Eternal Perspective

In the classic sports film, Heaven Can Wait, actor Warren Beatty plays a man named Joe Pendleton. He was the star quarterback for the Los Angeles Rams and on the verge of leading his team to the Super Bowl when he is struck by a truck while riding his bike. An overzealous angel prematurely removes him from his body, assuming that he was about to die.

When he arrives in heaven, Joe refuses to believe that his time is up. So, he pleads his case that he needs more time on earth. He successfully argues his point with the overzealous angel’s supervisor, but there’s a problem—he can’t go back into his original body because it’s been cremated. So, they have to find another dead body for him to enter. Lo and behold, there’s this multimillionaire who’s just died, murdered by an unfaithful wife.

Joe comes back to life in the multi-millionaire’s body. Then he buys the Rams so that he can become their starting quarterback and lead them to the Super Bowl. The problem is that his wife still wants him dead. Right before the Super Bowl, he’s shot. The Rams are forced to start the backup quarterback, but during the game the backup takes a brutal hit, and what happens? He dies. What happens after that? Right again. The angel’s supervisor sends Joe into the backup quarterback’s body, and he leads the Rams to Super Bowl victory.

At this point, you’re probably wondering what this story has to do with hope of heaven? The message of the movie is that heaven can wait because it can’t possibly be better than getting what we want right now. Attaining a lifelong dream—that’s heaven! But the truth is when I do get what I want, I find out that there’s something else I want that’s even better.

How do you make sense of the problem of pain and the wonder of beauty occurring in the same world? If you’ve ever had the privilege of visiting the Louvre in Paris, you probably braved the crowds to get a glimpse of the statue of Venus de Milo.

Millions have been captivated by the woman’s physical beauty displayed in stunningly smooth marble. They’ve also been disturbed by seeing her arms broken off. Somehow the damage done to her arms doesn’t destroy the aesthetic pleasure of viewing the sculpture as a whole. But it does cause a conflicted experience—such beauty, marred by such violence.

I doubt if anyone has ever stood in front of that masterpiece and asked, “Why did the sculptor break off the arms?” More likely, everyone concludes the beautiful parts are the work of a master artist and the broken parts are the results of someone or something else—either a destructive criminal or a natural catastrophe.

We need a unified perspective on created beauty and marred ugliness that can make sense of both. The Christian faith provides that. It points to a good God who made a beautiful world with pleasures for people to enjoy. But it also recognizes damage caused by sinful people. Ultimately, it points to a process of restoration that has already begun and will continue forever.

An article in The Wall Street Journal warns: “Your 401(k) is up. Don’t let it go to your head.”

Checking your 401(k) is the feel-good move of the year. After the stock-market rally, it now feels safe to peek at your 401(k) balance again. That is a relief for the millions of people whose retirement accounts are still recovering from the bruising they took in 2022, when the S&P 500’s total return was -18.11%.

Don’t let your self-worth balloon along with your net worth, financial advisers warn. They say the overconfidence that comes with making big gains can cause people to take bigger risks with their investments. And that makes us feel like we’re savvier investors than we really are.

Neuroscience backs up the idea of overconfidence being a problem. Research on the brain has found that increases in dopamine, a brain chemical that likely gets released when you see large returns in your account, can lead to more financial risk-taking.

Possible Preaching Angle:

That’s good financial advice, but the Bible also warns that, more importantly, it’s good spiritual advice.

Is there really an afterlife? While most people think humans will never be able to prove what happens after death, half of adults still believe their spirit lives on—somewhere.

The new survey of over 1,000 people in the United Kingdom, finds 50% of respondents believe in an afterlife. Of this group, 60% believe everyone experiences the same thing when they die—regardless of their individual beliefs. However, two in three believe scientists will never be able to tell us what really happens when someone passes.

Regardless of whether people think they’re going to heaven (55%) or worry their life choices could end up sending them to hell (58%), the poll finds 68% of all respondents have no fear of what comes next. Overall, one in four think people go to heaven or hell, 16% believe they’ll exist in a “spiritual realm,” and 16% believe in reincarnation.

