“Heaven or Hell, Are Those the Only Choices?” It’s Not About the Here After...It’s About the Here and Now.

Is heaven the goal of the Christian life? No, not really.  The popular understanding of the goal of the Christian life is that once you’ve accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior that’s it, nothing else is required or expected except maybe getting others to do the same.  But this understanding is not right, if you comprehend Jesus and his way you will also understand that the goal of Christianity isn’t to stay out of hell and go to heaven.  The goal of Christianity is to transform lives and the world.

This heaven-and-hell framework has been the way Christianity has been seen, known and understood for a long time now.  Sometime after Constantine called the bishops together and asked them to formula a unifying doctrine for Christianity, a creed that summarized the faith so that everyone knew what it meant to be a Christian and how to know if someone wasn’t Christian, the world has been divided into “us” and “them.” And naturally once you have defined who is acceptable and who isn’t, you can begin to draw up a world view that separates people into two groups and a theology that makes your group the better one.  What this means is that if you are “us” then you get to go to heaven.  But if you are “them” then you go to hell and the only way to keep from ending up in hell is to believe as the “us” group believes.

Add to this a desire by those in power to formula a theology that gave support and credence to the way society was ordered – a theology that said that this life isn’t what matters; it’s the life to come.  In fact, this life will most likely be filled with suffering and pain and this is because of your sin and the sin of your ancestors and of Adam and Eve.  And the best you can hope for is that when you die you will be found faithful and granted entrance into heaven where suffering and pain are no more.  The best way to live faithfully is to believe that Jesus’ death was a payment for your sins, believe the creed, accept your lot in life and place your hope in God’s grace so that you can receive your eternal reward.  And if you want to guarantee a favorable report upon your death you convince someone else of this reality you have accepted so that they can be saved too.  The goal of Christianity as presented in this way is heaven and saving souls.

Jesus didn’t have a lot to say about any of this.  In fact Jesus didn’t seem too worried about heaven and hell and the ultimate destination of one’s eternal soul.  Jesus was far more interested in getting people to recognize that the religious and political authorities were using violence and injustice to try and subjugate the people and keep them from finding the truth that is God’s desire for peace and justice for all people.  Jesus talked a lot about the kingdom but not as a final resting place for a saved soul.  He was talking about a political and spiritual reality that transcended the present reality.  He was trying to tell about God’s justice, God’s economy, God household and how things are to work in God’s creation.  Jesus was about the here and now, bringing justice here and bringing peace now.  We are commanded to love one another not save each other’s souls.  We are commanded to love one another not to believe a certain set of stipulations so that at some final judgment we can be found acceptable.  And in the every few places where Jesus does seem to talk about a final judgment, the measuring stick isn’t a creed or belief system it is what you have done for the least and the lost that counts you among those who are blessed.

The Christian life is one of love and service not of saving souls.  The church has to figure out how to reclaim our original calling.  We have to ask ourselves, how do we become a people on the way instead of a waiting area for the heavenly train?  You see, as I have been saying now for eleven weeks, faithful living isn’t about gaining entrance into heaven.  It’s not about earning a crown or somehow surviving the tests to make it to the sweet reward.  Faithful living is working for peace and justice, it is loving others and struggling to transform the world into the place God dreams it can be.  The goal of faith is a transformed life and world; right here and right now.

The Christianity that professes the goal of faith as being heaven and saving souls is not the Christianity that fits with Jesus’ life, teachings and the early church that grew from his original band of followers.  Time and again the “us” and ‘them” division was trumped by love and acceptance.  Jesus didn’t advocate it, Paul wrote against it, and Peter had visions that told him to forget it.  Being on the way with Jesus isn’t traveling to a place and time in the future we call heaven.  Being on the way with Jesus is living life as Jesus lived it.  It is letting love flavor all you are and do.  It is serving others.  It is working to end oppression and injustice.  It is living God’s commonwealth here and now.  We who claim to believe in Jesus are to be passionate about the here and now and not about some heaven light years away.  The community of faith that claims to follow Jesus on the way is a community that is heavily invested in the here and now and has no time to dwell on heaven and hell and ultimate rewards.  If you follow Jesus you realize that there really isn’t an “us” or a “them.”  We are just “we,” all of us together; the family of God.

I believe in God’s grace.  I know that God wishes only the best for me, you and every single person on this planet.  I believe in God’s love.  I know that whatever comes after I take my last breath, when we take our last breathes, will be something that every person knows.  There isn’t a place called heaven.  There isn’t a place called hell.  There isn’t a final division of humanity into “us” and “them.” 

What there is is a world that needs us.  A world filled with people who are victims of injustice and oppression.  People who have been sold a bill of goods that is so much smoke and mirrors.  A world filled with people who are desperate for a better life, here and now.  People who need other people to love them, assist them, advocate for them and provide opportunities for them that will help them have a better life here and now.  What people don’t need is someone handing them a Bible, telling them to accept Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior and to keep on believing and earning for themselves a get into heaven free card they can use when they die.  If we are living faithfully they will know God, they will know a living Christ, they will find hope, and they will begin to find their way to God.  If we love and service, work for peace and justice, advocate and provide opportunity heaven will come, God’s commonwealth will be realized.

The goal of faithful living is partnering with God for the transformation of the world.  The goal of Christianity is loving and serving, transforming lives and the world.  Forget about heaven, don’t worry about hell, don’t sweat saving someone’s soul.  Love you neighbor, help the least and the lost, be the best person you can be, love God and everything will be ok.