Heaven, the Resurrection of the Body, and Mourning as Christians (repost)

In this episode, Johnathan Arnold and David Fry continue to discuss the church's happy anticipation of heaven and how it shapes our life in this world.

Quotes from Fry:

• In the end, heaven is a place on earth. Earth doesn't comprehend earth, but heaven comprehends earth.
• Simply put, heaven is the dwelling place of God.
• We have so separated heaven and earth that it leads us to a view that we can trash earth before God trashes it. That is not at all an orientation that God allows us to have towards the earth. And that's very dangerous. Christians need to recover a better ecology.
• My male body will be resurrected. We will be male or female eternally. We are not going to become angels. Jesus told us that there will be a particular way that we will be like angels, but that's not one of them.
• Anticipating the loss of the things that we take pleasure in now seems more like hell than heaven. The popular visions of heaven and hell are reversed—where hell is the place where you party and have all of the best of human experiences that we can experience now, and heaven is a place where you lose all of those things. But heaven is not the loss of all these things, it is the fulfillment of them.
• Whatever we have to say about heaven—as we study God's word and how Christian thinkers have reflected on it—we cannot leave out the importance of the resurrected, physical body of Christ which is the foundation of our faith. That's our starting point for thinking about things eternal, and that's a physical reality. That's where our physical theology has to start. But so many of our thoughts about heaven are spiritualized and disconnected and have really become more like fairytales than real, physical realities.
• Prolonging life at any cost actually takes away from the sanctity of the passing of a saint. That approach is grounded in the lack of belief in a physical resurrection. We go to an extreme to preserve bodily life as if we've given up hope of a bodily resurrection.
• In our great effort to prolong life, we actually end up making death worse than it is—more despairing.
• We are pilgrims and exiles or strangers. We are passing through this age. Kings come and kings go. And that's not to say that these things have no importance. But the basic Christian confession that "Jesus is Lord" ought to run through all of our public faith. It ought to dictate everything we do—from voting to living under authorities that perhaps we didn't vote for.
• Our thinking about heaven must translate into how we live in this world—a public faith that reflects careful, holy living and a passion for being creatures who are made in the image of God, conveying godliness. That has to be our guiding passion for thinking on these things.

Transcript

Copy Transcript Copied

SPEAKER_01 0:01

The resurrected physical body of Christ, which is the foundation of our faith. That's our starting point for thinking about things eternal.

SPEAKER_03 0:14

So many of the views that we take related to heaven and hell really fundamentally undermine who we are as humans.

SPEAKER_02 0:24

You're listening to the Holy Joys podcast, co-hosted by Jonathan Arnold and Dr. David Frye. Visit us at holyjoys.org and stay tuned for weekly discussions of theology and ministry practice, all for a holy, happy church.

SPEAKER_03 0:40

In his book, Surprised by Hope, Wright says something like Salvation is not fundamentally about our I don't want to misquote him, but but he he kind of downplays the relationship with God, me and God, kind of like the Protestant emphasis on me getting right with God. And he says it's really about joining God in his creation project. And I don't want to be unfair to Wright, but it does feel like there's so much emphasis on the new creation and not on us as individuals before God. And there's so many times in that book I'm just like rejoicing, like, yes, he has, you know, we've missed this, but then there's other times where I'm just like cringing at the deepest level and just like, oh my word, but what about being with God and God being our God? Like, relationship is huge, dwelling is huge. So, what are your thoughts on right? You know, do you think he's maybe kind of overcorrected it at some points?

