3 Reasons Heaven Doesn’t Affect Us as Much as It Should

I used to think about heaven from time to time, but it didn’t regularly affect my everyday life. That all changed when my oldest son, Cam, suddenly and unexpectedly died in Christ in November 2013. After my child went to live with the Lord, heaven became a profound influence on my day-to-day perspective. It changed my life.

Heaven was previously something I intellectually knew about. After Cam’s death, eternity became a driver for action, a filter through which I gauge my perspective, and a comfort—not just for major tragedy but for the ordinary disappointments of life.

Heightened heavenly mindedness has given me greater contentment, provided strength to persevere in suffering, and inspired me to focus on mission and evangelism. The pain of my son’s death isn’t something I would’ve chosen, and I won’t completely outrun it in this fallen world. But the heavenward shift the Lord brought has been one of the greatest blessings of my life.

Why doesn’t heaven affect most modern Christians as much as it could? Here are three reasons, along with some direction on how we can grow in heavenly mindedness.

1. We see heaven as an exclusively future state.

Before my son died, I only thought about heaven as the place I’ll go when I die—what theologians call the “intermediate state”—and as the new heaven and earth Jesus will bring at the end of this age.

But there’s more to heaven than these future states. The New Testament, particularly Paul’s letters and the Gospels, characterize Christ’s first coming as the arrival of heaven on earth in the present. The Old Testament pointed to the end-times “day of the LORD” and the age to come as its heavenly expectation (Joel 2:1–11; Zeph. 1:14–18). The day of the Lord marked God’s coming to earth to purify the world of evil and bring justice to his enemies. The age to come, the period when heaven inhabits the earth, would follow the day of the Lord.

Heightened heavenly mindedness has given me greater contentment, provided strength to persevere in suffering, and inspired me to focus on mission and evangelism.

Paul’s letters identify Christ’s first coming as a partial installment of the day of the Lord. In 2 Corinthians 6:2, Paul writes, “For he says, ‘In a favorable time I listened to you, and in a day of salvation I have helped you.’ Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation” (emphasis mine). Since the divine visitation first occurred when God came in the incarnate Jesus, the age to come has been initiated. Heaven dwells on the earth. This doesn’t mean the “present evil age” has concluded (Gal. 1:4); that will end with Christ’s second coming. Nevertheless, heaven is here.

When a person puts his faith in Jesus, there’s a shift in his spiritual location. In Colossians 1:13, Paul says believers now dwell in the heavenly realm: “[God] has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son.” When Paul says “our citizenship is in heaven” (Phil. 3:20), he’s speaking in present terms. While we still physically live in sinful flesh and on this fallen earth, we also dwell spiritually in the kingdom of heaven.

Even now, we have present access to the “spiritual blessings in the heavenly places” through our union with Christ (Eph. 1:3). Certainly our sin and the struggles of this present evil age still create difficulty and pain. At the same time, the rich spiritual blessings of heaven bring deep, rich joy to our day-to-day lives.

2. We have uninformed and unbiblical ideas about heaven.

When I began to research heaven, I was astonished to find that “heavenly visitation” books constitute the majority of recent literature on the afterlife. I’ve observed a number of people turn to books like these, where a person relates a near-death experience, after the death of a loved one. Many modern Christians see such books as authoritative theological accounts of what heaven will be like.

I’d discourage people from investing time with heavenly visitation books when the Scriptures provide the absolute truth on what we can expect in the life to come. The truth revealed in the Bible (and in books that explain what the Bible tells us about heaven) far exceeds people’s subjective accounts.

Randy Alcorn’s Heaven, Joni Eareckson Tada’s Heaven: Your Real Home from a Higher Perspective, and my book Heavenward: How Eternity Can Change Your Life on Earth are all good resources to help you build a solidly biblical perspective on heaven. A quality commentary like Vern Poythress’s The Returning King will make the book of Revelation less intimidating and enhance your knowledge of the afterlife.

