Reddit mentions: The best christian death & grief books

That misunderstands what God "is" and what evil is. To be able to answer your question, we're going to have to change how think about those two words. And once we have altered your perceptions of those words, we realize that the "problem of evil" is fundamentally a non-question that poses no problem to Classical (neo)Platonic Theism. First, I'm going to suggest a book that covers this issue. If you're actually serious in learning an answer, and not here to just cause raucous, please look into it. And I suggest this to everyone, not just OP. The Doors of the Sea: Where was God in the Tsunami? By David Bentley Hart

Now my response is going to basically be a copy/paste from when I've answered this before (actually in relation to my younger brother's sudden death). If you want, here is the whole post. Remember, these responses are just pointers.



It begins with our concept of the word, "God". God is not a being. If God were a being, God would be confined to the rules of whatever realm he dwells in. God would also need an explanation of why God exists. So, to say God is a being is to limit God. And that would be no different than a Zeus or a Flying Spaghetti Monster, hence the ability for atheists to say, "The only difference is that I believe in one god less than you". Therefore, God cannot exist in the way we exist. God cannot be as we are. Or as only a programmer to a video game. He would be limited to that role. Therefore, it is perfectly acceptable to say: God does not exit.

God/The Divine/whatever term you use, is transcendent to our notions of "being". To be transcendent does not mean to be like a ship outside Earth's orbit, but to be in, through, and over Creation. As all other objects (material and immaterial) in the universe, the universe itself needs a source. It doesn't matter if the universe is infinite because it still has the quality of "existence". The universe still "is". In a literal sense, you cannot create something out of nothing. Just like light can shine through window thanks to the sun, so does the universe exist through participation in the Divine. And just how it seems that light is ever present, so the Divine is ever present. Please don't take this metaphor too far. Just because light is seen only during the day time, if the conditions are right, doesn't mean that God is only found in certain parts of "Existence"/"Being". To be always transcendent means to be always immanent. Being participates in this "Being Beyond Being". Metaphors are only fingers pointing to a beautiful moon, not the moon itself.

>Christian metaphysical tradition, in both the Orthodox East and the Catholic west, asserts that God is not good but goodness itself, not only true or beautiful but infinite truth and beauty: that all the transcendental perfections are one in him who is the source and end of all things, the infinite wellspring of being.   


This brings us to the question before the question: Why didn't this "loving god" create a "perfect world"? That is an illogical question. To put it another way: Why didn't Perfection breath Perfection? If Perfection were to create Perfection, it would be creating itself. Not only is that impossible (ex. can we clone a sheep that is the same in all ways including thoughts and experiences) but also selfish. And as we can see by what Perfection is, Perfection wouldn't do that. It'd be contradictory. So, Existence must have imperfection i.e. time, and "free will" as popularly understood. What we have to distinguish between then is imperfection and badness/evil/ungood. Would you say that just because your friend accidentally hung up on you during a conversation (imperfect) that that would constitute the hanging up as bad? Or, when you draw a circle, it's not perfect but it's not bad (ungood). You may say it's a bad circle, but what you really mean is that it has imperfections. Therefore, just because Existence has imperfections does not mean it is inherently bad.

Here comes the tricky part - as if the above is easy to comprehend. If imperfection isn't inherently bad, then how did badness come into play? That's why I mentioned "free will" as being imperfect. Free will, as popularly understood, means we have to choose between options. Whether we choose A or B. Cool. However, that is still a limit. We are limited by our history, by our beliefs, by other factors. we are not truly Free. So, understood in that way, Freedom is being free from such limitations:


>His freedom is the impossibility of any force, pathos, or potentiality interrupting the perfection of his nature or hindering him in the realization of his own illimitable goodness, in himself and in his creatures. To be "capable"of evil - to be able to do evil or to be affected by an encounter with it - would in fact be an incapacity of God; and to require evil to bring about his good ends would make him less than the God he is. The object of God's will is his own infinite goodness, and it is an object perfectly realized, and so he is free.

