1 Corinthians 15 (More To Come)
In the late Eighties, when U2 released The Joshua Tree Album, many Christians scratched their heads. Weren’t these guys supposed to be Christians? Obviously not, right? As anyone who listened to “Christian Music” in the eighties knew, Christians were perfectly happy people who never had any problems and knew the answer to everything. U2 could not possibly believe in Jesus Christ, because they had not yet found “the answer.”
Of course that is all nonsense. Plenty of Christians, even all the way back as far as Paul, knew that life here would never approximate Heaven on Earth. There is suffering and death. People who are followers of Christ, in fact, face hardship and persecution because of their faith. This world is not our home. Christ never promised health and wealth to be our fortune.
In the resurrection, however, we will see a world as God intends it to be, with no suffering or death. The enemy will be defeated, and sin will reign no more! That is what Bono refers to when he sings this gospel song. He is looking forward to a time when the glory of his hope will be fulfilled.
Once we get there, by the way, a lot of Christians will probably be confused. They have gotten the idea somewhere that Heaven will be some spiritual realm of eternal worship—i.e. church. This is a misconception. In fact, a lot of Christians will probably breathe a sigh of relief to hear that. Nothing could be more tedious than an eternal worship service, no matter how wonderful it was. True worship involves all aspects of life, and the resurrection will be a corporal existence in the new heaven AND the new earth. It is not clear exactly what that will involve, but it will certainly be more dynamic than any worship service has managed to achieve in this existence!
Here’s to eventually discovering the fulfillment to what we all have been looking for.
Of course that is all nonsense. Plenty of Christians, even all the way back as far as Paul, knew that life here would never approximate Heaven on Earth. There is suffering and death. People who are followers of Christ, in fact, face hardship and persecution because of their faith. This world is not our home. Christ never promised health and wealth to be our fortune.
In the resurrection, however, we will see a world as God intends it to be, with no suffering or death. The enemy will be defeated, and sin will reign no more! That is what Bono refers to when he sings this gospel song. He is looking forward to a time when the glory of his hope will be fulfilled.
Once we get there, by the way, a lot of Christians will probably be confused. They have gotten the idea somewhere that Heaven will be some spiritual realm of eternal worship—i.e. church. This is a misconception. In fact, a lot of Christians will probably breathe a sigh of relief to hear that. Nothing could be more tedious than an eternal worship service, no matter how wonderful it was. True worship involves all aspects of life, and the resurrection will be a corporal existence in the new heaven AND the new earth. It is not clear exactly what that will involve, but it will certainly be more dynamic than any worship service has managed to achieve in this existence!
Here’s to eventually discovering the fulfillment to what we all have been looking for.
Comments
Post a Comment