No matter what happens after death, respondents are confident it’ll actually be an improvement over their current life. The poll finds adults think heaven provides people with a chance to recapture the things they’ve lost throughout their life.

The vast majority (86%) think the afterlife involves a sense of peace and 66% describe it as a place of happiness. Three in five adults believe there will be no more suffering when they die.

However, respondents think there are a few conditions people need to follow in order to reach this peaceful realm. Over four in five people (84%) say you have to live a good life and be a generally good person to reach heaven. One in three claim you have to place your faith in a higher power to reach the afterlife and one in five say it requires you to confess all your sins.

Possible Preaching Angle:

This survey was taken in mid-life when old age and illness are seen as far away. When one gets closer to the end, it is likely many of them will change their opinion, or fall deeper into denial with the help of Satan who wants to soothe them with lies.

A tourist in Las Vegas hit the jackpot on a slot machine, but he was never informed due to a malfunction in the machine, according to gaming officials. Now after an exhaustive search, the Nevada Gaming Control Board says they have identified the winner of the nearly $230,000 prize.

A man, later identified by officials as Robert Taylor, played a slot machine at Treasure Island Hotel and Casino. Due to a communications error, according to gaming officials, the slot machine malfunctioned and didn't notify Taylor or casino personnel that he was a winner. By the time the error was noticed, casino personnel were unable to identify the man, who was from out of state. The gaming board took on an exhaustive search to make sure the man would be awarded his prize.

To identify the winner, gaming officials combed through hours of surveillance videos from several casinos, interviewed witnesses, sifted through electronic purchase records, and even analyzed ride share data provided by the Nevada Transportation Authority and a rideshare company. The jackpot winner was determined to be Taylor, a tourist from Arizona.

Possible Preaching Angle:

We too are the inheritors of a great wealth, the Kingdom of God, but we go through life living unaware. How would it change the way we live today if we truly understand the vast riches of tomorrow?

In the book The Faith of Elvis, Billy Stanley, half-brother of Elvis, shares poignantly of the ups and downs of Elvis’ walk with the Jesus. On a more humorous side he shared this encounter between Elvis and Sammy Davis Jr.:

It was a kind of a funny thing, and also serious in a way, but one time in Las Vegas, he was talking to Sammy Davis Jr. Sammy noticed Elvis wearing both a Star of David and a cross necklace—two things that don’t normally go together because they represent two distinct religions: Judaism and Christianity.

Sammy said, “Elvis, isn’t that kind of a contradiction?”

Elvis looked at him and said, “I don’t want to miss heaven on a technicality.”

Kim Kuo tells of the 10-year-long battle her late husband, David, had with terminal cancer. David was the former deputy director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives. Much of his time was spent in pain from the vicious side effects of surgeries, radiation, and medications. But, instead of considering the alternative of euthanasia or becoming passive, he chose to focus his remaining time to spiritually touch the lives of people.

Especially in suffering, we can dive below the shallow waters and touch another’s heart and soul. Steve Jobs, who died of pancreatic cancer in 2011, shared this wisdom at a commencement speech at Stanford University: ‘No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because death is very likely the single best invention of life. It is life’s change agent.’

People can’t say goodbye anymore,” writes the poet Les Murray. “They say last hellos.”

In his book A Severe Mercy, Sheldon Vanauken tells the story of his last meeting with C. S. Lewis, who had become a friend. The two men ate lunch together, and when they had finished, Lewis said, “At all events, we’ll certainly meet again, here—or there.” Then he added: “I shan’t say goodbye. We’ll meet again.” And with that, they shook hands and parted ways. From across the street, above the din of traffic, Lewis shouted, “Besides, Christians never say goodbye!”

Avoiding goodbye when we have to move on and face the prospect of never seeing each other again in this life denies the importance of our bodily life together. Brushing over “farewell” denies that the pain of separation is real—that no matter how many texts or phone calls or Facebook updates we share, we won’t be available for each other in the same way anymore.