SPEAKER_01 1:37

I do, I do. And I think uh I'm in fact I'm looking right now at my bookshelf and and pulling out a book by Michael Allen called Grounded in Heaven, which I think is a really nice uh response, really on that point to to right. So so you mentioned he you know down planning this what we may call you know a personal relationship with God. And he couples that with this what what he sees as a misconcept of saying, you know, our goal is to you know go to heaven. Well, I think I think those two points together, which he holds together, um he really overstates or or over uh yeah, uh just he overstates it. And uh he doesn't need to. That's the thing. He doesn't need to. And and actually I think uh the other author, um Jay Richard Middleton, uh, does the same thing in his book, uh New Heaven and New Earth. Um and and I've actually interacted with Middleton uh on that. Uh I don't have you know the opportunity to interact with Wright on it, but uh this yeah, it's overstated and I think the um his his concern for this language of personal relationship comes directly out of his adversity to sting our salvation as being taken out of the world. And uh he he makes I think he holds those two together, and so it comes across to us as as something you know quite odd. And that's where then I think Michael Allen's response is is really good uh and grounded in heaven. And uh so for instance, you know, so how does how would I differ then in my language or description of heaven? I I have no problem with saying, you know, we are going to heaven. You know, my goal is like like John Wesley, you know, to make it to that happy shore. That's my that's my uh passion in life. You know, one one uh purpose, I think Wesley said uh in a preface to his sermons, uh, is to make it to that happy shore. Um I have no problem with that, um, because I think that is biblical. Uh so he is uh he doesn't like that sort of language simply because of how it has been packaged with this otherworldly language, and he wants to ground us in earth, which is why Michael Allen uh responded with the book titled Grounded in Heaven. Uh and I want to say, in the end, heaven is a place on earth. Um, earth doesn't comprehend heaven, but heaven comprehends earth. And um and and that and so I think if we think in those terms, we don't have to be as adverse as what right is with that kind of language.

SPEAKER_03 4:39

Yeah, so how do you define heaven? Because I think if we could get a working definition of heaven, it might be easier for us to make that step towards heaven and earth being one and not feeling that they're they're they're uh you know somehow pitted against one another. So like um I think right says something like earth is man's space and heaven is God's space. And from the beginning, those have interlocked. You know, we see that in Eden. Wherever God comes, that's temple theology, right? So that's like Beale. That's so wherever heaven and earth are interlocking, God's space and man's space, heaven and earth are are coming together, but there's going to be this full and complete marriage where the two become one. You know, so marriage is not only a signpost to union between an individual in Christ or between his people in Christ, but also a signpost to the marriage between God's space and man space, heaven and earth. Uh what about that just simple definition of heaven, of earth?

SPEAKER_01 5:34

Right. So Arthur Roberts, um, and I the title of his book is slipping my mind, but Arthur Roberts gives uh twelve different uses of the word heaven in scripture. Um simply put, I think heaven throughout scripture, in all of these you know, twelve or even more senses, uh heaven ultimately is the dwelling place of God. Now, uh you know, we have heaven appearing in the in well, of course, in Hebrew it is a plural noun, uh, but when it's translated in English using the plural, uh usually that refers to the you know the skies, the atmosphere, uh the everything that's not you know on the ground. Um then when it's used in the singular in English, even though again in Hebrew it's a plural all the time, um the translators are trying to convey heaven as the dwelling place of God. And yes, that is temple language. And yes, in the end, uh the earth is the temple of God. It's the dwelling place of God. And and so I define heaven broadly as simply the dwelling place of God.

SPEAKER_03 6:44

So I'm thinking of a song that we have sung at our little country church since I came there. Uh it's a favorite song, and so we've continued to sing it. And and the more I've thought about it, the more I think there's something to it. And I think it's been it's been popularized again by maybe like the David Crowder band or something. It's it's heaven came down and glory filled my soul. So, you know, for a while I thought that was kind of strange, like heaven came down and glory filled my soul. But if you think about heaven as God's dwelling and you think about how the church is the the uh the temple, it does seem like there is a sense in which heaven is already come to earth in the church. In some way, you get in touch with heaven and with God's dwelling when you come into the into contact with the church.