So, we are imperfect insomuch as we are limited by time, material, etc. With these limitations comes not being able to see the consequences of our actions. Creation was tempted by the imperfection. Creation (or in the specifics, humanity) chose to eat the forbidden fruit (read as metaphor). So, badness came into Existence when Existence chose the temptation of its own nature instead of that which is Good. Therefore, we are trapped in chains...and here we are to prove that.

tldr The Bible writers always expressed the eternal heaven and earth will be concrete/material/earthly etc. The doctrine of resurrection means the old human bodies that will be resurrected will get replaced with perfect concrete bodies, these bodies need to live somewhere and since concrete bodes must live in a concrete context and God says Christians will be in Heaven forever it follows that eternal Heaven and earth is concrete

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Some key scriptures

Mark 10 [biblehub.com] Matthew 19 [biblehub.com], hundredfold>
>29 Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, 30who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life

John 14 [biblehub.com], dwelling places>
>2 In My Father's house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you

Revelation 21-22 [biblehub.com], is filled with material descriptions of the New Earth primarily focused on a city called New Jerusalem and God coming down to earth>


>1Then I saw a new Heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, and there is no longer any sea. 2And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of Heaven from God

1 Corinthians 15 [biblehub.com], immortal bodies>
>53For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality

Romans 6 [biblehub.com], resurrection>
>5For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his

Romans 8 [biblehub.com], resurrection body>
>23...but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies

In my understanding there are two reasons why the eternal Heaven and eternal earth will be material/earthly.One, the language used in the bible. Two, the definition of resurrection

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I've drawn these points from Heaven [amazon.com] by Randy Alcorn [en.wikipedia.org] and the Bible of course

language

Throughout the bible and especially in the New Testament, Jesus and his followers continually describe the eternal Heaven and earth with material concrete language while they hardly attempt at describing them in ethereal spiritualized terms. Jesus says he's preparing many rooms for his disciples and that his followers will receive land and families in eternal life (see above verses). Also, The language in Revelation is emphatic in describing the eternal Heaven and earth as concrete places. The writer describes Heaven coming down to earth and God dwelling on the earth with people. (many bible academics will tell you the technical meaning of Heaven is God's dwelling place, or God's throne. So, if God's throne is on earth then this means that Heaven is on earth because God's throne is the definition of Heaven). Indeed, if you read the Bible without any secular influence it is clear the writers are anticipating an eternal state that is material concrete and earthly, yes this includes Heaven. You must "read into" the Bible to believe the new Heavens and New Earth aren't concrete or material

resurrection

The doctrine of resurrection is essential to understanding our eternal state. Our resurrection is a central theme in the Bible, topical bible entry [biblehub.com]. Christians are constantly told we are to be raised from the dead in resurrection and that our bodies will be resurrected in glory, that we will be resurrected just as Jesus was and that we will be like Jesus.

So, what is resurrection? Here's googles definitions [google.com]

> - restore (a dead person) to life
> - revive the practice, use, or memory of (something); bring new vigor to

Resurrection has to do with restoring things, to bring them back to original form or a better form. In the case of Jesus he died in a body and since his body was resurrected Jesus returned in a body, the old body was restored/resurrected to a new body. If Jesus was "resurrected" without a body would this be called resurrection? No, just by the definition resurrection means his body would have been restored to another one. So if Jesus was resurrected without a body then he was in fact NOT resurrected because there was NO body

Since Christians have been promised many times that we are going to be resurrected just as Jesus was then we can anticipate we will have concrete bodies and we will live in these bodies forever. Since we have concrete bodies it follows they need a concrete place to live, we call this place earth which can also mean the universe (concrete bodies in a spiritual realm cannot exist and cannot make sense). And since these concrete bodies will live forever the universe will also live forever, and since Heaven/God's home is coming down to the New Earth then Heaven will quite literally be on earth FOREVER

misconceptions

• There is only one Heaven, but it exists in two states. First, Heaven is in some temporary state at the moment and will not change until the resurrection of the dead (it's kinda funky and we don't really know if it's concrete or not), I'm calling this temporary Heaven (some say this is Sheol, but I haven't deeply researched this and can't really comment on it). Secondly, Heaven will come down to earth after the resurrection of the dead, this is Heaven's eternal state and I'm calling it eternal Heaven
  