The word “goodbye” is actually a contraction of “God be with you.” Saying goodbye is important, in the end, because it’s one way of reminding each other that we are God’s bodily creatures. We want him to watch over us and keep our love for one another alive, right now, even before the day of our eventual reunion.

In an issue of CT magazine, author Jen Wilkin writes of the difficulty in describing the glory of heaven:

I am a competitive game player. A few years ago at a party, the host brought out Pictionary for the evening’s entertainment. Ready to wow the room with my skills, I glanced at the word on my card: “Difficult.” I had played Pictionary for years and had never had a word that hard. My mind went blank.

Nothing seemed to rhyme with it or illustrate it. The timer ran out, and in utter frustration I said, “How ironic that my word was ‘difficult’!” Holding up the card as proof, I realized I had accidentally drawn not a card for game play but the instruction card listing each of the categories for different words. Difficult, indeed. I spent 60 seconds trying to illustrate an abstract idea, trying to draw the undrawable.

My dilemma made me think of the Book of Revelation. John, in describing the new heaven and the new earth, is playing the hardest round of Pictionary known to man—he is called upon to describe the indescribable. Talk about difficult. He writes “The wall was made of jasper, and the city of pure gold, as pure as glass. The foundations of the city walls were decorated with every kind of precious stone,” (Rev. 21:18–19).

At first glance, it seems that streets made of gold are meant to stir our excitement to live in a place where opulence abounds at every level. But John’s description of heaven takes things we esteem the highest in this life and reduces them to the level of commonplace.

All of these elements—gold, precious stones, crowns—are things that we exalt. These are all the idols of this world. When John determines to describe the indescribable, he turns our human expectations upside down.

Heaven is a first-is-last place where the things we have exalted will be cast down to the level of their real worth: as mere metal and stone. Heaven is a place where precious metals and stones are trodden under foot as common road dust. Where our crowning personal honors are cast at the feet of God. Where the people and objects and institutions to which we have ascribed our worship will fall from their lofty places. It is a place whose inhabitants at last obey the first commandment, “You shall have no other gods before me.”

The Good Place is a popular comedy TV show that follows four humans and their experience in an imagined afterlife. People accumulate points based on their good and bad actions on earth and then they’re sent to either “the good place” (heaven) or “the bad place” (hell).

But the characters soon realize that there is a problem in heaven—everything is wonderful, but no one seems happy. One of the Good Place’s residents says, “You get here, and you realize that anything is possible, and you do everything and then you’re done. But you still have infinity left. This place kills fun, and passion, and excitement and love.”

In the show’s final season, to counter the boredom of an eternal existence, the characters decide that the best solution is to give people an escape. The main character explains:

When you feel happy, and satisfied and complete and you want to leave the Good Place for good, you can just walk through [a door leading out of heaven] and your time in the universe will end. You don’t have to go through it if you don’t want to, but you can. And hopefully knowing that you don’t have to be here forever will help you feel happier while you are.

When one of the residents of the Good Place asks what will happen when they pass through this door, the main character says he’s not sure: “All we know is it will be peaceful, and your journey will be over.” They encourage them to have the time of their lives, and then, “when you’re ready, walk through one last door and be at peace.” The show’s argument, then, is that when heaven becomes unbearable, people should have the choice to end their time there on their own terms and in a peaceful manner.

Singer-songwriter Sandra McCracken shares insight of how an early morning flight changed her perspective on her problems:

One morning I boarded an early flight to Florida for a music gig. My mind scrolled through the usual anxieties, like old tapes on repeat. From a west-facing window I found myself ruminating over some troubling circumstances that were pending resolution.

It was dark as we ascended through heavy clouds. Most of the window shades were closed in the cabin. A little time passed, then someone on the left side of the plane opened their shade across the aisle from me. The morning sun shot a blaze of pink light across my face. The sunlight lifted my spirits.

