Heaven is a Place on Earth

Loss is never far from the human experience. This week my heart is aching for multiple friends who are grappling with family illnesses and confronting the very real prospect of losing loved ones. I had my own moments this weekend of realizing anew the pain of losing my dad, who's been gone for nearly nine years. What I wouldn't give for just a little more time with him, for him to watch my son handle a ball and hear him "read" his books. Imagine a world without that loss! Imagine a power who could take that pain away!

From Isaiah:

Thus says the LORD:
Lo, I am about to create new heavens
and a new earth;
The things of the past shall not be remembered
or come to mind.
Instead, there shall always be rejoicing and happiness
in what I create ....
No longer shall the sound of weeping be heard there,
or the sound of crying;
No longer shall there be in it
an infant who lives but a few days,
or an old man who does not round out his full lifetime;
He dies a mere youth who reaches but a hundred years,
and he who fails of a hundred shall be thought accursed.
They shall live in the houses they build,
and eat the fruit of the vineyards they plant.

Today's reading from Isaiah is a beautiful promise of paradise, of a land full of joy and absent of sorrow. Is this the promise that that the Israelites were waiting for the Messiah to fulfill? A tall order, to say the least. So when Jesus comes and, in John's gospel, begins to perform signs like turning water to wine, healing sick children and giving sight to the blind, is it any wonder that he'd be greeted with such great expectations from some—and such hostile resistance from others? What man would be able to accomplish the great feats described by Isaiah?

But we're not promised this world on earth; it's beyond our mortal grasp. What's the comfort? It's hard to look so far ahead for the promise of paradise after death. 

This is where I think the human community comes into play. It's our job to create as much heaven as we can muster here on earth. We can't eliminate the losses or take away the pains, but we can try—with kindness and generosity, with forgiveness, with care and concern and comfort—to lift each other up from the burdens that oppress and afflict us.