There’s a despicable principle of our lives woven inextricably into the very fabric of reality as we know it: all good things must come to an end. Time brings changes, which naturally brings ends. There is something fundamentally wrong about good things ending, no matter how well-adjusted you are. It is almost like we weren’t designed to be in a world like this. God made it impossible for humans to be totally satisfied with the way our reality works.
“He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end” (Ecclesiastes 3:11 NIV).
Personally, I felt relieved, even validated, when I read this passage for the first time. We all have “eternity” In our hearts, which guarantees some dissonance in this finite world. We will all come to long for something more. Jesus modeled life lived with an eternal perspective; everything he did was for his grand purpose.
In the last few weeks, we have seen Jesus carry on a conversation with his Father. He said many wonderful things but frequently spoke from the perspective of having done things we know he hasn’t done yet. We understand that the Bible claims that the Father operates in and outside of time, knowing the beginning from the end. Jesus converses with his Father, fully taking on timeless perspectives, baffling anyone who reads it.
We also know that we will see our King when we die and experience becoming like him. For heaven to truly be heaven, we will have a radically different relationship with eternity, and therefore, time itself. If our experience of time is different, maybe the truism that all good things must end will be barred from ever being true again! I haven’t a clue what that means, but it is a spring of joy to ponder.
The point I want to drive home is heaven will be different, yes, but better! Literally, in every way. Life here can be broken in countless ways, but heaven will be better in every single one of those ways, and that’s low-balling it! Ultimately, we aren’t able to conceive the reality of it, but to the degree it encourages, join me in reveling in the infinite possibilities of its splendor!
“What no eye has seen,
what no ear has heard,
and what no human mind has conceived” —
the things God has prepared for those who love him—
1 Corinthians 2:9 (NIV).
Jonathan Duncan
EFCC Member