• People get confused when Christians "go to Heaven" but then we also say Heaven will be concrete. Clarification> at the moment Christians go to Temporary Heaven but eventually they will go to the concrete Heaven. Temporary Heaven and eternal Heaven are not the same. If we separate the two we should clear the confusion

I think I first have to shatter a paradigm in your thinking.

Christianity isn't about getting into Heaven. Yes, a lot of churches in the West sell it as a "get out of Hell free" card. Yes, Jesus is "sold" to a lot of people that way. But that's not what the Bible really says, at least, not fully. It's a partial picture, at best, and a misguided one at worst.

Christianity, is first and foremost about God's work to lovingly restore mankind and creation to full life. Relationships are about distance, and it's about God closing that gap between us and Him.

What do I mean by, full life? The idea starts with us realizing that there is something deeply wrong and broken in the world, and in each of us, as individuals. We come from broken homes, warring countries, feuding families, a world of scarcity, pain, and death. We all feel inadequate in some way; there are these fault lines in our souls that we attempt to spackle over with things like relationships, hobbies, aspirations, occupations, other people's approval, etc.

We are literally slaves to death, in this paradigm. We strategize how to spend our remaining time, maximizing our comfort and happiness, and if we can, helping those we like along the way (often because they provide us with a kind of identification that makes us feel less precarious).

Christ (and the Law) were given to us to break us out from under that slavery.

The Bible tells us the Law came first to make us aware that we were even under slavery in the first place. Oftentimes, we're so broken, we actually prefer being in slavery. We can't see, hear, touch, taste, feel our enslavement - or if we can, we're so accustomed to it that we stick with it. Addicts are an extreme example of this, but there are manifestations of this in all our lives.

The Exodus story provides an early example of this. The Bible tells us it took the Israelites 40 years as they were guided by God to get from Egypt to Israel. Well, look on a map; they're not that far away. What took them so long? Was God, who was guiding them, lost?

The Rabbinic scholars basically sum it up thusly: God could take the Israelites out of Egypt in a heartbeat, but He also needed to take Egypt out of the Israelites.

When you're a slave for 400 years, you get accustomed to it. You move like a slave, you think like a slave, you sleep like a slave, you generally act like a slave. Your parents were slaves, and you will be too, so you don't even expect right from life any more.

But imagine, then God suddenly comes in and tells you, no, you're my child (aka, divine royalty) - and, all of the sudden, these former slaves are supposed to know how to act like royalty?

God made them stop many places along the way; taught them what victory looked and felt like, taught them to be conformed to His ways (literally, to begin moving like the King), and provided food, water, and everything they needed along the way during those 40 years of reconditioning.

(As a sidenote, I often hear critics of the Law approach the Law as a negative thing on the face of it. I want to challenge them to approach it as a good thing designed to give wisdom and life. Often times the amount of laws (613) is listed as this staggering amount that no man could keep. Well, yeah, God knows that. That's why no human being is supposed to keep all the Law. Certain Laws are only for men, or only for women, or only for priests, or only for subsets of priests, or only for certain occasions; etc. When someone lists the amount of Laws as their chief objections, I immediately say in my head, "Okay, this person doesn't know much about Torah law." But this may be neither here nor there in terms of chief objections).

So then, we have the Law and that that "Old Testament" stuff, and then Christ enters the picture and says things like:

>You have heard that it was said, Do not commit adultery. But I tell you, everyone who looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

What was Jesus getting at with things like this? He was pointing to a deeper reality that the Law can't serve as something that will bind up your cracks and make you presentable to God (much in the same way we use relationships, hobbies, aspirations, occupations, etc.) The people who were following the Law that way had missed the point! The Law highlights our absolute need for restoration (and a restorer!) by showing us exactly how we are broken.