SPEAKER_01 7:33

Oh, certainly. Yeah, yeah, I think so. And I think that goes back to my previous comment about understanding heaven and earth more in terms of continuity, or at least more than what we have thought in the past. Uh, we have too often separated heaven and hell hell, I'm sorry, heaven and earth. Uh sometimes we do experience earth as hell, uh, but uh but we have so separated heaven and earth that uh that leads us then to this view of earth as a place that we we can trash before God trashes it. And and that's not at all what God uh uh God's word allows us to uh that's not a a uh orientation that God allows us to have towards towards the earth. Uh it's something very different. Uh so and I think that's very dangerous. Christians need to recover a better better ecology, really. So most of the other reasons that uh you know people's happy anticipation for what ought to be a happy anticipation for heaven uh is either just non existent or at least it's dampened, uh, are those sort of uh sometimes we think they're uh you know selfish issues. And you mentioned one of them, you know, a young person who wants to get married. You know, we have a lot of experiences that we look forward to in this world, and then our but our vision of heaven excludes those those pleasures or those um those experiences that we can have as you know, real physical beings. And uh and of course if a heaven without those things is it's hard to imagine uh that it would be a place that we would enjoy more than this. And a heaven like that can wait. And so really it's it's all of those other things that we anticipate uh being able to enjoy. But as I think C. S. Lewis really does a great job, uh, and there are others, but he does a great job of of um uh both through his his fictional works and then uh you know his his more uh intellectual works, uh describing for us how all of those experiences, even eating food, having a a wonderful Sunday dinner, you know, all of those things are simply pointing us to uh the the substance of which for which God has created us. Uh and and uh you know, so so I talked uh a couple of weeks ago about about what does mealtime look like in heaven. Uh this coming week I'll talk about uh what about marriage in heaven? What's that look like? Particularly uh and we know Jesus straightforwardly answered that question, but what does that mean about us as sexual beings? Because we will uh these bodies will be resurrected, not resuscitated, resurrected. And uh there the church fathers speak uh often about the necessity of being numerically one with our body, uh that it's my body, my male body will be resurrected, and and so we will have uh we will be male or female uh eternally. But what's that look like? How how do why and what's that mean for us biologically? Um those are all important questions, but if we bracket that out altogether and say, no, we're just gonna become angels, uh well, no, that's not what Jesus said. He said there is a particular way in which we will be like the angels, uh, but that's not one of them. So um so so anticipating uh the the loss of the things that we take pleasure in now seems more like hell than heaven. And uh quite frankly, the popular visions of heaven and hell are reversed. Where where hell is the place where you party and where you have all of the best of human experiences that we can imagine now, and hell and heaven is a place where you lose all those things.

SPEAKER_03 11:57

Versus pleasures at his right hand forevermore.

SPEAKER_01 11:59

Right, right. And and that's uh and so those though all of those things that fit within our our experience of human pleasure now are are all questions that cause people to um to wonder, you know, is is heaven the loss of these things? And when in fact heaven is the fulfillment of those.

SPEAKER_03 12:20

So it seems like, and this this goes back to our shared interests in systematic theology. It seems to me like so many of the things you're saying about our eschatology and how we need to correct our understanding of last things are really grounded in a strong uh Christian anthropology, understanding how we were created, who we you know, who we were made to be, and the the basic goodness of those things. Um and it's so it seems like so many of the views that that we take related to heaven and hell really fundamentally undermine who we are as as humans. So, how how do you see maybe work that needs to be done in our anthropology potentially being a starting point for reshaping our eschatology?

SPEAKER_01 13:06

Yeah, great question. And that actually takes me back to a seminary and uh just a little reference that uh Dr. Bill Ure made, uh, I don't remember the whole context, but he mentioned having a physical theology, that we need a better physical theology, a theology of the physical. And that has really stayed with me. And uh even through this study of of heaven as well as hell. And I whatever we have to say about heaven, and as we study God's word, and then as we study how Christian thinkers have have reflected on God's word and interpreted it, uh, I I don't think we can leave out the importance of the resurrected physical body of Christ, which is the foundation of our faith. That's our starting point for thinking about things eternal. And that's a physical reality. That's where our physical theology has to start. Uh but again, um so many of our thoughts about heaven are are spiritualized and disconnected and are really become more like fairy tales than uh than real physical realities.

SPEAKER_03 14:33

Yeah, and the thing I like to try to emphasize is that all the resources we need for this kind of renewal in our in our minds, all the resources that we need have really been deposited to us in the faith once for all delivered. So if we can get back to these fundamental doctrines and start to unpack them, like the resurrection of Christ and the resurrection of the body, right there in the Apostles' Creed. You know, how many times do we recite that, or maybe we don't recite it enough, how many times do we recite that you know, if we confess the resurrection of the body? But all of our talk about future things centers on heaven as some kind of often disembodied experience and never this bodily reality. So allowing the faith once for all delivered and getting back to these fundamental truths is really, I think, maybe the starting point. We just need to get back to what we believe as Christians and allow that to shape everything else.