I looked back to see the view out the west-side window. It remained predominately dark. I had been so wrapped up in my tiny scope of vision that I hadn’t realized the sun had crept over the horizon. While one side of the aircraft was glowing with light, the other was still in the shadows. Perspective has a way of shifting our experience.

On any given day, I could make a list of my anxieties, but the morning light shining on the east side of that airplane reminds me that I could just as easily make a list of the good gifts that God has given me. Sometimes I choose to look out the dark side of the plane, into the shadows, and I focus on what is broken or needs repair. This is essential to know and consider the reality of our world. But I can get stuck there.

But no matter which window I looked out, all the while I was strapped safely in the window seat of that airplane. And all the while the pilot continued to steer the plane toward our destination. In spite of our shifting perspectives, we have a destination. God has gone before us to lay out a good plan for our lives (Jer. 29:11, Isa. 30:21). Even as we keep ourselves on the trajectory that God has purposed for us, he holds us and guides us along the way.

The pandemic has done a lot of strange things to the global economy over the last 14 months, from creating a massive shortage of semiconductor chips to a ballooning supply of hand sanitizer.

The US housing market has gone haywire too, as urbanites took advantage of remote work to leave expensive cities and resettle in smaller towns across the US. But it's not all that simple. Glenn Kelman, the chief executive of Redfin, broke down some of his observations of just how unusual the current US housing market is in a Tuesday Twitter thread:

Inventory is down 37% year over year to a record low. The typical home sells in 17 days, a record low. Home prices are up a record amount, 24% year over year, to a record high. And still homes sell on average for 1.7% higher than the asking price, another record.

It has been hard to convey how bizarre the US housing market has become. For example, a Bethesda, Maryland homebuyer included in her written offer a pledge to name her first-born child after the seller. She lost.

Possible Preaching Angle:

God’s people have no such worry. We have a guaranteed home in heaven, personally prepared by Christ, reserved in heaven for us. And, we should mention, it is fully paid for.

There's a Signpost Forest just outside of Watson Lake, Yukon. It was started in 1942 when a soldier named Carl K. Lindley was injured while working on the Alcan Highway. He was taken to the Army air station in Watson Lake to recuperate.

In those days a simple sign post pointed out the distances to various points along the highway. One of the signposts was damaged by a bulldozer. Lindley was ordered to repair the sign, and decided to personalize the job by adding a sign pointing towards his home town, Danville, Illinois, and giving the distance to it. Several other people added directions to their home towns, and the idea has been snowballing ever since.

Since those early days, tourists continued the tradition, and there are currently ( as of 2021) 80,000 signs from around the world. Now the Signpost Forest takes up a couple of acres, with huge new panels being constantly added, snaking through the trees. There are street signs, welcome signs, signatures on dinner plates, and license plates from around the world.

We all long for home, especially our heavenly home. Throughout life we encounter signposts that point us to our home in heaven. The blessings given to us by our heavenly Father such as family, friends, worship music, the laughter of a child, are all signposts that point toward home.

Stefan Thomas, a programmer in San Francisco, has two guesses left to figure out a password that is worth about $220 million. The password will let him unlock a small hard drive, known as an IronKey, which contains the private keys to a digital wallet that holds 7,002 Bitcoin.

The problem is that years ago Mr. Thomas lost the paper where he wrote down the password for his IronKey, which gives users 10 guesses before it seizes up and encrypts its contents forever. He has since tried eight of his most commonly used password formulations—to no avail. Thomas said, “I would just lay in bed and think about it. Then I would go to the computer with some new strategy, and it wouldn’t work, and I would be desperate again.”

Bitcoin has made a lot of its holders very rich in a short time. But the cryptocurrency’s unusual nature has also meant that many people are locked out of their Bitcoin fortunes as a result of lost or forgotten keys. They have been forced to watch, helpless, as the price has risen and fallen sharply, unable to cash in on their digital wealth.

