could have said..."  To claim that your interpretation retains validity because Jesus didn't state things in a fashion that would have contradicted your interpretation isn't utterly convincing.

Our Layover in the Intermediate Heaven (Chapter 5)

Chapter 5 really just introduced the idea of the intermediate Heaven. So many things stuck out to me in this chapter. I have found that more questions arise as I read this book, but I trust that Randy will get to the answers in later chapters. For example, the New Earth will be a "completely renovated" picture of what we see around us. So, will our same condo be "without sin" and not have a noisy dishwasher? I know that is trivial, but you get the idea.

I was reminded of the instant nature of death. When a person dies, (BOOM!), they are right there, standing before the judgment seat. What a sobering thought. Encouraging for us that Christ is with believers in the "transitional" Heaven - 'to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord'.

More mind-blowing to me, is the reminder that I will give an account of ALL my actions at the Final Judgment. It really puts things into perspective. But praise God! That is what we all need, a heavenly perspective. Even at a young age for some of us, present company excluded, we should be putting a higher price tag on our time. I don't know where to draw the line between study, prayer, service, and leisure. I know that God is pleased when I honor Him, no matter what I am doing. But what about watching the game or a DVD, reading Time mag, playing risk online? I know it is an issue of priorities and what comes first should be my relationship with the Lord, fleshed out by study, meditation, prayer, and good deeds. I think I will continue to redraw the line as I grow in my faith. Any convictions from you guys?

He doesn't go into detail about rewards but I like that he footnotes some books on the topic. I want to be more familiar with his rewards for believers because He tells us to believe in His promises.

wow chapter 5

First of all, it's wonderful to finally be blogging with you. God makes life so easy. It's amazing how often I forget this. All of the wonderful truths that sounded intimidating but still entangled me with excitment in chapter 5 were all promises given to us by our Lord, taken from His Word. I am so thankful for Randy Alcorn and his faith in this endeavor because just contemplating the idea of a seperate intermediate state of Heaven and a New Earth is incredibly daunting for me. I am also thankful for the oppurtunity that the Lord has graciously given me in this book study to learn about our future home. So, we WILL (this is guaranteed, promised by our GOD) live on a New Earth where Heaven and Earth come together as one, where we are free from the burden of this world, and where we not only live with our Creator but we actually do things like EAT and WORK and HANG OUT.....that's AWESOME! It is things such as these that can truly ease the worried mind of a 22 year old, single, newly Christian man. This book is amazing because it helps me to understand the promises that God has laid out for me in scripture that I can glance over sometimes without giving them the attention they deserve. This for example,"the meek shall inherit the earth." THINK ABOUT THAT! What does inheritance mean? It will be ours because God has made it for us, and He will live with us! After reading this chapter I am the most convicted when I think about how analytical I can be. This book is helping me to live in light of the Resurrection and to put down my magnifying glass and just praise God. I am sincerely looking forward to the weeks to come.