This is where the Resurrection comes into play, because the ultimate reality of Jesus' work isn't to funnel souls into Heaven, but to prepare them for their own resurrection. There will be a day when God will restore the Earth (namely, by bringing the Kingdom of Heaven down to it), establishing his rule, and bringing it back to the Paradisical, Edenic state.

I mean, this might be a big concept to wrap your mind around now, but if you want to see the Biblical basis for this, check out N.T. Wright's Suprised by Hope. Jews always believed in the Resurrection and the world to come (aka, Tikkun Olam). The Orthodox Church has always preached the doctrine of the Resurrection. And it's in all the creeds. (Yes, Western Christianity has misunderstood and misrepresented it for ages).

So in a sense, you're kind of right about morality. Jesus isn't so concerned about morality as much as he is about relational distance. God wants to be close to you, to see your wounds, heal and restore them, and then use you to help restore others and all of creation (sidenote: this is why the Orthodox are particularly "green"). That's the fundamental nature of Grace, and truly, we are under Grace.

I mean, Paul practically wrote Romans 6 in response to your blog:

Seriously. Take a moment. Read the chapter. It answers just about every objection you raised, though I think in a way you wouldn't expect (because you set it up as a dichotomy, and really, there's a third way).

C.S. Lewis once said:

>We are so little reconciled to time that we are even astonished at it. “How he’s grown!” we exclaim, “How time flies!” as though the universal form of our experience were again and again a novelty. It is as strange as if a fish were repeatedly surprised at the wetness of water. And that would be strange indeed; unless of course the fish were destined to become, one day, a land animal.

Deep inside, even if we had the best life we could imagine for ourselves, we'd still know that something is seriously wrong in the world. This is because God didn't design us for sin and death, yet we experience it's effects on a daily basis.

In the end of the chapter, Paul talks about us being slaves to either sin, or slaves to righteousness. Being a slave to sin leads to death, because the wages of sin are death. Being a slave to righteousness leads to life, because it is close to God, the author of life.

Christianity isn't about "being good." It's not about getting all your holy ducks in a row and hoping it'll appease an angry God who wants to burn you forever and ever and ever.

It's all about relational proximity. God is drawing close to us, particularly through the advent, death, and resurrection of Christ, and yes, thank God He's more interested in restoring everything than he is in destroying it.

Jesus ascended into heaven in a glorified body. When he rose from the grave, he looked different. Some suspected he was a ghost (i.e. purely spiritual), but he made clear that he was not a spirit. He was phyiscal, and yet he did not have an earthly body but a heavenly resurrected body.

The bible clearly tells us that we will one day join him and be given similar bodies:

"The Lord Jesus Christ... will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body." (Philippians 3:20-21)

"As just as we have borne the likeness of the earthly man, so shall we bare the likeness of the man from heaven". (1 Cor 15:49)

Therefore the type of things Jesus was able to do after his resurrection are things we can expect to do in heaven (e.g. eat, talk, walk). When he ascended, he did not materialize into some ghost like spirit, but kept his physical resurrected body. Just as Jesus ate on earth, we are promised to eat and drink in heaven. Do not be tempted to think of Heaven as completely spiritual and void of all matter. It is in many ways a physical place with physical bodies, physical food and physical houses.

If you are interested in further study, I highly recommend:
Heaven - Randy Alcorn
It smashes many of the myths that Christians (and thus popular culture) have developed over the centuries regarding heaven by examining the bible over traditional stories.

>"And now I cannot see in [my]self what I see in others - hope, potential, and greatness. I see that in every person, but myself. I have this ability to see more in every broken person that I encounter. I see past each person's mistakes and past. I see what this person can become. That gives me the chance to show this person the greatness within them.
So I end up living a life telling other[s] how great they can be. Yet I see nothing in me."


