Two Realms… Heaven and Hell on earth?

“May your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”  This is a part of the most common prayer known to Christians, the prayer that Jesus taught his disciples to pray, “Thy kingdom come, they will be done on earth as it is in heaven!”  What does this mean?  Is Jesus telling his disciples to pray that the kingdom of heaven come down to earth?  Is Jesus saying that heaven, the realm where things are as God’s will is truly done and played out as He wants them, can be here on earth? 

            This seems to be the perspective that Rob Bell takes in his book Velvet Elvis.  This adds a whole new perspective to Christianity, at least in my eyes.  What a concept, what a responsibility!  If this is true then as proclaimed Christians we can no longer sit around, complacent with where we are as Christians, knowing that we will one day die and go to Heaven.  I mean, I guess we could do that, but why would we if it is possible to bring heaven here.  Look at it this way… an example: you know that soon you will be going to your favorite place in the world… say Disney Land/World when you were a kid, or the beach now… for me it would be some place warm like my aunt and uncle’s house in Florida where I get to fish all day long, lay at the pool, eat great food, go to the beach when I want, eat great food, etc… you get the picture.  So say that I knew I was going to go to their house in the future, but wasn’t quite sure when that was going to happen.  I’m totally stoked about going, but a little sad at the same time because I really want my friends/family… the people I love to come along with me, but to get them all to travel with me to Florida that’s a pretty big task, right.  It would cost way too much to fly everybody down there and to drive… my  goodness that’s a killer drive and we’d have to take multiple vehicles and we’d be stopping every 20 minutes because somebody would have to go to the bathroom… what a hassle!  But, I still want them to experience this.  What if… what if I could bring my aunt and uncle’s house, and everything that came with it, here to where I am now?   That would solve all kinds of problems, I get to experience it with all those that I love “here” and have what I want that is “there.”  Is this possible?  Well I don’t really think I can bring Florida, but who cares about Florida, what if I could bring heaven here?  Replace my aunt and uncle’s house in the above story with heaven… how does that fit in.  Do I know for sure I’m going to get to experience heaven with all my loved ones?  I sure hope I do, but I’m not totally and completely sure of that yet.  What if I could bring heaven to earth… there to here?  I have said in the past (and I didn’t come up with this somebody else did but I don’t remember who), “Maybe Christians aren’t really allowed to get more than the slightest glimpse of heaven because if they did the suicide rate among Christians would be astronomical.  Christians wouldn’t be able to wait any longer if they saw what they are truly missing!”  But what if we did acknowledge the glory of heaven and rather than committing suicide (we won’t get into the theological debate about suicide… just stick with me here) realized that we have the potential to bring that to the here and now, for all to experience, with us!  Imagine the possibilities.  We wouldn’t need any gimmicks or “marketing” as churches or as Christians… we’d have heaven and I think that trumps any kind of gimmick anybody could ever come up with to try to bring folks in their doors on Sunday mornings.

            You see a problem that arises with this concept is that Christianity, like many religions, is basically (and I say basically because in the end God is still over Satan, Jesus defeated death and hell, there for I do not mean to look at this on a completely dualistic scale such as Zoroastrianism) based on a dualistic principle… good/bad, God/Satan, heaven/hell… you get the picture, but look at the last one.  Heaven/hell, you see if we have the possibility to bring heaven to earth, that also means we have the possibility to bring hell to earth.  What does it mean to bring hell to earth?  Well if we look at it on a dualist level then it means just the opposite of bringing heaven to earth.  If heaven on earth is where things are as God desires them to be, then hell on earth would be absent of how God desires them to be.  Rob Bell talks about 1994 Rwanda when 800,000 people were killed in Rwanda by their own people.  My first thought was the situation taking place in Darfur/Uganda.  Bell describes hell on earth as, “poverty, injustice, suffering – they are all hells on earth, and as Christians we oppose them with all our energies” (page 148).  Jesus talks about this in Matthew 25 when he said, “When I was thirsty you gave me something to drink, when I was hungry you gave me something to eat, when I was naked you gave me clothes, and when I was in prison, you visited me.”  Jesus tells us when we do the above things to “the least of these” we are doing it to him, we essentially are bringing heaven here.  Does this seem odd that God would want to bring heaven here?  I don’t know why it would surprise you, he sent a part of heaven by the way of Jesus once.  Before that Solomon built the temple so God could reside there among his people.  Why would it surprise us that God wants to bring heaven here?  He wants to share that with us.  Again, as Christians this puts a big responsibility on us.  What do people normally do when they have guests coming to their house?  I know when my girlfriend is coming to town I get in a panic and start cleaning my apartment like crazy… why?  Not necessarily because I don’t want her to think I’m a slob, she basically already knows that, but because I want her to have a place that is hospitable.  When people invite guests to their house they want to be hospitable and have a place that looks presentable.  Well how much more should this be emphasized for our God.  If we are inviting him here to the place we live should we not have a sense of panic… or even better a sense of urgency to prepare this place for him to come.  Because honestly as much as I would love to bring heaven to earth to experience that, look around us.  Is this truly a place of hospitality for God.  Even better example, say you are house sitting for a family friend, somebody with a really really nice house, the kind you almost feel guilty house sitting for pay because its such a nice place and they have basically given you free reign to enjoy yourself.  “Feel free to have friends over, there’s food in the kitchen, pools open, enjoy the big screen and surround sound, etc…”  So you stay and just tear this place up with all your friends, have a blast, thoroughly enjoy yourselves, but have made a mess of the place.  Naturally you would want to clean this place up before they got home, right.  You’d feel embarrassed for them to come back and see the mess you made of their house, after they had opened it up to you and all your friends.  Any person with a conscience would feel horrible.  Now, look back to bringing heaven here, bringing God here.  God, the creator of this earth we now live on.  As Christians we invite him back here to bring heaven down to earth, but don’t you think we might need to do some cleaning up first… again look around.  Look at all the poverty, injustice, continued suffering.  Are we ready to bring God back to a place like this?  Maybe we need a greater sense of urgency, not maybe, WE NEED A GREATER SENSE OF URGENCY!  We need a little fire in our britches as the saying goes.  Start picking up after ourselves and “cleaning up the area” getting ready for the owner to come back home.  Find out what that means to you.  What kind of clean up do you think the place needs before you’d be willing to “invite God over”?  I personally believe there’s a lot of work to be done… let’s go do it!

A final verse from Amos 5:24- “Let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream.”  Go do it!