Of the existing 18.5 million Bitcoin, around 20 percent—currently worth around $140 billion—appear to be in lost or stranded wallets. Brad Yasar has put his hard drives, containing millions of dollars in Bitcoin, in vacuum-sealed bags out of sight. He said, “I don’t want to be reminded every day … of what I lost.”

Possible Preaching Angle:

This sad story is in sharp contrast with the security of our inheritance that is guaranteed in heaven. “An inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, reserved in heaven for you” (1 Pet. 1:4).

When French impressionist painter Auguste Renoir was confined to his home during the last decade of his life, Henri Matisse was nearly 28 years younger than him. The two great artists were dear friends and frequent companions. Matisse visited him daily. Renoir, almost paralyzed by arthritis, continued to paint in spite of his infirmities. He had to hold his brush between his thumb and index finger. As he painted, students often heard him crying out in pain.

One day as Matisse watched the elder painter work in his studio, fighting torturous pain with each brush stroke, he blurted out, “Auguste, why do you continue to paint when you are in such agony?” Renoir said, “The pain passes but the beauty remains.”

Possible Preaching Angle:

If we were to speak to Jesus on resurrection morning, He might have said the same thing. The pain of the Cross has passed, but the beauty remains: The beauty of new creation, the beauty of an army of disciples that spans the millennia, the beauty of a kingdom established in the hearts of his people, all this remains. But it may be that you are going through pain just now and you can’t see an end to that pain. Can you trust that out of the pain will come a beauty that will last forever? Give that pain to God and ask him show you its beauty.

Pastor J.D. Greear says, “If you are not generous, you’ve never really experienced the Gospel. If you feel guilty about how little generosity you show, you don’t understand the Gospel.” He goes on to explain his reasoning. Basically, the idea is this: It is impossible to really experience Jesus and not be radically generous in response.

First, a major component of what it means to be truly “converted” is that you realize His Kingdom is the most beautiful and lasting reality in the universe. You begin to find your significance in it, not in what you possess. So, you don’t have to spend lots of money to add beauty and significance in your life.

Second, you recognize Jesus, not money, is your security for the future. So, you don’t have to save extravagant amounts of money to feel secure.

Third, to be truly saved means you have some sense of how gracious God has been to you. The Bible repeatedly says that the sign that you have tasted God’s grace is you become gracious

Thus, if you have tasted of the Gospel, you will be gracious. Instinctively.

Atheist Angel Eduardo argues that keeping our beliefs to ourselves, while avoiding confrontation and promoting harmony, is actually harmful and immoral. Beliefs are the “engines of our actions. They’re foundational to how we think and behave, and they have consequences.” He admits when atheists tell Christians and people of other religions to keep their beliefs to themselves, they don’t truly grasp what they are asking:

We rarely think about this from the perspective of the believer. For them, every encounter is of paramount importance. They are truly convinced that you are in danger and that they possess the keys to salvation. ... Their proselytizing is a moral act, even when we consider it a nuisance. However misguided or wrong they might be, their actions are motivated by a desire to make our lives (and afterlives) better. ... It’s hard to imagine how the consciences of the ethically devout are burdened by every skeptic they’ve failed to convert. ... How much worse would that guilt be if they’d instead been unwilling to try?

Eduardo wants atheists and skeptics to be more understanding:

Imagine us atheists indifferently watching the religious waste their lives believing nonsense. What would it say about us if we didn’t try to talk them out of it, to help them save what little time they have left on this mortal coil, because we’ve chosen to keep our beliefs—or unbelief—to ourselves? Sure, we’re being polite in the moment. We’re exercising tolerance, in our own myopic way. We are living and letting live, but at what cost? Not one I’m willing to pay.

Possible Preaching Angle:

This fresh perspective should give Christians even more motivation for sharing our faith.

A tourist was once travelling through the area where the famed Rabbi Hofetz Chaim was living. Being a great admirer of the rabbi, he made inquiries whether he could visit the rabbi at his home. He soon got a reply that he was welcome to visit the rabbi anytime.

