Originally posted by lemondropMy own life has been quite long, but I am not bored yet. Given a chance, I would happily live a normal human life for a lot longer.
eternity is a long, long, long time
BORING
Heaven is defined as a desirable place to be (with few other details given). The biggest issue I have with an afterlife is that I am not convinced that a 'me' without my body is really me, so it wouldn't be me in heaven anyway, so what do I care?
Originally posted by lemondropIt depends who you ask, Muslim heaven is lying around on couches with rivers of wine and cool winds while you are attended to by a large retinue of servants and large bosomed virgins. Norse heaven seems to be kinda the same except you get up each day and fight each other and feast all day in Valhalla.
eternity is a long, long, long time
BORING
My own religion teaches that a heavenly government will rule over a paradise earth and mankind will eventually be brought back to a state of relative perfection where they will enjoy using their talents to the full. I dont think it will be boring for at present we have seventy or eighty years which is simply not enough to reach our potential as humans.
Originally posted by robbie carrobiewhat about some loved ones who didn't make to your heaven and are suffering for an eternity
It depends who you ask, Muslim heaven is lying around on couches with rivers of wine and cool winds while you are attended to by a large retinue of servants and large bosomed virgins. Norse heaven seems to be kinda the same except you get up each day and fight each other and feast all day in Valhalla.
My own religion teaches that a heavenly gover ...[text shortened]... ent we have seventy or eighty years which is simply not enough to reach our potential as humans.
could you really be happy knowing this?
or maybe they don't even deserve a second thought or tear
Originally posted by lemondropI don't believe in eternal suffering, i don't think its consistent with a loving beneficent and just creator nor can it be Biblically established. Infact the Bible states that the dead are conscious of nothing. If that is the case then logically and reasonably they cannot be suffering.
what about some loved ones who didn't make to your heaven and are suffering for an eternity
could you really be happy knowing this?
or maybe they don't even deserve a second thought or tear
You understand that my paradise is essentially an earthly paradise and that I profess that relatively few people go to heaven?
The consummation of God's full salvation includes these three parts of our total being:
1.) The spirit of man - regeneration
2.) The soul of man - transformation
3.) The body of man - transfiguration
4.) The environment of man - a new heaven and a new earth
We should not think of disembodied cloud like souls floating in some obscure realm of hazy light.
The final environment is "a new heaven and a new earth".
"And I saw a new heaven and new earth for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, and the sea is no more." (Rev. 21:1)
Once again we read of a new environment:
" But according to His promise we are expecting new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells." ( 2 Peter 3:13)
As for the sons of God, their spirit is regenerated, the soul is transformed and their body is transfigured.
These three processes make the sons of God like Jesus Christ.
"Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not yet been manifested what we will be. We know that if He is manifested, we will be like Him because we will see Him as He is." (1 John 3:2)
So to be born again is to embark on a process in which the believer will be filled with divine life within and swallowed up with divine life from without.
I just include two more passages on the swallowing up of the whole man, including the body in divine life:
" For also, we who are in this tabernacle [present physical body] , being burdened, in that we do not desire to be unclothed [disembodied] , but clothed upon, that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life." (2 Cor. 5:4)
Again, the saints await the transfiguration of the body not being disembodied from it.
" For our commonwealth exists in the heavens, from which also we eagerly await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ,
Who will TRANSFIGURE the body of our humiliation to be conformed to the body of His glory, according to the operation by which He is able even to subject all things to Himself." (Phil 3:20,21)
That is enough for this post.
-Removed-Given that 'fell' is a construct of space time, one can say conclusively that it doesn't 'feel like' at all. Even existence is questionable. I had a thread on that subject and most posters were of the opinion that existence without time is at best a different sort of existence and at worst not existence at all.
What interests me is that you have talked a lot about Hell in the past, yet surely Hell too, being eternal would be immune to our every day concepts of suffering etc?
And given that you know next to nothing about heaven, why does it concern you whether or not you ever go there, (if the term 'go there' even has meaning)?