This is hauntingly and beautifully written. Your words are remind me of what I had been struggling with these past couple years. I started to withdraw myself from everyone and found myself on a dark, narrow, lonely path with nothing but my own imperfections and failed potential staring me back in the face. No matter how I tried to be positive and find the good in myself, it never worked. Being an INFJ, I've always felt the burdens of the whole world and all the people that I've known weigh on me. Even if I hadn't talked to a friend in the longest time, I would feel for them some semblance of an endearing love; I would want the best for them, for them to be happy and be the best they could ever be. I hated that I cared so much for them and this caused me to withdraw even more. My friends thought I stopped talking to them because I stopped caring, but that was never the case. I didn't want to burden them with any of my problems and it was just too hard to deal with all their issues when I, myself was not sorted out. I am currently in my 6th year of college, with my planned graduation in a year or so. Although I have received so many undeserved chances, I have kept struggling with my issues and kept questioning the world around me and being upset at myself for not being able to do what I knew I wanted for me to have done. Only recently, have I finally started to feel like I am living for the first time. I won't go into too much detail, but it was centered around my faith and also medication that helped me to face myself. Although I am not completely well yet, I feel that I am slowly making progress and beginning to appreciate the personality traits that I carry and accept myself for who I am.



I cannot promise you that it will get better. I cannot say that you will one day accept yourself and be happy with who you are. You will always care for other people. No matter how much you hate it, you will always have an unwarranted sense of responsibility for all the other humans in this world. It won't be easy, but please don't give up. If you drift down the indifferent and apathetic road, you will just wake up months/years later and be in the same position, most likely more depressed and more crushed. Start small and work from there. I started watching videos and reading encouraging books. I started to keep a journal where everyday, I write three things that I am thankful for in my life. Don't overthink things and don't make it more complicated than it is. My whole life I've tried to figure it all out by thinking everything through and in the end I would just end up a hopeless mess that was worse off then I started. Stop thinking about how miserable you are or all the missed opportunities you had. You can't change any of those, but what you can do is change what you do starting from today. Think about all the things that you are grateful for that are important to you. Hold on to those things and protect them. Remember the most important thing to INFJ's is to work on yourself first. Focus on yourself and what you know you need to do. Even though it seems contrary to who you are, force yourself to do that, because you can actually help others better if you yourself are more stable and of sound mind. I know you feel all alone and that you've dug yourself in a humongous hole. Don't worry! We are all here with you ;]. Take baby steps and maybe one day you will find yourself in a place where you can use this experience to help someone else who is struggling through a similar situation!

Hi /u/KDTHEDESTROYER,

I've been through seasons of intense doubt. I nearly walked away from my faith at one point. I've been on a long journey, exploring the reasons why I now think Christianity makes the most sense.

On your question about prayer - God wants you to pray to him about anything and everything. He loves you and is with you through every struggle. Prayer is your way of spending time with Jesus and talking to Him about your troubles. He loves you so much, cares about them all, and just wants you to spend time talking to him.

If you're having trouble praying, a really good strategy I've heard is to pray the book of psalms. They help remind us that we can come to God with any problem and any emotion. We can just vent to God, because He loves us and wants to listen to us, and He wants us to rely on Him and share everything with Him.

If you're having serious doubts, the best book for me was The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism by Timothy Keller

It covers a wide range of topics (and is pretty heady), but I find that the issue of doubt goes wider than any one issue.

Here is a really great (and free!) sermon series to start with:

https://gospelinlife.com/downloads/the-trouble-with-christianity-why-it-s-so-hard-to-believe-it/

A good book about heaven and the afterlife is Surprised by Hope by Tom Wright.

Again, this is some heady stuff. If you're okay with simple answers, PM me and we can talk through some stuff. And if you want deeper, complex, and nuanced answers, I can try to help direct you to some good resources that will be helpful for you.

