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RE: Whispering Hope 8 - Odds and Ends Gone Missing...
all these 'missing things' are implicitly absent in heavenly glory, and we won't miss them because we won't need them - but just enumerating them and stating how they'll be absent helps create a clearer picture of what that other life will be like. But it still gives me bumblebees in my brain to try to wrap my thoughts around the whole idea. Besides, Paul couldn't even begin to describe it, so it's no wonder I have difficulty trying to imagine it. I suppose it's like our vast universe - so mysterious we can't comprehend it and more wondrous than we can even imagine.
Hi John, your comments take me back to this observation:
I believe that we will be very happily shocked and surprised by two things...
First, we will be very surprised at how comfortably familiar things are. We will have bodies that we are comfortable in, that feel well, that are familiar. We will be surrounded by familiar sights and sounds, trees, oceans, flowers, life, loved ones, friends. "Heaven," or as I often refer to it, the Glory, is a very physical, substantive place filled with realities that we will instantly recognize and embrace.
However, we will also be shocked and surprised at how different it is. I think many of those differences, and the things we will struggle to wrap our heads around, that are hard to imagine, will be the consequence of the utter absence of the sins, pain, poor relationships, all the things that we are all too familiar with here, and struggle with so mightily. But then there will also be the truly unimaginable and (for now) indescribable.
I hope to compose a paper about one of those "indescribable" elements one of these days - and to "describe" it by relating it back to something we all see and recognize now, but that once was utterly unknown.
I think the closest I can come to imagining the interplay between the familiar and the new is to trace the implications that autonomous cars will have on our daily life. No need to own cars, just rent them - order them up like Uber - no garage, no traffic jams, no outlay on vehicle maintenance, washing the car, changing the snow tires etc etc No drunk drivers, greatly reduced automobile accidents and death - it goes on and on :)
That's a pretty good effort, John...
Autonomous vehicles will certainly have all those beneficial effects in the present age, assuming we're around long enough to enjoy that advancement.
One thing I've imagined in stories I've written in the past are "angels" being tasked with being our vehicles... Custom-designed beings who are a combination of chauffeur and vehicle all rolled into one... ;)
that's an intriguing concept - you may have invented a whole new genre- Christian science fiction,except the science isn't natural science but metaphysics. Write a story about that last line re angels as spiritual autonomous vehicles - a kind of Kitt in Knight Rider saga in the spirit realm
Hey there, John,
Thanks, I appreciate the encouragement.
The bible really is full of information suggesting things like this - have you read the first chapter of Ezekiel lately? ;)
And "angel" is really a very generic term for messenger, or agent. I'm sure the LORD has lots of "custom designs" we haven't seen or heard of... ;)