I have had these same thoughts and questions. The only thing that ever made sense to me regarding Heaven was the description in C.S. Lewis's final Narnia book
The Last Battle. That was the only description of a heaven I wanted to go to. Just as Aslan was the most compelling Christ image I've ever come across.
The Narnia books are actually written for children, but I think they are very profound.
The gist of the Heaven image given in this book is that the earth is like a shadow of Heaven. Heaven is the true place--as much richer and fuller and more detailed as your body is when compared to its shadow.
In fact, C.S. Lewis has referred to this world as the "Shadowlands" often.
If Heaven is anything like the book
Childhood's End where humanity is sucked into a soulless, identity-less "overmind"--then, I'll pass.
I may not be much, but I am all I have.
I was doing a lot of soul-searching this summer, and I wrote a couple of poems--they aren't very good, but they do truly reflect what I was thinking and feeling at the time I wrote them. They deal a bit with what you are talking about in your post.
So, read them if you want--or don't.
God, Who Are you, Really?
God, who are you, really?
So many people say they know.
An they'll be glad to tell me,
And also where I'll go.
Some say you are a stern-faced judge;
Some say that you are love;
Some say you're just a real old guy
Up in the clouds above.
Some say you keep a careful count
Of all the crimes I've done
And they tell me there are many,
Enough to block the sun.
Oh, I've been told I'm going to hell
Too many times to number,
For horrid crimes like talking back,
Or ignoring work to slumber.
God, do you really care at all
If I have a tattoo?
Or more than one or even two?
Does it matter much to you?
When I was only eight years old
And threw a screaming fit,
Did you make black marks on my white page
To rub my nose in it?
Or when I was up in my teens
And told my dad to die,
(I really didn't mean it.)
Did my words make you cry?
Do you keep track of every sin
No matter how minute?
Lots of them were just mistakes--
Ignorance their root.
And when I did some real bad stuff
My heart brim full of malice
And hurt someone who had hurt me
And took sick pride in this
I always learned that it was me
Who really paid the price
Always the guilt filled up my soul
And nibbled me like mice.
Some say you are salvation
And always will forgive,
But, they say, I must confess
And change the way I live.
There's the rub that puzzles me
'Cause I don't understand
Just how to change my nature
To fit what you have planned.
Some say you want me to be good
And by that, what they mean
Is that they must control my life
Or my soul will be unclean.
I've read the Bible many times,
One cover to the other,
So much to grasp and comprehend,
I feel like I will smother.
And there is always someone
Who swears that he is wise
Who's willing to instruct me,
But I don't trust his eyes.
It's too easy to manipulate
The verses that they read
To imply almost anything
And force others to heed.
And that is why I wonder
And write this poem to thee
God, who are you, really?
Will you show yourself to me?
When I Get to Heaven
When I get to Heaven
And stand outside the door,
Will Jesus come to greet me,
Or will I drop right through the floor?
When the dusty ledger opens
And he turns it to my page,
Will his eyes glitter with pleasure,
Or his brow furrow with rage?
Will he show me what is written there
Penned in his own hand:
The evil actions weighed in stones,
The good in grains of sand?
The world is deep and broad and wide;
To live in it's the goal.
Each day a hundred million trials
Spring up to test my soul.
And some days I am tired,
And some days I am sad.
And some days (sigh) I just don't care,
And so I choose the bad.
Some days, I feel quite content.
And even so, I fear,
My choices are just not that great--
The worst ways I could steer.
Some days I swear and stamp my feet
Because I'm feeling irked,
And so I jerk somebody's chain
Because my chain's been jerked.
And some days I just tell a lie
For no reason that is known
Except it suits me to evade
A thing that makes me groan.
When I think back on my fell deeds,
They mostly make me sad.
It hurts to look into my heart,
And see that I am bad.
And yet I feel a longing toward
The things both right and pure.
And I look up toward heaven
And contemplate a cure.
God, I believe, can fix me up
And change my wrong to right.
But how will I be different then?
Will I be strange in my own sight?
If not myself, I wonder now,
Just who I might become.
And wonder too, I must admit,
If I'll loath the changes some.
Who I am is all I've had
For many, many years,
It's overcome some dismal days
And crossed o'er lakes of tears.
And it's hard for me to let it go,
This bitter thing I am,
As in some way I cherish it
Though it isn't worth a damn.
And so I ponder as I sit
And contemplate God's plans
If I deserve to enter in
To God's true holy lands.
I feel I should be on my knees
To plead for my salvation
Instead of feeling hesitant
To submit to alteration.
I guess it boils right down to trust
And that for me is hard
Even when it's God himself,
I can't let down my guard.
And so I think of Heaven,
And I fret about my fate.
When I stand there at the doorway,
Will they open up the gate?
).
I can't believe I missed it! Will definitely have to check it out. Thanks, Fist and Faith.
