Theology Talk: Memory in Heaven
A couple of days ago I posted about how several of my dead relatives should have been at my graduation party, and weren't. A couple of my regular posters (The Wife and Billy D) commented that my dead relations were there "in spirit".
I was alerted to the following verse...
... at a Bible study in about 1998. I didn't much care for it when I read it, because like everyone else does, I'd taken comfort in the fact that my loss of my loved ones wasn't a total loss: that they were up in Heaven, looking down on me and observing the continuing happenings of my life.
However, the more I turned it around in my head, the more sense the alternative made. The Bible tells us, and basic observation confirms it (unless you're a complete tool), that most of life's problems are caused by humans and human nature. So why would we want to remember this in Heaven, which is supposed to be the ultimate reward? Would you want to spend eternity being reminded of the pain you had to endure in this life? Of course not.
Our reward is separation from pain and eternal communion with God. That's what Heaven is. Hell is in some ways a punishment, but it's considered by most theologians to be a place where one receives the eternity they chose: by separating themselves from God in this life, they are resigned to separation from God in the next life.
Bottom line? It makes a lot more sense to me that our divine reward would be a separation from any memory of anything that was tangentally related to pain or regret. Though the separation from my deceased loved ones is painful to me, I would hate to believe that part of their eternity would include constant reminders of that emotional pain caused by separation, and by memories of the world they left behind.
I know folks will likely disagree with this, and that's cool; I post it not to be contentious, but to explain my position on the subject. If you have thoughts, please post them.
I was alerted to the following verse...
"Behold, I will create new heavens and a new earth. The former things will not be remembered, nor will they come to mind."
- Isaiah 65:17
... at a Bible study in about 1998. I didn't much care for it when I read it, because like everyone else does, I'd taken comfort in the fact that my loss of my loved ones wasn't a total loss: that they were up in Heaven, looking down on me and observing the continuing happenings of my life.
However, the more I turned it around in my head, the more sense the alternative made. The Bible tells us, and basic observation confirms it (unless you're a complete tool), that most of life's problems are caused by humans and human nature. So why would we want to remember this in Heaven, which is supposed to be the ultimate reward? Would you want to spend eternity being reminded of the pain you had to endure in this life? Of course not.
Our reward is separation from pain and eternal communion with God. That's what Heaven is. Hell is in some ways a punishment, but it's considered by most theologians to be a place where one receives the eternity they chose: by separating themselves from God in this life, they are resigned to separation from God in the next life.
Bottom line? It makes a lot more sense to me that our divine reward would be a separation from any memory of anything that was tangentally related to pain or regret. Though the separation from my deceased loved ones is painful to me, I would hate to believe that part of their eternity would include constant reminders of that emotional pain caused by separation, and by memories of the world they left behind.
I know folks will likely disagree with this, and that's cool; I post it not to be contentious, but to explain my position on the subject. If you have thoughts, please post them.
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