SPEAKER_01 15:26

Certainly. And uh that's what we've emphasized today, and I'll throw this out. We there's no way in the world we have time to address this question now, but uh in response to what other things keep a person from having a happy anticipation, uh, this would be the the next big one, and that is uh we are fearful uh you know, first uh second 2 Peter 3 uh verse 13, I think it is, where we are to look forward forward and hasten the day of God, right? When when the new heavens and new earth will will come. But we have a hard time looking forward to that, much less hastening that day when we know or at least believe, to say we know who will be lost, is might be saying it, overstating it, but believe that there are many, especially of our loved ones, who are not ready for that day. And so the the question of how can we be happy in heaven while knowing that there are those that we love now who are suffering eternally in hell? That's a huge question. Again, it's not one that we have time to get into, but that is a serious theological question that we have to have an answer that we have to answer in light of the New Testament saints' uh eager anticipation for heaven. Do do we not think that they thought those thoughts too? Of course they did. And and yet uh the biblical authors uh still convey this uh this notion, uh uninhibited, happy anticipation of the coming of God. So so even the the prospect that some may be lost in hell did not dampen the fact that uh that Paul, for instance, uh knew that uh his own death and the c or the or the coming of Christ would be would be total gain, no loss in that. Total gain. And so uh uh there are and there are many ways to answer it, um, but that is that's the next big question that I think has to be addressed.

SPEAKER_03 17:38

What do you think about our avoidance of death as a culture? How has that contributed to this loss? Because it it seems to me like we we more and more, even as the church, avoid death. We don't even want to call it a funeral anymore. We want to call it uh, you know, a memorial. Not that there's something wrong with that, but but we want to call it a celebration of life or something. Um we don't give people much time to mourn as a culture, you know, compared to biblical mourning to today. W we resist putting graveyards next to churches, which is an ancient practice uh of memento mori, you know, intentionally bringing death before you. Um even thinking about old paintings where you see a skull on the desk, you know, that the famous painting of Augustine, you know, has that skull and of Luther in his study that there's always a skull. Why? Well, it's a constant memento mori. We're bringing death before us. We have pushed that out of our culture. And I recently heard that John Baer, somebody I respect greatly, uh, identified this as the number one challenge in evangelism. And that really has has caused me to reflect um how people we used to say about, you know, when you where are you gonna go when you die? Well, people don't even don't even think about that question anymore, and they pushed it out, and so it doesn't have the deep resonance that it once had. Um so so what do you think about this this avoidance of death as our culture?

SPEAKER_01 19:04

Yeah, so uh I am now still in that the 40 days of of you know traditional mourning uh that Christians have practiced uh for centuries uh over the loss of of uh life. You know, my mother passed away on October 11th. And so, you know, this is a this is a real question. And uh and I honestly have um you know I've done a lot of reflecting on on death. And I think the the approach of you know prolonging life at any cost that is seems to just prevail within our culture now actually takes away from this sanctity of the passing of a saint. And and I think it is itself grounded in the lack of belief of a physical resurrection. There are many people who believe in some sort of afterlife, but again, it's this nebulous, uh spiritualized, um out-of-body experience that uh causes us to uh go to extremes to preserve bodily life, uh as if we have given up hope of a bodily resurrection. And uh the truth is is that uh while death itself is um you know has a sentence of death, it will it will pass away. Um as we experience it now, uh it's a very uh it it's vital to the redemption of the world, the process that that God has allowed uh to take place uh in order for there to be resurrection and redemption. Um so you know in our world today, we we have a culture that uh sees death as um as the the ultimate enemy and will do anything to preserve life as it is now uh because uh for two reasons. One because uh of a lack of a physical resurrection uh belief, and secondly, because of I think lack of um should I say appreciation of uh what has actually happened, not appreciation in a good sense, but uh acknowledgement of uh the burden that all of the physical world is currently under. uh you know creation all of creation including humanity is groaning under the the weight of of Adam's sin and uh and and so when you lose those two uh theological points uh then I think it all adds up to uh uh a practice of whatever we do we have to prolong life as long as we can and and that's especially sad uh when uh when I am around a a a Christian family or someone who's been around the church for a long time and they uh kind of fall into that that way of thinking um I I hope as pastors that we can convey a confidence and a hap or a real happy anticipation that's good even in the face of death.

SPEAKER_03 22:52

Yeah it's challenging because you know there's those two truths that have to be kept in tension and uh we mourn but not as others. And when I think about people who I think they do have a happy anticipation of heaven um it often is older people who say things like well more of my friends are on the other side than are here and so that has created in them that that anticipation. So trying to find that balance I think is is really important. And I think you know to come back to what we said at the beginning of this this time together, we want people to ultimately long for heaven, not because their loved ones are there, but then ultimately because God is there, um not that those two are opposed, but finding that balance I definitely think we we at so many points are just so different in our as Christians in our in our understanding and response to death in the culture that surrounds us.

