Is it ok to dislike Heaven?

Akibahara said:

Now, I know many of you are like: "Why? It's a great place! It'll be beautiful, we can explore a vast world, we'll sing, eat and dance and have lots of fun!" Yeah, I read that. I'm a Baptist Christian, and I'm reading through Heaven by Randy Alcorn -- and Heaven STILL isn't appealing to me. I mean, sure, if you're an extrovert who loves the outside and social activities. I'm more of an indoor person unless it involves something unique and exciting.

From what I read, New Earth will be located here -- there'll be a New Jerusalem, an eternal Heaven, and amongst other things. We'll be able to communicate face-to-face with Christ, eat at large banquets (PS: If I were in Heaven, I could honestly care less about food), explore the unknown, etc.

But...

All my questions I asked in the past concerning Heaven were met with "maybes" or a flat-out "no": I may be able to explore fictional universes beyond eternal Heaven, or ideas I wrote up in my earthly body; there will not be sex in Heaven, but some sort of "transformed version" of it; and all love in Heaven is agape love--or brotherly love.

Honestly, Islamic Paradise (no, I'm not a Muslim) seems a bit more appealing... :/

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Do you expect hell to have sex in it? Unlikely. Sex was created by God...it was a good thing that has been distorted into all sorts of evil variations. But that doesn't change that it was created by God for the enjoyment of couples. Nothing on earth was created in a vacuum...we are created in the image of God and everything good on earth is a shadow of what heaven is like. So whatever heaven's version of sex is must be fabulous...it isn't your watered down version of "brotherly love" which sounds like some version the dreaded "friend zone". I also suspect it doesn't involve needing a shower afterwards...and it won't involve infidelity since marriage doesn't exist...

Since Jesus often referred to the church as being the bride and He was the bridegroom...I kind of personally expect the whole experience of heaven to be not unlike an orgasmic experience. Joy like can't be described with words.

Akibahara said:

Now, I know many of you are like: "Why? It's a great place! It'll be beautiful, we can explore a vast world, we'll sing, eat and dance and have lots of fun!" Yeah, I read that. I'm a Baptist Christian, and I'm reading through Heaven by Randy Alcorn -- and Heaven STILL isn't appealing to me. I mean, sure, if you're an extrovert who loves the outside and social activities. I'm more of an indoor person unless it involves something unique and exciting.

From what I read, New Earth will be located here -- there'll be a New Jerusalem, an eternal Heaven, and amongst other things. We'll be able to communicate face-to-face with Christ, eat at large banquets (PS: If I were in Heaven, I could honestly care less about food), explore the unknown, etc.

But...

All my questions I asked in the past concerning Heaven were met with "maybes" or a flat-out "no": I may be able to explore fictional universes beyond eternal Heaven, or ideas I wrote up in my earthly body; there will not be sex in Heaven, but some sort of "transformed version" of it; and all love in Heaven is agape love--or brotherly love.

Honestly, Islamic Paradise (no, I'm not a Muslim) seems a bit more appealing... :/

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To call our eternal home "Heaven" is confusing. Our eternal home is the New Earth. Read Rev. 20 & 21. Heaven is God's domain. We will not be living there. And the Bible does not address sex in eternity.

blackribbon

Hell is the absence of God and everything good. Burning alive without being consumed is a visual picture of what it will be like to be separated for eternity from God. It isn't a physical fire.

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There is no reason to consider that hell isn't physical or that the flames are not physical. Jesus' story about Lazarus and the Abraham's Bosom included a man who said he was on fire. Jesus called hell a furnace and said it's a place where people scream and grind their teeth and he did not say or add or explain "... but I'm just being metaphorical, it's not real fire" . There also isn't any reason think Jesus wouldn't burn people. He had women burned to death by commandment in Leviticus.

And we all deserve to be separated from God...that is the eternity we have all earned.

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That's circular. The bible god created his own rules and declared that it's what we deserve and that we have to be punished in his own torture device. It all rests upon his unfounded opinion, and he kills and tortures people too so his opinion shouldn't matter. He's not a reliable moral source.

However, it is through coming to God and asking for forgiveness and worshipping Him that we are given the gift of GRACE that allows us to spend eternity not in our earned place but rather in the presence of God. This is a gift offered to EVERY single soul that accepts it. It isn't exclusive. God wishes to give it to all but not everyone is willing to accept the gift and so they get the eternity they have earned instead.

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Having a choice to please the murderer or rapist or torturer does not change that murder and rape and torture is not morally justifiable. If I was going to rape you and promised I wouldn't if you'd love me, me raping you if you refused would still be wrong. That's what happened in Isaiah 13. God had sinners raped and killed.

This is ultimate justice. No one is innocent. Those that ask for grace get it....those who don't, don't have it forced on them.

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If I came to your home today and told you that I was going to put you in your stove and turn it on unless you confess your sins to me and promise to love me. Would you? Would you do it just to get away and consider my dilemma just? Would truth and morality not matter?

There is no reason to consider the god's claims of sin to be true, he simply insists that we are sinners, even when there is no human who has ever brought the amount of pain and destruction that he does.

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It's also silly to say I am guilty because he says so. I am not allowed to lie, or steal or have sex before marriage or be gay or look at women in desire.... but he's allowed to set me on fire and burn me and listen to me scream forever. That's backwards.

Kiritsugu Emiyah said:

So is heaven comprehendible or not? You said it wasn't, now you're saying it is (to special people)

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It is once you get there. Until then you can only understand it in abstract terms.

Strathos said:

It is once you get there. Until then you can only understand it in abstract terms.

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So god did fail to communicate it then

Kiritsugu Emiyah said:

So god did fail to communicate it then

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Only by your definition.

Strathos said:

Only by your definition.

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You said you couldn't comprehend heaven

We're not meant to, until we get there.

Strathos said:

We're not meant to, until we get there.

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So you do not comprehend it. That means his attempt at causing you to comprehend was not a success.

We're not supposed to comprehend it fully until we get there.

Strathos said:

We're not supposed to comprehend it fully until we get there.

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That doesn't change that he tried to communicate it in the bible and it didn't work

No, He gave us clues as to the general properties it has, He never intended to reveal everything. There are such things as divine mysteries we're not supposed to know (yet).

Strathos said:

No, He gave us clues as to the general properties it has, He never intended to reveal everything. There are such things as divine mysteries we're not supposed to know (yet).

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He actually made statements like "this creature looks like this, this is what it does all day" "This gate looks like this, it's made of this" "The people do this and say this"

He intended to communicate the nature of heaven to you, that you do not understand meant he did not succeed in causing you to understand.

Do you know what metaphorical language is?

Do you know the purpose of a metaphor?

blackribbon said:

Since Jesus often referred to the church as being the bride and He was the bridegroom...I kind of personally expect the whole experience of heaven to be not unlike an orgasmic experience. Joy like can't be described with words.

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The Ecstacy of St. Theresa. Yeah, the beatific vision is supposed to be orgasmic. That is to say that heaven, being in the presence of God with full communication, is suppose to be orgasmic.



On earth certain drugs can cause orgasmic feelings even though you're not having sex. So, if that is possible on earth, theoretically it should be possible in heaven.

But you can no more know what heaven is like than you can know what meth or cocaine is like unless you experience each one personally.

I think some saint once said that we on earth can no more comprehend heaven and all its experiences than an unborn child can comprehend life on earth outside the womb. Seems a logical proposition assuming heaven exists.