Heaven and Hell and Random Thoughts

As a child, I had certain images of both Heaven and Hell. I'll start with Hell. This might sound odd, but I used to imagine Hell to be like a hot bath. This was an image I had conjured up from somewhere when I was about seven years old when I was imagining what Hell was like. It was not something that was given to me by someone else, although obviously the idea of heat was from the traditional idea of Hell. But what's so bad about a hot bath, you ask? Aren't hot baths generally pleasant?

Of course, Hell was not just any kind of hot bath, it was a hot bath that you didn't get used to. You see, at that age when Mum would draw me a bath, the water was always a little bit hotter than what was comfortable for me. However, I'd get in slowly, and my body would eventually adjust to the heat, or as I would put it at that age, "I'd get used to it." Then, the heat would be pleasant, then the water would cool down and I'd sit in the bath for ages not wanting to get out because it was too cold when I got out and my fingers would get all wrinkly.

But the point is... my idea of hell was like a bath that was always too hot, a bath that you wouldn't adjust to.

It seems like a tame idea of hell but I suppose my view of Hell hasn't changed so much. It's not based on heat anymore, but there are plenty of unpleasant things on Earth that you can get used to. You can get used to loneliness, or abuse, or hardship, or heat, or cold, or pain, if you're experiencing it long enough. Some of those things are not things that is necessarily a good thing to get used to, but a lot of the time people experiencing these things learn to live with it if they have to. They get used to it, however unpleasant they might be. Hell is not something I understand a lot about as a Christian, but I mostly believe that Hell is the absence of God. And I suppose I believe that being in complete absence of God, and having full comprehension of that absence, well, you wouldn't get used it.

My view of heaven at seven years old was if a slightly different nature. I imagined it as a place where I could have whatever I wanted, and did whatever I wanted. And at that age, the thing I wanted more than anything else was an infinite source of magic paper, that whatever I drew on it would become real. So when I would pine over the fact that this paper does not yet exist, I would console myself with, "I'll get it when I'm in heaven."

I went to a Christian school where they would have an assembly every Friday morning. I remember one such assembly where they had a guest speaker who was very passionate about heaven. I suspect he may not have really thought about what was the best thing to say to kids to get them passionate, however. But he talked about his own vision of heaven, and I always remembered it.

He said that God would be there, and he'd be like, let me show you something really awesome, and God would open up his coat to show some imaginary thing that was hidden underneath his coat (and I often imagined God to be wearing a trenchcoat for years afterwards whenever I thought of heaven), and God would show us this awesome thing, and then we'd be so awe-struck and astounded that we would praise God for a thousand years. And just when that thousand years was up and we were winding up our praise for God, God would say, "Let me show you something else," and he'd show us another thing that was hidden underneath his coat, and we would be so awe-struck and astounded that for another thousand years, we would be worshipping God. And just when that second thousand years ended, God would say... well, you get the picture. This would go on for eternity.

And you can imagine what I, a seven-year old girl was thinking, that spending a thousand years to eternity gawking over something I didn't even know what it was, yet, I wouldn't have any time to draw on my magic paper.

I was disappointed, but I was also a faithful little girl and I told myself that I just didn't get it, yet, that I knew that Heaven would be fun. And if that's what we'd be doing in Heaven, well, we'd have fun doing it. And for some reason, this image stuck with me.

Now that I'm older I think I understand better what the man was talking about, and why he was so excited about his view of heaven, an excitement I couldn't comprehend at the time. I had to change my thinking a bit to understand it, though. Instead of thinking about what I could get to do in heaven, I needed to try and imagine what was so wonderful that could make me sing out in joy for a whole thousand years. A thing that could excite me for a whole thousand years that I could do nothing but sing and dance out in joy the whole time is incomprehensible to me, but that was what it was to look forward to Heaven, to find out what that thing is. And I don't think it's something that God is hiding under his trenchcoat, but I think it will be God's majesty itself, in all its glory. I think that because I sometimes feel it while on Earth, that sense of being in awe of God, a desire to grow closer to God and to be in God's presence. This is Heaven's reward, and it is hard for people who do not have this desire to understand what is so great about it, which is very similar to why I didn't understand what was so great about this man's view of heaven when I was seven.

A person once told me that no matter how good a thing is, one will eventually be tired of it, even existence. That is why if there was a Heaven, if it was for eternity, it would eventually turn into Hell, because one would grow sick of existence. I don't believe this, though, because the bible tells us that there will be no weariness in Heaven, and boredom is a kind of weariness. Getting sick of something is a kind of weariness. It is hard to imagine because we only have our earthly bodies as reference, but it will be a different kind of existence, one that we cannot yet comprehend. I was thinking about this earlier today, and it occurred to me, Heaven and Hell have one thing in common. You see, I believe that Heaven is being in the complete presence of God, and the thing about being in the complete presence of God, is that you don't get used to it.