irony, thy name is the next page

There are times when the irony is so thick, one wonders how the author didn't get slapped up side the head with it while he was writing.

Consider this, from McLaren's "The Secret Message of Jesus", p. 118.

I should acknowledge that many people assume the sermon (Sermon on the Mount) intends to answer one question--namely, "How does an individual go to heaven after death?"...I have become convinced that Jesus is exploring a very different set of questions--... Rather then directing our attention to life after death in heaven, away from this life and beyond history, these questions return our focus to the here and now--and in so doing, they provide an essential window into Jesus' secret message.

While granting that the Sermon on the Mount is about more than getting to Heaven, the irony comes in when you actually consider some of the things Jesus said in it, which McLaren actually has written out over the next few pages in his book.

Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kind of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven...

Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisess, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
pp. 119, 120

These are parts of the Sermon, and are early in the record of it. And we see Jesus telling about the kingdom of heaven and rewards in heaven. Far from being peripheral or even nonexistent, it looks like Jesus' teachings in the Sermon have Heaven pretty much in focus.

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
p. 132

This passage gets short changed (pardon the pun) in the book. He tries to make it all about secrecy, which is likely a way of de-emphasizing the "treasures in heaven" aspect--sneaking in treasures on earth, but doing so in a pious and 'spiritual' way; rather, I would say this is about focus. If we keep in mind what the NT says elsewhere about our longing for our real home, where God is, then we can see that storing up treasures in Heaven real is about storing up treasures in Heaven.

To understand McLaren's attempt to de-emphasize Heaven, you must understand that he wants to establish the Kingdom of Heaven here on earth. And I don't mean that he wants Jesus to return to establish His reign on the earth, but that he wants to use political means to establish his version of the Kingdom of Heaven (and if you think I'm misrepresenting him, consider why his writings have such a political element to them, and why he writes for the political blog Sojourners).

Such thinking is wrong. Let him ridicule us as being "escapist" or whatever other labels, as he wishes--he answers no questions that way, and only comes off as childish.

heaven (and hell) is a place on earth?

In the book of Psalms, it's written: "The LORD has established his throne in heaven, and his kingdom rules over all" To the Jewish mind, heaven is not a fixed, unchanging geographical location somewhere other than this world. Heaven is the realm where things are as God intended them to be. The place where things are under the rule and reign of God. And that place can be anywhere, anytime, with anybody.

Now if there's a realm where things are as God wants them to be, then there must be a realm where things are not as God wants them to be. Where things aren't accodring to God's will. Where people aren't treated as fully human.

It's called hell.

Rob Bell, sex god, p. 21

If there is any doubt that Bell is saying that Heaven and Hell are things or condition here on Earth, in this present world, read a page further.

When Jesus talks about heaven and hell, they are first and foremost present realitites that have serioius implications for the future. Either can be invited to earth, right now, through our actions.

It's possible for heaven to invade earth.

And it's possible for hell to invade earth.

p. 22

I don't know if some other part of the book deals with his thoughts on after-death matters, but at least from that little bit, Bell is pretty much saying heaven and hell are here, that we humans make our own heaven and hell here on earth.

It would be interesting to know where he gets this stuff. For example, one can look at Jesus' story of the rich man in Hell to see that he didn't wind up there until after he died. One could as well look at Jesus' words to the criminal at the crucifixion, telling him he would be with Him in Paradise, to know that if one is promising Paradise to a man soon to die, then that Paradise has nothing to do with this present world.

ooooo, heaven is a place on earth???

Because our questions about the afterlife have risen out of the Greek worldview, rather than the Hebrew culture of the early church, it's not surprising that we can find very little in the way of answers. But if we are willing to suspend the need for answers to those questions for a bit, I believe we find a whole other set of questions that are worth pursuing with equal passion.

The early Christians saw heaven not as a place we go to but as a reality that comes to us. They talked about redemption and healing coming through God's creation, not apart from it. They believed we would live as freed bodies in this healed place, not as freed spirits in some other place.
Pagitt, A Christianity Worth Believing, p. 228-229

Counterpoint.

Praise by to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a lving hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,

and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade--kept in heaven for you,

who through faith are shielded by God's power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time.
I Peter 1:3-5



Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands.

Meanwhile, we groan, longing to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling,

because when we are clothed, we will not be found naked.

For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed, but to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life.

Now it is God who has made us for this very purpose and has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.

Therefore we are always confident and know that as long as we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord.

We live by faith, not by sight.

We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord.

So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it.

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may recieve what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.
I Corinthians 5:1-10




Jesus replied. "You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God.

At the resurrection people will neither marry nor by given in marriage; they will be like the angels of heaven.

But about the resurrection of the dead--have you not read what God said to you,

"I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob"?

He is not the God of the dead but of the living.
Matthew 22:29-32




Brothers, we do not want you to be ignorant about those who fall asleep, or to grieve like the rest of men, who have no hope.

We believe that Jesus died and rose again and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him.
I Thessalonians 4:13-14




He died for us so that, whether we are awake or asleep, we may live together with him.
I Thessalonians 5:10

The Bible does say much about how things will be set right when Christ returns, among men and in all Creation; however, in regards to the earth, it also says that it is "reserved for fire", and that we look for "new heavens and a new earth", which seems to be something similar but different to what we have now.

As such, then, I think that Pagitt must do more then just claim that the early church didn't see Heaven as a place they would go to. Paul is pretty plain that "to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord". That doesn't negate the things said about Christ's rule when He returns, but those don't negate the other, either. Jesus said that in His day Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were living, and in the Transfiguration He converses with Moses and Elijah, who in body had been dead hundreds of years, and for Moses well over a thousand years.