One last thing - when I was going through doubts, reddit comments and internet searches almost never helped (they often made me feel worse!) Good books, community, and overall the work of God in my life is what really helped me through.

For the most part, Christians are confused as to why the apostles made such a big deal about the resurrection beyond that of Christ's. They weren't talking about "going to Heaven when you die," which is partially true but it sells us short on what we've been promised. If you want to read into this subject, I highly recommend reading Surprised by Hope by NT Wright.

In terms of our cosmology, those who have been saved do enter Heaven (often called Paradise for the sake of clarity) to join God and the saints. We will not have bodies but our person will survive through death in the Lord's presence. After the Lord's Coming, the universe will experience the resurrection and we will be subject to the final judgement, at which point the saints will live in the resurrected Heaven and Earth with God.

The idea of us being asleep is generally held to refer to our bodies being dead, while our person remains alive. Essentially, a conscious disembodiment, with a dream being the closest real analogy that we have to that image. This period ends with the resurrection, when our person is reunited with our bodies, and we get to experience God's glory in full.

There's theological nuance here (and to be fair, a lot of heresy) but that's basically how it's expected to play out.

My current favorite is Surprised by Hope. I like to leaf through it a little bit at a time. His writing is very accessible and not overly heavy or ponderous. I find this book very comforting.

A dear friend gave me a copy of The Things You Can See Only When You Slow Down. It's also fun to read a few pages at a time. Just some brief meditations/observations. Very easy read, not heavy.

For lighthearted fun I like to read a little bit of Rumpole. I have most of these on my shelf and on my Kindle and Nook books. I also like to watch the DVD's of the old BBC series. I think Leo McKern is an excellent Rumpole. I like that the TV adaptations are very much true to the books.

I also like to read some Bertie Wooster and Jeeves stories. They are easy to pick up and put down. I enjoy the light-hearted and gentle humor of these. I like most of the Wodehouse stuff, but my favorites include Jeeves and Wooster. Here's another one I like to watch the DVDs. Hugh Laurie as Bertie and Stephen Fry as Jeeves are really enjoyable, and also true to the books.

The heaven of popular culture is not the heaven of the Bible. For one, Jesus taught of a heaven that is present now. He often said things like, "The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand" and he told his followers to tell people, "The Kingdom of Heaven has come near to you". The Kingdom of Heaven is a present reality for those in Christ.

Also, the floating in the clouds with gold harps as a final destination is also off. The clearest picture of eternity in the Bible is Revelation 21-22, and even that you can't read too literally. The Christian hope isn't to escape from earth to heaven, but rather for heaven to come to earth in the resurrection. For a better picture of new creation, the resurrection, and the hope of Christians see N.T. Wright's Surprised by Hope.

If at any point you'd like to join us, you're welcome. The gates will always be open.

There's an excellent view of world to come in NT Wright's book Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church. In short, the angels-playing-harps-on-clouds view of heaven is completely unsupported by the Bible, and there's a world of things to do and make better, absolutely well-suited to our being human.

We will be praising God in our work, just as we praise God in our work on Earth. And there will be amazingly awesome choirs and things for standing around and going "Great is our God," just as we have pretty good choirs for that on Earth. But it's absolutely not all we're doing.

> I think I am scared of the idea of living forever, in which my mind is never at peace. I am a Christian and know that we will be glorifying God forever and adoring Him in the new heaven/new earth, but perhaps that just feels too vague or something.

I find that most people have a really weak understanding of Heaven. There really is a good amount from the Bible on what Heaven will be like. And on top of that, there is a considerable amount of speculation based on scripture, which can give us a pretty good picture of what we might expect in Heaven. Some of the problem is our limited imagination.

For one, you can know with 100% certainty that you will not be in a situation as a Christian where you live forever, but your mind is not at peace - one of the things granted to us in Heaven is peace and rest in Christ.

I second Heaven by Randy Alcorn.

