What’s So Great Up There in Heaven?

[leavemealone]

The main objective of the Christian scheme of life and death is to get to heaven after we die. Why? Because that’s where God is, and heaven without God would be like a sunny day without sunshine, an innate contradiction. Christians want to be with God because, they say, he is all-perfect, and eternity with him will be beyond the greatest happiness imaginable. But how many people stop to ask why this will be so.

Okay, so God is the greatest thing since sliced bread. Even greater. So what? What will this do for me? As they used to say years ago in my hometown of Italian, Slavic, and Nordic immigrants in northern Minnesota to measure the value of what one was doing, “Will it put a chicken on the table [to eat]?” How does God’s being so great and wonderful translate into our happiness being far greater than we could ever imagine if we are there with him? I don’t get it. So he’s incredible and magnificent and perfect and everything else, and I, along with millions of others, am by his side. Now what? Where do we go from there? I mean, what will we do in heaven besides worshiping the Lord?

All manner of pleasurable things have been envisioned by people through the years about heaven, the Disneyland of the Christian imagination. Originally, Billy Graham, who at one point said he knew the precise dimensions of heaven — “sixteen hundred square miles” (No. Seriously. Time, November 15, 1993, 74) — thought heaven was just going to be about fun. “We are going to sit around the fireplace and have parties, and the angels will wait on us, and we’ll drive down the golden streets in a yellow Cadillac convertible,” he said. (Billy didn’t say if our body or our soul would be in the driver’s seat.) But Billy, with age, particularly when he found a passage in the Book of Revelation that says we will serve God in heaven, realized that, although life in heaven would all be just glorious, it wasn’t going to be all play. He told Good Morning America in April of 1997 that “when we get to heaven, I don’t think we’re going to just sit down. I think God will have other work for us to do. There are billions and billions and trillions of other planets and other stars, and I believe there’s life on many of those and God may have a job for us to do on some of those places.”

But Billy, none of what you say sounds like a place I want to go to. I never sit around fireplaces, and even if I did, what’s so special about sitting around a fireplace in heaven as opposed to one on earth? Also, I’m not a partygoer. And I don’t want anyone waiting on me. It makes me uncomfortable. And I have no desire at all to drive a yellow Cadillac convertible down golden streets. And why would I want to work on distant planets for the rest of time? I’m not being silly, Billy. You and Christianity are.

Even if what happens in the Christian heaven is the greatest thing ever, such as being in God’s presence — like the transfiguration of Jesus at the top of the mountain where his clothing became dazzling white, far whiter than any earthly process could ever make it (Mark 9:2-3 ) — after a few twenty-four-hour days of this, won’t it get awfully tiresome? Or at least humdrum? If not, what about 365 days a year? Or 1,000 years?

Billy, after we get to heaven, what’s going to happen that’s going to be so great that it will make me, and others, so indescribably happy? Given that billions of people throughout recorded history have believed in heaven and everyone wants to end up there, am I being unreasonable to ask?


The above is an excerpt from the book Divinity of Doubt: The God Question by Vincent Bugliosi, by kind permission of the publisher, Vanguard Press. Copyright © 2011 Vincent Bugliosi.

Vincent Bugliosi, author of Divinity of Doubt: The God Question, received his law degree in 1964. In his career at the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office, he successfully prosecuted 105 out of 106 felony jury trials, including 21 murder convictions without a single loss. His most famous trial, the Charles Manson case, became the basis of his true-crime classic, Helter Skelter , the biggest selling true-crime book in publishing history. Two of Bugliosi’s other true-crime books—And the Sea Will Tell andOutrage—also reached #1 on the New York Times hardcover bestseller list. No other American true-crime writer has ever had more than one book that achieved this ranking. His latest book, Reclaiming History: The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy, was also a New York Times bestseller, and is being made into a ten-part HBO miniseries, for which Tom Hanks will be a producer. Bugliosi lives with his wife of many years in Los Angeles. For more information follow the author on Facebook.

[Sikufanya]

I don't think anyone really knows what heaven is supposed to be like.
Billy Graham's personal heaven doesn't sound good to me.
Other people's ideas where it sounds like being in a big garden and you are reunited with all your loved ones sounds better.
The cold sterile, white apple designed heaven of most Hollywood movies seems so utterly dull and ghastly.

I think the best ideas of heaven are a little more abstract. If God is basically everywhere, and time has no meaning, then Heaven is probably more of a state of consciousness where we are "with God" so we are basically in all places and at all times as well. Therefore we presumably can effectively experience whatever we want, whenever we want but also time will no longer have any meaning to us so it won't be like: "Not swimming with dolphins and conversing with Albert Einstein again, I did that every day for the last 3,000 years!" ,everything we do will effectively happen at once and will last an eternity or a brief moment, depending on how you look at it.