The young tourist thereafter arrived at the rabbi’s home with much excitement. Upon reaching the simple one-roomed house, he was asked to enter. Upon entering, to his amazement he saw only a table, a lamp and a cot, besides many books, inside the house. Surprised by what he saw, the tourist then inquired, “Rabbi, where is the rest of your furniture?” Rabbi Chaim calmly replied, “Where is yours?” Puzzled by the rabbi’s response, the tourist replied, “My furniture? But I’m only a visitor here.” The wise rabbi then replied, “So am I.”

Possible Preaching Angle:

The young tourist learned the valuable and powerful lesson that day that God's people are only pilgrims on this earth. As Jim Reeves wrote in a song, “This world is not our home.” Peter addresses the Christians as, “foreigners and aliens” (1 Peter 2:11). Therefore, since we are “foreigners and strangers on earth” (Heb. 11:13), the Apostle Paul advises us, “Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things” (Col. 3:2).

If you were traveling to outer space, what would you take with you? Photographer Steve Pyke got to find out what items some American astronauts felt were significant enough for that. Starting in 1998, Pyke began a series of portraits of those who had traveled to space or walked on the Moon in the late 1960s and early 1970s. But he also photographed objects that had made the journeys with them. There were the wonderfully geeky working items: a case used to bring the first lunar rock back to Earth on Apollo 11 in 1969 and the geological hammer used during Apollo 12.

But then there were more personal and sometimes surprising artifacts that orbited the Earth and even made the journey to the Moon. A figurine of a Madonna, an unopened bottle of brandy, a golf club, and quotes from famous people, and a copy of the Declaration of Independence. Astronaut Rusty Schweickart brought those quotes on pieces of lightweight onionskin paper tucked inside his tunic during Apollo 9. Pyke writes, “To him, they were pieces of wisdom from Earth that would remain up there, on his person, even if he was lost during the mission.”

Each lunar astronaut was allowed only two pounds of personal items that they could bring back, so the items they chose can be curious, odd, and personal. “The objects that are documented here—the quiet and intimate minutiae—give us access to the very personal, psychological, and human side to the journey into space. What is it that these astronauts and pioneers wanted to take with them on their ultimate journey into the unknown?”

Possible Preaching Angle:

What are you taking on your ultimate journey to heaven? Many things that we spend our life pursuing, such as material possessions, money, fame, hobbies, and status, will be left behind. Among the only things we can take are our own soul (Matt. 16:25-26), our good works done with the right motive (1 Cor. 3:8, Rev. 14:13), and the people we have led to faith in Christ (Dan. 12:3; Phil. 4:1).

A South Korean virtual reality (VR) company has undertaken the challenging task of reuniting a mother with her deceased daughter in VR. Jang Ji-sung wanted to see her 7-year-old daughter again, who she lost to blood cancer in 2016. It took the company almost a year to create the simulation. The documentary on the project, titled Meeting You, aired in South Korea on February 2020. A segment of the documentary has more than 20 million views on YouTube.

Nineteenth century inventions like the photograph and motion picture were heralded at the time as preserving life after death and declared as “man’s triumph over death.” VR resurrection allows the mother to “touch her hand, and they float into the sky to a twilight-toned afterlife.” The daughter falls asleep “after telling her mother that she’s no longer in pain. ‘I love you, Mom,’ she says.” The mother’s emotions are real. She later described the experience as a “wonderful dream.” The daughter’s character and personality were developed through extensive family interviews.

Psychologists and ethicists caution, “We just don't know the psychological effects of being reunited with someone in this way. ... Is it a one-time opportunity to enable closure or do you then prolong that relationship? ... The story strikes me as very much high-tech spiritualism with all the potential for fraud and deception that used to be associated with fraudulent mediums.”

Possible Preaching Angle:

Belief in the death and resurrection of Jesus is the only true comfort for grief and the only true hope of reunion with loved ones (1 Thess. 4:13-18).