The Heavenly State

[Speedlearner1]

Years ago Henry Ward Beecher wrote a sermon called The Heavenly State. According to what I read, he thinks Heaven and Hell are not literal places.

As a matter of fact, he says, "We are at liberty to make our own heaven. The maiden has a right to make a heaven that will represent to her purity, power, heroism, goodness and grandeur, in their most ideal forms."

I, of course, don't believe any of this. But I wanted to hear anyone else's thoughts on this matter. You can find the sermon here:

https://books.google.com/books?id=-w...series&f=false

[Obsidian]

If that is what he believed, then it sounds like that guy is in a literal hell right now.

[Jedidiah]

If that is what he believed, then it sounds like that guy is in a literal hell right now.

If he was a Christian in error about that he was not condemned.

[Obsidian]

A Christian who doesn't believe in heaven isn't a Christian in any real sense.

[Speedlearner1]

Upon reading the sermon further, I realize that the streets of Heaven aren't necessarily paved with gold. However, they are probably paved with a substance that reflects the glory of God. Therefore, a person in this life could think that they are paved with gold.

I also realize that heavenly mansions are a little different than the mansions you would see in Great Britain or the United States today. After all, it was Jewish hands that wrote the Bible. So what would Jewish mansions look like? I performed a Google search and found mixed results. However, I know that the mansions Jesus referred to would be in the form of Jewish mansions rather than European mansions.

But I believe that in Heaven we will eat literal fruit from literal trees. We will work but we will not labor. After all, I wouldn't want to lay around all day and do nothing for all eternity. I believe we will look like we do now except all aging and diseases will be removed from our bodies. Our new bodies will reflect the glory of God. People will recognize us and we will recognize them.

[Jedidiah]

A Christian who doesn't believe in heaven isn't a Christian in any real sense.

Acts 16:30 Then he brought them out and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” 31And they said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and understand correctly the nature of heaven and hell and you will be saved, you and your household.

I must have a misprint in my Bible since the portion marked in red is missing from it.

[Leonhard]

If he was a Christian in error about that he was not condemned.

Depends on whether he was invincible ignorant about it. Would you say that one could deny that Jesus was divine, yet also be saved by Him?

Arguing a specific case is beyond me, as deep down, I don't know what he believed, or what he understood, or what his particular situation was. Only God is capable of judging a soul. However I wouldn't call denying the Christian hope a safe card play.

Also insisting that all things be explicitly stated in the Bible is a bit naive. The Trinity of God is undeniable, yet its nowhere clearly stated in a succinct manner.

[Obsidian]

Acts 16:30 Then he brought them out and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” 31And they said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and understand correctly the nature of heaven and hell and you will be saved, you and your household.

I must have a misprint in my Bible since the portion marked in red is missing from it.

Exactly what do you think "believe in the Lord Jesus" means

[Jedidiah]

Depends on whether he was invincible ignorant about it.

?

Would you say that one could deny that Jesus was divine, yet also be saved by Him?

Pretty unlikely.

Arguing a specific case is beyond me, as deep down, I don't know what he believed, or what he understood, or what his particular situation was. Only God is capable of judging a soul. However I wouldn't call denying the Christian hope a safe card play.

Also insisting that all things be explicitly stated in the Bible is a bit naive. The Trinity of God is undeniable, yet its nowhere clearly stated in a succinct manner.

[Leonhard]

?

It is a Catholic term for a person who is ignorant of something that is a doctrine of faith, and where no amount of study on the person could have overcome this. Basically a person is innocently wrong about something, and so isn't guilty of heresy. In reality it very rarely applies, unless a person is mentally handicapped or lives away from Christian societies and has only infrequent access to missionaries.

[Paula]

I have mixed feelings about this. On one hand, Christianity does have essential doctrines. On the other hand, I wonder how many truly understand doctrines like, say, the Trinity.

[Rushing Jaws]

I think God is Heaven, and the Heavenliness of Heaven. And that if God were "in" Hell, it would be Heaven.

I think that, somewhat as the places in the Primary World that we live in are more really places than the places that exist in the Secondary World of human fiction - London has a measure of reality that Hogwarts Castle lacks; the reason we can't set foot in Hogwarts has nothing to do with our being Muggles - so, perhaps, Heaven is more real, more solid, than London. I am too real to go to Hogwarts; I am not remotely real enough to go to Heaven. One can meditate on Hogwarts as truly as on Heaven, but they are wholly different. Heaven is for grown-ups, for people who have faces, people in whom Christ is fully formed, people who are all the more really themselves for belonging always and totally and only to Christ. Heaven must come to us, in Christ, and He must enter into us and transform us from within, if we are to be fit to associate with Him in His Heaven with His angels and with His Saints. This BTW is why the Eucharist is so important - we are meant to become the One Whose Presence we eat. To say nothing of the Work of the Spirit of Christ. The Ascension seems to suggest a re-ordering of the material universe.

To borrow a thought from C. S. Lewis: we on earth are the Unsolid People, light, wispy and indefinite, like motes in a sunbeam; the Blessed in Heaven are the Solid People in the Solid Land that those not of it cannot walk. An ant would be destroyed, if it had to carry the Himalayas. God is too Real for the shadowland that is earth, with its less than Real inhabitants. And God's Glory is so great, that we would be destroyed if He inflicted it on us. It is earth, not Heaven, that is barely existent - Heaven is terribly real, terribly holy, terribly good, terribly joyful. Atheists who want to be shown God, do not know what they are asking for. Because they barely exist, they cannot tell Hogwarts from Heaven. Christians are better off, because we can do that.

Just a few thoughts.

[Sparko]

Heaven will be on Earth. Not floating around on clouds.

[Faber]

The heavenly state certainly isn't New Jersey.

[hansgeorg]

According to what I read, he thinks Heaven and Hell are not literal places.

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