[Ex.Deus]

I think the best ideas of heaven are a little more abstract. If God is basically everywhere, and time has no meaning, then Heaven is probably more of a state of consciousness where we are "with God" so we are basically in all places and at all times as well. Therefore we presumably can effectively experience whatever we want, whenever we want but also time will no longer have any meaning to us so it won't be like: "Not swimming with dolphins and conversing with Albert Einstein again, I did that every day for the last 3,000 years!" ,everything we do will effectively happen at once and will last an eternity or a brief moment, depending on how you look at it.

This desription fits better than sitting by a fireplace or"Worshiping the Lord" for all eternity. Although whatever description you attach, and wherever in the universe you think it might be the point is you don't go "there" when you die "here" The bible suggests one round on this planet and you've either made it to heaven or not - god was far more realistic about the the whole situation

[Geronimo]

Prince Philip said when he reincarnated he wanted to come back as a virus and wipe out man kind...when i reincarnate i would like it to be as one of the aliens who are forever ducking in and out of this world...on returning after a long off world journey, id hover the ship over the White House while they are entertaining world leaders at a garden party, and jettison the septic tanks over the lot of them..

[Geronimo]

heaven is in the arms (and legs) of a woman...who says i cant be a romantic fool..

[Sikufanya]

You can't be a romantic fool!!

I think that was the point I was trying to make but didn't say it very clearly.
The abstract idea of heaven is all around us. You are outside space and time, or experiencing all of space and time at once. Therefore, your spirit, or soul could presumably choose to focus on a specific moment in space/time such as swimming with dolphins or whatever, you wouldn't be swimming with dolphins, you would be with the dolphins when they are swimming.
Of course, because you are outside of space/time, there will be no concept of time passing. And if you DO focus on a specific point in space/time,( like presumably God did when he spoke to the prophets) and you focus on another point in space/time, this is effectively happening at once or not at all as you are not shackled by space or time.

See? I'm still having trouble explaining it. It is a concept that makes a certain kind of sense in that we are experiencing everything like God would, so we are "with God" as people perceive heaven, but it is really difficult to explain, even to people of intelligence and learning. This is why we end up with the sitting on a cloud playing a harp bollocks or Billy Graham's rubbish.

The other problem is the description of the heavens and the Earth in Genesis. The 4004 BC literal word of God people, don't seem to spot the major inconsistencies of viewing the first few chapters of Genesis like that.

Imagine there really WAS a big bang to start the universe. There was no time before the big bang, as Einstein tells us it is all part of Space/Time and would all have started at once. Eventually the stars and the planets were formed, and then Earth brought forth life in all its forms.

Now try and explain that to someone thousands of years ago, with no scientific learning, who basically keeps goats for a living. He sees plants and animals about in all their forms, he sees a big light in the daytime and smaller lights at night time.
He thinks to himself: "What's it all about eh?"

And the best explanation that he could even hope to understand is something along the lines of:

1:1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
1:2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
1:3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.

Obviously that is the King James version, and is several translations away from the original, but at least gives the gist.

Now try and explain what you think heaven is to that same goatherder.

[Geronimo]

Heaven to goat herder would probably being able to get up at 8am to lie on the sofa in the sun while his woman makes him breakfast...thinking of it iim sure that would be heaven for all men..just where do you get a woman like that...and an outside sofa..

[observer]

How does God’s being so great and wonderful translate into our happiness being far greater than we could ever imagine if we are there with him? I don’t get it

If you wish to understand how to translate begin by researching the word 'translation' and you will find it may be defined as follows ...

"To convey to Heaven without death"

... then substitute crucifiction for translation to get a flavour of what has been hidden from the masses. If you really want to get it forget christianity (religion) and think Christ (Principle)

Warm Regards

[Sikufanya]

Geronimo!

Here's a Garden Sofa: http://www.featuredeco.co.uk/mall/produ ... eco/_17260

As for the woman, you could try this site: http://www.goodwife.com/

So Belinda Carlisle was right, Heaven is a place on Earth, (provided it is a heaven for a goatherder who has just won the lottery so can afford the sofa and the mail order bride.)

[Geronimo]

iv had a look on that goodwife site...the picture are cool...not only traditional women but old fashioned looking and dressing too...stocking versus tights...no contest...tights were tptbs attempt to bring the population growth to a stand still