And consider such biblical passages as are above, I think we can say that they did see Heaven as a place. A place where those who died before are, and where we go after we die.

so, where did he get that idea?

Jesus made it clear that the afterlife isn't a place. It's a state of being...

While it might not seem like it at first glance, even Jesus' comments about "going to prepare a place for you" and "in my Father's house there are many rooms" come from the rabbinic tradition and are meant to create a picture of God's redemption on earth.
Pagitt, A Christianity Worth Believing, p. 222-223

Although not as footnotes-happy as Bell or Tony Jones, Pagitt does have several in this book; however, when he makes this contention about Jesus' statement about His Father's house having many rooms, there are no footnotes, and no support is given to his claims about the interpretation he claims.

Also, there is the disciple's own reactions, recorded in the passages in John, to Jesus' statement. They are troubled by His words, and ask where He was going, and are in sorrow that He would leave.

If they knew He was only using figurative language, then why did it bother them so much? Would they not have welcomed it if it had been "a picture of God's redemption on earth"?

You heard me say, "I am going away and I am coming back to you." If you loved me, you would be glad that I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I.

I have told you now before it happens, so that when it does happen you will believe.
John. 14:28-29

Perhaps Pagitt has some kind of supports for his claims. But if so, what are they? What rabbinic tradition is it that says what he claims? Why is his claim not supported? Could no specifics have been given, no specific resource cited?

the emergent shift?

"Preach the gospel to all creation," Christ said. Are we only now beginning to understand what he meant? I believe the unwritten melody that haunts this book ever so faintly, the new song waiting to be sung in place of the hymn of salvation, is simply the song of creation. To move away from the theology of salvation to the theology of creation may be the task of our time.
Vincent Donovan, Christianity Rediscovered, quoted in McLaren, A Generous Orthodoxy, pp. 100-101

One of those 'in a nutshell' statements--Heaven is traded for earth, salvation is discarded in exchange for saving the world, love of the world pursued.

Plus, I suppose we could ask, where did Jesus say to preach the gospel to all creation (as if either Donovan or McLaren were Creationists, we may wonder). Preach it to every nation, all peoples, yes. All of creation? Book, chapter, and verse, please.

spinning lewis

We've said it again and again in these pages: the secret message of Jesus isn't primarily about "heaven after you die". It doesn't give us an exit ramp or escape hatch from this world; rather, it thrusts us back into the here and now so we can be part of God's dream for planet Earth coming true.
McLaren, The Secret Message of Jesus, p. 183

It rather honks me off that in the chapter in which he writes that sentence, he quotes C.S. Lewis rather a lot, as if Lewis was on his side in this, as if Lewis is some kind of 'posthumous Friend of Emergent' (dare I say, an 'emergent zombie'? Ht the movie "An American Carol" and ACLU zombies). Read these, please, and see if you think that Lewis thought that ideas of Heaven (notice I capitalize that name, and notice that McLaren doesn't) was some kind of 'escape hatch'.

Hope is one of the Theological virtues. This means that a continual looking forward to the eternal world is not (as some modern people think) a form of escapism or wishful thinking, but one of the things a Christian is meant to do. It does not mean we are to leave the present world as it is. If you read history you will find that Christians who did most for the present world were just those who thought most of the next. The Apostles themselves, who set on foot the conversion of the Roman Empire, the great men who built up the Middle Ages, the English Evangelicals who abolished the Slave Trade, all left their mark on Earth, precisely because their minds were occupied with Heaven. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this. Aim at Heaven and you will get earth 'thrown in': aim at earth and you will get neither.
Lewis, Mere Christianity, p. 134

'...If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probably explanation is that I was made for the other world. If none of my earthly pleasures satisfy it, that does not prove that the universe is a fraud. Probably earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it, but only to arouse it, to suggest the real thing...I must keep alive in myself the desire for my true country, which I shall not find till after death; I must never let it get snowed under or turned aside; I must make it the main object of life to press on to that country and to help others to do the same.'
Lewis, Mere Christianity, pp. 136-137

The doctrine of the Second Coming teaches us that we do not and cannot know when the world drama will end. The curtain may be rung down at any moment: say, before you have finished reading this paragraph...

The doctrine of the Second Coming, then, is not to be rejected because it conflicts with our favorite modern mythology. It is, for that very reason, to be the more valued and made more frequently the subject of meditation. It is the medicine our condition especially needs.
Lewis, The World's Last Night, pp. 105, 106

Lewis does not seem to at all denigrate the hope of the 'other world' as McLaren seems to do. Lewis even equates those who have a healthy hope for life after death with those who do the most good here on earth, as opposed to emergents who seem at best embarrassed by the afterlife and either cite some kind of 'Platonic dualism' or try to shift focus away from it as quickly as they can.

But emergents can't get away with it. They have aimed for earth instead of Heaven, and so shall have neither. They shall, no doubt with the best on intentions (such as the ones that pave the way to hell), redefine and deconstruct the Bible to fit their own presuppositions (all while condemning the presuppositionalism of others), embrace other religions as being other ways to God (all while condemning those in their own religion who know the Bible teaches otherwise), and support politics that legislate for their favorite pet ideas, like global warming and the redistribution of wealth (all while ridiculing those who focus on real moral issues, like the murder of the unborn and the legalizing of sexual immoralities).

And so, they will pollute earth, because they will not have people think of Heaven.