We leave for the Believe Conference in 3 hours (holy cow, I gotta pack!) I'm really looking forward to seeing what God's gonna do this weekend with our middle school students and leaders. It's gonna be great! I'll post updates throughout the weekend.

You can find details at www.ciy.com/believe.

Unanswered Questions #5

At the Edge, we did a two part questions night. I'm going to use this space to answer some of the questions we didn't get to that night.

Question: "What do you think Heaven is like?"

Answer: I've got to talk a little about what it isn't before we get to what it might be. If I haven't already confused you with that line, then let's jump in and see where this goes...

Okay, heaven is not a place where we sit on clouds, play harps, and have wings. All of that is stuff people have made up over the years, and you won't find any of it in the Bible. None of it. Period. Drop that boring idea right now.

It's also not streets of gold and mansions for everyone. You hear that one in church all the time, but it's not Biblical. Those pictures come out of the end of the book of Revelation mostly. In Revelation 21. It's a picture of the new city of Jerusalem. But it's all symbolic. It's not a real description, and alot of people don't even think it's a description of a city, but just of God's people. But for sure, it's not heaven. So we can let that whole thing go.

So what is heaven? Not much is said about it honestly. We know who is there. God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, and everyone who wants to follow them and worship them. We know that when we are there, the distance between us and Jesus is way less, and our ability to be with Him, to know Him, to be loved by Him is way easier. We have some pictures of angels worshiping God. But it's primarily about who we will be with, more than what the place is like.

I think that's on purpose by God. He didn't leave it out accidentally. He wants us to focus on Him and loving Him. That's what we are created for, that is when we are at our best, and that is what Heaven is all about.

What about the "heaven is boring" idea. I don't buy that at all. The more I follow Jesus, the more I obey, the more I realize what a risk taking, amazing God He is. To be closer to Him can't be boring, it will be full of adventure, passion, creativity, and excitement. So I don't know what heaven looks like, but I can promise it won't be boring. It's just not possible. Why would God make the place around Him boring?

I hope that helps a little. Fire back any more questions you want to ask specifically about heaven, and we can discuss it some more.