When I was a teenager and attending church camp, a creative Methodist minister preached on this very question. He said to picture a lovely garden where everything is perfect. The flowers are all beautiful, the deer are running through the woods, people are spread out on the lawn have a really fun picnic. The children are all playing on the swings and laughing. The birds are singing. Everything is in just right. For that minister, that was “heaven.”
Then he said, picture that entire beautiful pastoral environment enclosed in a giant glass bubble. Now, picture people outside the giant glass bubble lying on top and looking in. That’s hell. That image has always stuck with me.
Seriously, I believe whatever may exist beyond this life is up to God. The Apostle Paul cobbled together some words of Isaiah to give us this description: “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him.” (1 Corinthians 2:9, NRSV)
My job here and now is to love God with all my heart, mind and spirit, and to love my neighbor as myself. I am to love, not because of the possibility of a heavenly reward, but because God loved humanity enough to offer God’s son as a model for how humans should treat each other. Because God loves me, I should love the hell out of my neighbor. If God is love then God’s heaven is dwelling in that love.
Hell is being on the outside of God's love, looking in. Fortunately, that never has to be the case, at least as far as God is concerned. The welcome mat is always out. God's persistent and ever-faithful message to humanity is: I LOVE YOU AND THERE IS NOTHING YOU CAN DO ABOUT IT!
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