Why Should I Want To Go To Heaven?

[Joveia]

Hi ericlawrence, here are my two cents:

While, in my experience, Christians are capable of describing the horrors of Hell vividly and with great proficiency, they have yet to dream up an illustration of eternal happiness that can be conveyed in a way that anyone should so much as be impressed with the scenery.

Something interesting about our happiness in this life is that it is very, you could say, 'temporal'. That is, people's happiness experiences a huge issue with boredom. Some people would be happy to live forever as long as they could keep experiencing new things forever, but in polls a lot of people say that they wouldn't want to live forever if they could do so.

I believe this is because human happiness is not naturally hardwired for eternity. Our ability to be happy cannot sustain us for that long. E.g. it's a relatively common motif in horror stories that someone is condemned to live forever even though they can do whatever they want.

But it's interesting to note that God is not at all like this, and we can know this if any God exists because otherwise God would have gone completely insane with boredom. In most theologies God is eternal and outside time, and thus God has already lived for an infinite length of time. If God's happiness can't handle eternity, then God would be mad with depression.

And this leads to the conclusion that, because God is naturally eternal or for some other reason, God's happiness is a kind of happiness we have no experience of in this world - apart from through the Holy Spirit's sense of peace, if Christianity is to be believed. This can be indicated, if any God exists, from the reasoning above.

Thus, I conclude that heaven is good and pleasant because we have access to this divine kind of happiness that allows someone to be at peace and contented forever without being made insane or something.

See Rom 14:17: "For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit,"

We get this happiness through being connected to God through His Holy Spirit. And this is made possible by Jesus Christ removing our sins when He took them into himself on the cross (1 Pe 2:24).

Is there freewill in Heaven?

There is but to see why I think you need a particular view of evil. In traditional Christian theology evil is not anything real but is an absence of good. It's a mistake, an error in reasoning, a lack of empathy.

For example, suppose someone wants people to treat them well, but they are really rude to staff at restaurants and other places. If someone could make them feel the pain they cause others for no reason, then this person would change their behaviour because they wouldn't want to be treated in this way. So their bad behaviour is actually the result of them not being consistent with their own principles in terms of how they want to be treated. Evil is not being truthful about oneself and one's own wants.

So if you believe this is what evil is, then in heaven God will make us completely truthful. Because we are completely truthful, we can never choose to be evil because evil is a lack of truth in a situation.

We will be unable to do evil in the sense that you are unable to find it desirable to rob banks or murder people - that is, you are free to do it, but you can't do it because you can't be tempted by it.

An eternity spent groveling beneath rule of an immortal king who's absolute rule over the kingdom will never come to an end, and who will never let you go - I dare say, to me this would be Hell.
What is enticing about Heaven to you? Is there anything that I should find enticing about it?

Let's say you have a friend who is an amazingly good person. They are 100% genuine, kind, respectful, trustworthy, dependable, etc. They are generous to a fault, and are a very kind husband/wife who works very hard to support their family.

You would I suppose respect them a lot, and this would just be a natural reaction to the truth of the situation.

Now, what if God is perfectly good, powerful, and loving, and is the creator of everything? Then respecting God and putting God at the centre of one's life is not anything different from your presumed reaction to your friend - it would just be a natural reaction to the truth.

 

[elman]

While, in my experience, Christians are capable of describing the horrors of Hell vividly and with great proficiency, they have yet to dream up an illustration of eternal happiness that can be conveyed in a way that anyone should so much as be impressed with the scenery. (Islam, on the other hand, has at least made a rather crude attempt at sweetening the pot with the promise of 72 virgins.) Is there freewill in Heaven? Is there pleasure? Is there any truth left to search for in Heaven or has the pursuit of knowledge become a dead enterprise? Where is the value of living for an eternity with no mysteries left to uncover? An eternity spent groveling beneath rule of an immortal king who's absolute rule over the kingdom will never come to an end, and who will never let you go - I dare say, to me this would be Hell.
What is enticing about Heaven to you? Is there anything that I should find enticing about it?

Heaven is life. Hell is death. Your question is why chose life over death?

 

[If Not For Grace]

Believers are not “happy” on earth but can have much joy, a wonderful objective, can participate in a wonderful work, can be partners with God’s Spirit in allowing the indwelling Spirit to accomplish great things and thus share in His glory by being there.

I guess you woul d have to define happy for me-b/c I thought I was happy (at lease most of the time) & I know some other people who think they are happy, & I know my dog is happy!