Heaven can only affect our lives if we base our views on the truth. Having a biblically centered, personal theology of heaven grounds our mindset about eternity in verifiable substance.

3. We treat heaven as an impersonal abstraction.

A problem in modern theology is that Christians tend to depersonalize theological realities. For example, many have reduced the gospel to merely a transaction: Jesus died. We repent and believe. Eternal salvation is credited to our spiritual bank account. Credentials acquired. Clearance granted at the pearly gates.

This falls far short of the Bible’s holistic, personal perspective: We were personally identified with Jesus in his life, death, and resurrection. God’s Spirit dwells within our hearts. We’re united with Christ and find abundant life in fellowship with the Father, Son, and Spirit. Our justification before God comes as part of the relational realities of our regeneration and adoption and the promise of our sanctification and ultimate resurrection. 

While we still physically live in sinful flesh and on this fallen earth, we also dwell spiritually in the kingdom of heaven.

Heaven has befallen a similar depersonalization. We tend to think about heaven’s features, like golden streets and pearly gates, or about the experience there (freedom from suffering, total euphoria, and so on) before we think about the center of heaven’s promise: Jesus.

Heaven became personal for me when my child went to live there. And as I studied and explored the realities of heaven, I grew in my relationship with Christ, the King of heaven, as well. What makes heaven heaven is Jesus. We’ll experience unfettered communion with him there. We’ll behold the face-to-face vision of God in his glory. That’s what makes heaven so euphorically wonderful. Understanding heaven in these personal terms moves us toward deeper fellowship with Jesus and enhances our relationship with him in the present life.

When heaven is depersonalized, it becomes merely hypothetical and abstract. Consequently, heaven has little influence on our lives because it doesn’t feel real. To grow in heavenly mindedness doesn’t just mean you intellectually know more about heaven. It means eternity has a discernible effect on your mood, perspective, and actions.

In his essay “The Negro Spiritual Speaks of Life and Death,” Howard Thurman described the critical role heavenly mindedness played in the survival and perseverance of American slaves. Thurman talked about the concrete view of heaven contained in their songs:

Heaven was specific! An orderly series of events was thought to take place. . . . A crown, a personal crown is given. . . . There are mansions. . . . There are robes.

Their theology of heaven was concrete and individual. A heavenly imagination that flowed out of Scripture nurtured this eternal sustenance.

Heaven will have greater significance and meaning in our day-to-day lives when we view it as both a real and a personal reality. We can employ our heavenly imagination within Scripture’s bounds to move in that direction.

Having a biblically centered, personal theology of heaven grounds our mindset about eternity in verifiable substance.

What will it be like to have a body that doesn’t experience back pain, acid reflux, or migraines? What will it be like to have conversations with Martin Luther, the apostle Paul, or your brother who died before you knew him? What will it be like not to walk by faith because you live with Jesus in plain sight every day? What will it be like to never experience temptation or falter in sin again? What will it be like to explore the new earth without limitation or expense? Using our sanctified imaginations in this way reminds us heaven is real and meaningful and that its reality should influence our lives.

In my life, these changes have taken various forms. I have more courage to say hard things and to share the gospel when it may feel awkward. Life on earth is too short and eternity far too long to let awkwardness or discomfort stand in the way of faithfulness. Heaven has shaped my moral and ethical thinking. When I’m tempted to be self-indulgent or to act out of anger and pettiness, knowing I won’t act this way in heaven compels me to resist sin in this life. When I remember that perfect, unfettered communion with Jesus is what will make heaven so glorious, I’m reminded to stop and pursue intimate fellowship with him now as the path to contentment.

Heavenly mindedness can bless us with great satisfaction, endurance, perspective, inspiration, and focus. Learning more about eternity and asking the Holy Spirit to cultivate heavenly minded thinking can radically transform your life. It certainly has transformed mine.

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