Heaven
Heaven and Hell are probably the two most misunderstood words one can come across, and the two most misused as well. So quite a lot of what I must write down is linguistic, and necessarily detailed. But bear with me, as there is a worthwhile purpose, I trust.
In the Old Testament of the Bible the word is actually plural (Hebrew shamayim) and means literally 'heaved up things'. The English translation varies from a singular 'heaven' to a plural 'heavens'. It is used of what we would call the atmosphere (or the sky), in phrases such as 'the birds of the heavens', or even space: 'the stars in the heavens' and so on. So when Moses is commanded to 'stretch forth thy rod towards heaven' (Exodus 10:21) it does not necessarily mean anything more than 'upwards'.
The trouble comes when we get to phrases which seem to treat Heaven as God's own place, and this is carried into the New Testament: in Matthew's gospel the 'Kingdom of Heaven' is used where the exactly equivalent phrase in Luke's gospel is the 'Kingdom of God'. When we say today 'Heaven forbid!' we mean simply 'God forbid!'. Paul talks about 'the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places' (Ephesians 6:12). This helps us understand a third essential meaning for 'heaven': in contrast to earth (the physical universe) there is heaven (the spiritual universe). As recorded in the gospel of John (3:12) Jesus says to Nicodemus: 'I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things?'
So there is a first heaven (the sky – the atmosphere – where birds fly), the second heaven (space – where stars and planets are), and a third heaven (outside, beyond, not of this physical universe). We do well to remember these threefold uses in the Bible.
This is what Solomon said when he dedicated the building he had built where God might be worshipped in Jerusalem: 'O Lord, God of Israel, there is no God like you in the heaven above or on the earth below ... But will God really dwell on earth? The heavens, even the highest heaven, cannot contain you. How much less this temple I have built?' (1 Kings 8:22-27)
And Paul writes of his own 'out of body' experience: 'I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know – God knows ... He heard inexpressible things, things that man is not permitted to tell.' (2 Corinthians 12:2-4).
The trouble comes when we start talking of Heaven as a place, or worse, as a reward, where the 'good' go after they die. This leads to all sorts of silly thoughts about who is going to get an entrance ticket, and on what basis, which is a total parody of the 'good news' of the Christian message.
Let us be quite clear: we are all going to exist for ever. That is the core belief of the vast majority of the human race in all history; it is only in relatively recent times that an ideology has come into popularity that asserts that death is the end not only of the body but also of the soul, the essence, the identity, of any human. It is singularly popular in post-Christian materialism; it certainly does enable a believer in this doctrine to say: 'eat, drink, and be merry; for tomorrow we die.'
The ancient Greeks believed in an afterlife, with Hades, and the river Styx, and the Elysian Fields, and so on. The three major monotheistic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) all believe in an afterlife, and in their own distinctive way, Hinduism and Buddhism also believe in a continuity of the soul beyond the death of the body. So to assert that death brings an absolute end, like the snuffing out of a candle, is to depart from the majority position. It is an act of faith, as much as to believe that death is not an absolute end is an act of faith. In many ways the belief that death is not an absolute end is more difficult, not less difficult: that there is a continuation implies that what I do in this mortal life has eternal consequences, really matters, in other words. Life matters, eternally. This is the doctrine which calls us to take it more seriously, to consider the eternal as well as the temporal, the heavenly (which will last for ever) as well as the earthly (which will pass away).
Now there is a certain approach where a reward, a paradise, in one doctrine asserted to be literally full of pleasures like eating, and the presence of beautiful women (houris), are promised to those who earn it. A dangerous doctrine indeed, when young men (and women) can be persuaded that going into a crowded place with a bomb strapped to them and detonating said bomb, to achieve their own death and those of many unsuspecting others, will ensure such a reward. What sort of a God rewards His followers in this way?
The Christian view never proclaims Heaven as a reward. Quite the contrary: if we are to get what we deserve, says the Christian gospel, it were far kinder to give us extinction. What Jesus Christ offered was 'life', not 'bios' (biological life) but 'zoe' (spiritual life). When we are released from this earthly body, there will be a better body awaiting us, imperishable and glorious. This is the message that Christians celebrate at Easter, that the last enemy has indeed been conquered:
'So it is with the resurrection of the dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable. It is sown in dishonour, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body.' (1 Corinthians 15:42-44)
Those who desire the presence of God within their lives in the here and now will find that choice has determined the 'then' too. Similarly, those who prefer to leave God on the outside now are choosing an eternal 'outside'. The choices we make every day matter – eternally. Something more than we can ever earn or deserve is offered, and it is a gift that is ours for the taking. Only the fool wants rewards, his just deserts, what he has earned. Alas, that is just what he will get.