He also has a fiction series that deals with some of those themes, too.

I'm glad you recognize that this problematic pattern of behavior has transferred over. This might sound strange, but there are resources to learn pastoral care best practices. Some are aimed for humanist chaplains. It might help you to learn better patterns. I'd also like to recommend Judaism Unbound podcast, because they have people who have thought long and hard about the complexities you're describing. I haven't read these, as I just found them last night, but I'm thinking about reading them. The Practice of Pastoral Care, Revised and Expanded Edition: A Postmodern Approach https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00SVSGW0A/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_way1Cb5H3BPB7. The Practice of Pastoral Care, Revised and Expanded Edition: A Postmodern Approach https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00SVSGW0A/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_way1Cb5H3BPB7. https://youtu.be/ACJk9ZSGomk

Sure. The idea that we go to another space called "Heaven" as spirits for all eternity is a very modern one. It's not what is taught in the Bible, and it has never been an orthodox Christian belief.

Heaven is the space where God resides, like another dimension. God created the earth in such a way that it kind of "overlapped" with God's space. Because of human rebellion (i.e. "sin"), we've lost the ability to be in full communion with God in that space. While heaven is still there and can interact with us, we cannot interact with it (at least not in the way we were meant to).

God's goal is to fully restore the relationship between our world and heaven. Revelation describes heaven coming down to earth, not us going up to heaven. God intends to make creation like new, restoring the heaven/earth relationship and wiping away the effects of human sin.

There's still a belief that the human soul is in some way protected by God after death, and that we exist in some kind of unembodied state, but that's not the end goal. If that's "life after death", then the real hope of the Christian faith is "life after life after death".

That's a super simplified version. If you want to know more, check out this video from the Bible Project, or read "Surprised by Hope" by N.T. Wright.

> I don't believe that a worldview that (for instance) legitimately believes in an afterlife will generate the resolve necessary to commit oneself to solving these problems.

I believe in an afterlife - not based on stories passed down by religion, but based on information collected from individuals who had died for a while; based on scientific investigation that has refuted pure materialism; and based on consistent reports collected from individuals under hypnosis, especially the work of Michael Newton - 1, 2. Brian L. Weiss is another author who has published his experiences with clients under hypnosis (e.g. 3), but a skeptical reader will want to read Newton first for a more comprehensive, less anecdotal treatment. There are reports where it was possible to confirm memories of past lives as recounted by children. Such stories are not scarce - if you frequent the right subreddits, you will see a few per year, for instance this one. Of course that's anonymous and easy to fake, but that's why we have this information from many sources.

You will probably need a personal experience to make any of this subjectively credible to you. You can't believe in electricity until you can feel it, or see it at work.

But none of this conflicts with what you wrote here:

> To advance, humans will need to deal with the ongoing anthropogenic mass extinction, reverse global climate change, sustain their explosive population growth, and eventually find ways to colonize other worlds.

I fully agree with this - and so does the above spiritual narrative. The works of Newton and Weiss both contain warnings from non-incarnated beings - call them guides - who emphasize that humanity needs to solve such problems, and that if we don't pay attention, we're on a good road to fuck up majorly.

Belief in afterlife provides context and perspective for our lives here. It changed the following attitudes for me:

• It becomes nonsensical to pursue an indefinite lifespan for the body, if the body is just a temporary vehicle intended to provide experiences needed by the soul.
  
  
• It makes much more sense to act selflessly and with love, rather than out of a hard-nosed, thick-skinned, rational self-interest.
  
  I see these attitudes as helpful in terms of contributing to solving the world's problems. If this was a purely materialist universe, then the rational end-game for me would be trying to develop augmented intelligence so that I can be among the first to become transhuman. I would hope to be part of a first wave of augmented intelligence pioneers that would render the rest of humanity obsolete. I wouldn't care about the outcomes for anyone but the people I know and care for. If I can make it off the planet and maintain a high quality of life in space, then for all I care, the Earth and its degenerate, monkey-like inhabitants can go to shit.
  
