Life ever after

For some time now I've been thinking and even dreaming about heaven. I am very aware that my tendency especially as a person who likes to get involved in mission is to think about the here and now and forget about life ever after. These thoughts have been fuelled by by the course I am doing at the moment which has really delved into the questions of what are we here for and what is it all about. I hear some of you saying well it's all about Jesus and the Kingdom and of course I would agree with you but as this is unpicked you realise that this is an absolutely massive subject. 

So I want to start from some way off ideas and state the obvious. I think we often assume we know what we think about things and actually when we go a little bit deeper we have merely swallowed what someone has taught us and it became part of what we believe. So what are we here for ? 

God created for relationship with himself and with each other. So most of us are on this earth for around 80-90 years. But then what, why on earth would a loving God just create us for that time. Forgive me I am very much thinking out loud. Even from a non faith point of view what would be the point of it all if that was all we had 80-90 years it isn't very long at all. Ok then so now let's think of it from a believers point of view. We often have the mentality that we live life on this earth and then we go to a place called heaven where it's like starting again in a reality we know nothing about in a kind of cosmic spiritual cloud party which to an extrovert kind of sounds like torture . To be honest this kind of heaven didnot really excite me. However as I have done this course I have found that heaven is actually exciting if we change the way we think about it. Going back to the idea that we live on earth for 80-90 years and then that's it off to heaven let me park these ideas for a minute and go back to the beginning. 

So God created heaven as a place for him to be in relationship with us very much like Adam and Eve in the garden where they were commanded to go out and subdue it the earth and be fruitful but sadly they stuffed it up. What if the plan hadn't changed and heaven is an opportunity to live once again in a place where we live in relationship with God again without any hindrances this time. What if that place was actually earth. We tend to have this view that earth is evil and it is a sinking ship that we need to get off as soon as possible and as Jesus has rescued us we can be shipped off to heaven right? 

This kind of thinking makes us almost forget about this earth. We think of heaven as a place somewhere far off in another galaxy or dimension even. What if heaven was right here, now hear me right I am not saying that the earth as we have it is heaven right now because we know that is just not true. There is still plenty disease sickness and suffering. Nonetheless Jesus is able to redeem all things then why not the whole of creation. In romans it says that all creation waits for the sons of God to be revealed why would creation be bothered about the sons of God being revealed if the whole redemption plan didn't include creation too. I know there is lots of rubbish going on and this world we live in is fallen but I do believe that we can see the fingerprints of God all over. For that matter if you take a look at the universe and even our earth the place we call home you have to admit there are elements that are totally beautiful even if you do see bad stuff as well.  I do love this world and I see the beauty of its designer all over it. It as well us is a masterpiece and God is the greatest artist there ever has or will be. 

Therefore why would God rub it all out and start again when he created everything he said it was good this hang changed but of course as it stands at the moment it is tarnished this I can't deny. Neither can I pretend to know what heaven is going to look like but I suspect it looks a bit more like our world than we are expecting and it might actually be our world but just the redeemed best version ever possible. Whilst in relationship of with the lover of our soul Jesus together with all the beauty and great things that man and God have ever invented that are inherently good for us to enjoy forever and ever.