Christianity Has a Heaven Problem

Strolling along the riverwalk in downtown Omaha, I met a man on the corner waiting to cross the street. He had noticed my University of Kentucky hat and started asking me if I was from Kentucky. Not an entirely uncommon thing. Big blue fans and haters are everywhere, but very shortly thereafter, he proceeded to hand me one of those iconic biblical tracts with a picture stating “HEAVEN OR HELL.” I replied thank you, and let him know that I loved Jesus and knew where I was going. He smiled and let me go on my way.

However, for the next hour or so, the general approach of this man and his ministry really started to churn in me. I understand that the main point of any question like this is that it’s a launching point for a conversation, but the focus on heaven or hell isn’t just an ice breaker or some small factor of the current religious mindset in this nation. It’s the centerpiece, and to many, it defines their entire understanding of God. It is a limiter that predefines both the extent of our relationship we experience and the way outsiders understand our faith. God is so much more, and there is so much to experience in this life with an active relationship with Him.

The consequence of a church with its eyes primarily set on the next world is that it fails to answer the problems of this one with anything substantial other than eventually your suffering will end. It’s a pain pill of bottled hope for chronic conditions. The current state of Christianity is so focused on the end times, that we are living in them, that it fails to see that this world is full of people hurting, still crying out for answers. People that we don’t try to answer with our hearts and compassion now, but instead with promises of some distant salvation, because Jesus is coming back soon.

So many times have I heard this promise of rapture from 50+ year old individuals who have probably gone their entire lives believing that, and I have to wonder how much did that shape their interaction with the world and God over their lives. How much has that shaped the expectations of the church over generations? I can’t help but feel that a body expecting for this world to not be around much longer is one that doesn’t invest as heavily in it. I see this mentality infecting even churches that don’t deliver heaven or end times based messages on a consistent basis, because it’s about the general belief and expectation.

The ironic part of all of this is the true beauty of the promise of heaven is something that only gets better the more you know and love God. The stronger your relationship is, the more being in the presence of God means something. If God is playing an active role in your life, then you know how special that intimacy can feel. How overwhelming grace can be when you understand it. Maybe that’s the real temptation in wanting to share the promise of an eternity wrapped in that warmth, but to a non-believer who doesn’t understand that relationship personally, how can it remotely capture the same meaning.

To a skeptic, heaven is a cop out. It’s this completely unprovable, intangible thing that wraps up humanity’s biggest fears of death and finality in a nice package with a cushy answer. Every religion has some sort of afterlife described, and without any sort of connection, they all are just as distant and seemingly made up. In this age of science and knowledge, promises of mythical far off places seem no more likely to be real than that of Westeros or Hogwarts, and it is this focus on heaven that is not just making Christianity inaccessible, it’s turning people away.

If I were a non-believer and someone handed me this heaven or hell tract, I would have laughed at it. God is doing amazing things in my life right now and I’m growing so much in my faith and my relationship with him because I hunger for more. That hunger is me acknowledging what my life is missing. The concept of heaven doesn’t fill that. God does. My relationship with Him does. Me hearing His word does. And it is those qualities of Him that we should be sharing on the street corners and in people’s lives. Instead of asking me if I’m going to heaven or hell, that man should have been asking me if I feel loved. If I feel complete. If there’s something missing in my life.

People are lost. Millennials joke constantly about depression and suicide. Even though we are in one of the most prosperous eras of all time, there is more collective animosity and fear than at any point in my recollection. Yet the church is not flourishing with new bodies that would reflect this need for answers. It’s dwindling. It’s being wrapped up and lost in the same bickering the rest of the world is caught up in.

Heaven is real, but it should not be our focus. Extending that kingdom here on earth today. It is not a physical outward measure, but a internal reality that effects the physical realm. That is what Jesus had in mind for us to do. That is the best way you can bring people closer to him. It is also what Paul taught. By preaching and sharing the love we know to be true. The instruction is to spread Christ on earth, not waiting for him to come to us.

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