heaven

Last night on ABC there was a News Special on heaven. Where it is, and how we get there. They had people representing an assortment of religions … Islam, Buddhism, Evangelical Christianity … beyond religion they had Atheistic representation and insights from the medical community. None of it was remarkably interesting to me. It really was just many different people speaking about what they believe regarding the afterlife.

One thing I thought was interesting was how thoroughly empirical the entire study was. The doctors who were on spoke of a “god-gene” that we possess, and the stimuli in our brains that come through when we worship / meditate. The focus was on whether or not it could be proven scientifically.

I was waiting for them to report about the fact that ever since mankind began recording history there has always been the element of spirituality. Rather, the science community tried to break down the physical to find the spiritual, the eternal. I guess I would liken this to looking at a flag that is blowing in the wind. Then embarking on a study of the flag … its fibers, its stitching, its design, its color and trying to deduce why it is rustling and moving around while completely ignoring the wind. It would not make sense, the flag is behaving this way, because of an outside force. Maybe people behave spiritually because of what the reality is that is all around us … maybe it is inside all of us … maybe this is why we reach out for God (See The Apostle, Paul in Acts 17).

As an aside it was mentioned that people don’t need proof, they need only faith. My trouble over this, is that so often as Christians we spend our time doing the same thing this program did. That is, we try to prove what we believe. We in many ways forsake faith. I remember teaching one time and telling the people I was teaching that I could not prove that God existed, that the Bible was true, or even that Jesus was God. I could however give good reasons why I believed all of these things to be true, and beyond that I am willing to die for these beliefs. Shortly after I was done preaching this, I was approached abruptly by many people who said, “What do you mean you can’t prove God?!?! It can easily be done, beyond question!”

So I asked, “If that is the case, then why is it that we have not gotten the news out so that everyone will finally know the truth?” It is interesting to me that the Bible begins the story like this, “In the Beginning God …” In the Hebrew “God” is the second word. How much time did he spend defending his existence? We have to return to faith. This is what Jesus called us to, this is what the Text calls us to … it is in faith that we truly find ourselves and more importantly the one who created us.