On Earth as It is In Heaven pt. 1

I’ll never forget when my family moved into our new house ten years ago. Even though I was just a little guy at the time, the sights and smells of that house are inescapably memorable for all the wrong reasons. There was this disgusting brown shag carpet covering every inch of the floor. Termites had nearly destroyed most of the framework of the house. The walls were stained. Not one thing worked the way it was supposed to. It was messy, disgusting, and the whole place smelled like cat urine. It was a hellhole, a place of decay and of deadness.

When my parents bought that house, they had not planned on staying there permanently. It was in a nice neighborhood in the heart of the burbs, a good place for my brother and I to grow up. But once we were gone, the real party would start for them. They planned on moving somewhere new, better, more beautiful. They never intended to retire in that house, or spend their “glory” years there.

But, imagine for a moment if in light of the fact that they would one day be leaving, into a newer, better and more perfect house they ignored the mess of the one they were currently living in. Instead of removing the carpet and tiling the floor, cleaning the grime and dirt, fixing the water lines and electrical wiring, and restoring our house they let it continue to rot and decay. Of course they wouldn’t add to the mess, but they wouldn’t try and fix the problems that already existed either.

That would have been easier; it would have sheltered them from actually dealing with the issues and the problems, and it would have been “ok” because ultimately all of their hope was in their new, shiny, future house.

That wouldn’t just would not make sense. In fact it would have been abusive, sick, perverse and irresponsible.

Sadly, Christians are often times guilty of this type of thinking, the worn-out and broken tirades about heaven; a far away happy land that Christians are miraculously vacuum-raptured to. And on that magical ride to heaven we will all look back in joy and amazement as the Earth is destroyed, all the mess, the rejects, and the wretched along with it. Maybe it started as a gross misinterpretation of the New Testament that was passed on and became a tradition, but for whatever reasons this way of thinking plagues our Christian community.

And it breeds attitudes and spawns actions like:

1. Praying continuously for the glorious and wonderful end times and rapture.

2.  Avoiding places where darkness is because obviously we’re “not of this world.”

3.  Hiding away from the darkness and grotesqueness of people, or evil.

4.  Altogether avoiding political issues, oppressive regimes because it “doesn’t really matter.”

5.  Getting people to pray prayers, partake in ceremonies, and attend worship services so they can get their tickets to the heavenly happy land, while their earthly life is strangely the same.

6. Using the Earth’s resources irresponsibly because “it’s all gonna be burned up anyway.”

But this is not what Jesus meant or intended when he prayed things like, “May your kingdom come and your will be done on Earth as it is in heaven.” And when he talked about a life to full, it didn’t mean in the future and definitely not in some distant world in the sky. Jesus believed that heaven and earth were coming together, that a new kingdom and a new era in human history had begun.

An era where the smells, the stains, the shag carpet, and the decay could no longer be ignored. 

Part one of a two part post. Read part two.