SPEAKER_01 23:44

Oh certainly yeah yeah no question uh we we do uh interesting in our in our great effort to prolong life uh we actually end up uh making uh death uh worse than than than it is if I if I can say that and that's it's it it's weird to say that even you know in light of my own you know mother's passing but there's a uh it makes death more despairing than uh what um and the grief that the grief that I have now it's not a despairing grief it's yes I'm I'm in mourning uh there are times throughout the day uh I was singing a song uh a a worship course uh you know driving to church the other night and uh you know alone in the car and I was singing the song and I don't remember which one it was but a worship uh course and the and the mind and then the thought came to my mind that uh you know I never I never heard my mom sing she was never you know known as a singer but I was thinking you know the that that God has healed her and although she's not resurrected yet um you know I do believe in conscious spirit prep being present with the Lord and uh mom may be singing right now and I I long to hear what her voice is like and you know I'm not I'm not despairing it's it's not a despairing but I mourn the fact that I can't hear her voice I mourn the fact that I I am am here and she is is one step closer to experiencing humanity as as God intended it to be and and uh so I my mourning is is yes for her uh but it's it is for uh it's for myself as well.

SPEAKER_03 25:43

Thanks for sharing that because that is uh a beautiful picture of what hope-filled mourning looks like which is so such a paradox for the for the world to understand um but uh yeah it's amazing how our Christian hope really reshapes these these experiences and again just the importance of what we're talking about for uh for pastoral counseling for so many things pastoral care and uh and just our uh our daily lives as as believers right right all right so before we close um two things first of all final question we are coming out of the most important election in our history and I want to get that make that clear because this is definitely the most important and so is the last one and so will be the next one but our our nation is it certainly is uh has has created a ton of turmoil and anxiety in our nation so to kind of move maybe bluntly from the personal application of these truths to now the more cosmic application of these views how does our knowledge of the coming resurrection and redemption of all things shape our anticipation for these things, our attitudes towards then our current situation and our response to the turmoil that we see around us where the nations are raging, the earth is groaning, things are in upheaval how does this knowledge, this hope shape our response to these kinds of situations I think we should be reminded as as Peter told us we are pilgrims and exiles or strangers I think one translation says we are we are pilgrims we are we are passing through this age and um kings come and kings go.

SPEAKER_01 27:38

And that and that's not to downplay its importance that's not to say that these things are have no importance for us but the basic Christian confession that Jesus is Lord ought to run through all of our public faith. It ought to dictate what our public faith looks like everything we do from voting to living under authorities that perhaps we didn't vote for if that's if that's the case. We we are guided by the basic Christian confession that is the basis of our salvation by the way that Jesus Christ is Lord and and that's and that's not just theoretical I know that's a you know a theological statement in itself but uh we have to we have to live when we have to as Kevin Van Hooser would say we have to act like Jesus is our Lord and and so many times um I think that truth is lost in our um in our loss of confidence in who we are in Christ. And and so yeah there's and I in fact there may be some some irony that you know the day after the election which I don't even know where all of that stands I think they're still counting ballots but um I you know and the day after election I what a you know there's no better time to talk about heaven than than now uh you know Lord come quickly. But that ought to be that ought to be true of our life you know every day. So there's and and that question that's a big question so I'm giving you a a very broad answer here because that really opens up a lot of other thoughts uh as to how how we ought to relate uh to you know as Christians but I and in particular you asked you know in light of you know this topic of heaven I guess I would say this and I and I would end with this if uh if you wish uh going back to to 2 Peter um you know when he he speaks of of uh you know the the destruction using using this apocalyptic language and he he tells us in verse 11 2 Peter 311 he says since all these things are to be destroyed in this way what sort of people ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness and our ultimately our our thinking about heaven has to translate into how do we actually live in this world a a public faith that reflects careful holy living and a passion for uh for being creatures who are made in the image of God godliness conveying godliness uh and and that has to be our our uh guiding passion for thinking on these things thank you for listening to the Holy Joys podcast email your questions about theology and ministry practice to podcast at holyjoys.org our labors for a holy happy church are supported by generous listeners like you please pray about partnering with us at holyjoys.org forward slash donate