  With my belief in the afterlife, I have a new interest in not selfishly pursuing transhumanism, but rather helping fix the planet's problems in a way that includes everyone else in the solution.
  
  My argument is that belief in an afterlife can be an essential component in favor of solving the problems you listed - rather than opposing them. In fact, I would argue you aren't consistent in your materialism if you care about trying to solve the world's problems, instead of becoming rich and transhuman only for yourself.

Awesome! Here's the central churches website (you can get further support there, if not from me): https://newchurch.org/

Here are some amazon versions of our books on: heaven and hell, the doctrine of life and a verse by verse explanation of revelation (pretty tough at first). I'd recommend starting with the doctrine of life, as it is easier to grasp and links to well known concepts like the 10 commandments.

Heaven and hell: https://www.amazon.com/HEAVEN-HELL-PORTABLE-NEW-CENTURY/dp/0877854068/ref=sr_1_1?crid=EI7FV0RXJI2T&keywords=heaven+and+hell+emanuel+swedenborg&qid=1568746466&s=gateway&sprefix=heavne+and+hell+%2Caps%2C412&sr=8-1

Doctrine of life: https://www.amazon.com/Doctrine-Life-Emanuel-Swedenborg-ebook/dp/B00D33AMV8/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=doctrine+of+life+swedenborg&qid=1568746531&s=gateway&sr=8-1

Revelation revealed: https://www.amazon.com/Apocalypse-Revealed-Emanuel-Swedenborg-ebook/dp/B01JLWWML2/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=apocalypse+revelead+swedenborg&qid=1568746599&s=gateway&sr=8-1-spell

Further resources which may be useful:

https://swedenborg.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/swedenborg_foundation_life.pdf; (free ebook)

https://www.youtube.com/user/offTheLeftEye

Please ask me any questions and ill try offer support. If you want any of the books free, not off amazon, I can share them, although some of the amazon versions are nice. I've been with the church 15 years, and feel like ive grown to be a better person, though it is not without hard times (carrying my cross).

>Do any of you have detailed information on what the Christians believe be what occurs in the afterlife?

Simply Christian and Surprised by Hope do a really good job of explaining the Christian afterlife and afterdeath and all the common misconceptions people have. If you want detailed information I strongly recommend them both.

>Does one have the same consciousness as he or she had when alive on Earth? Can you experience sadness and anger in heaven?

In Paradise (the afterlife) I think Revelation 6 suggests we can. The souls there sound like they're in a bit of anguish.

In the Age to Come (the afterdeath), "Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away." (Revelation 21)

>Do you have the same physical presence in heaven? Eyes, ears, nose, and skin?

Paradise: I don't know. I'd guess not since we'd just be disembodies souls.

Age to Come: Yes, but transformed to be like Christ.

>Does time exist in heaven? Do you sleep? Do you interact with others in heaven?

Paradise: I think the experience is probably a lot like the moments between sleeping in waking, where you're drifting in and out of consciousness and don't really have much experience of time. But this is just a guess.

Age to Come: Yes, don't know, yes.

It's a complex question with a complex answer. If we take our sources seriously, then our first clue lies in the Ascension in Acts 1. After Jesus moves up into the clouds, two angels appear and tell the Eleven that Jesus will return in the same way he left. So, we either take this that he will descend back down, or it will be a shocking event that we don't expect.

Acts 2 includes the pouring out of the Holy Spirit, which could be construed as the return, but that requires a reading of John, which Luke would not have and thus likely should not be considered an interpretation of the text.

Okay, but what about what Jesus said, because that's what really matters, right? Well, we have only a few bits of text outside of the Olivet discourses. As for those, Matt 24-25, Mark 13, Luke 21, they are a bit crazy. You have what appear to be clear allusions to the sack of Jerusalem, which make sense in regards to the prompt for the whole discussion regarding the stones of the Temple. But then comes the more abstract notions of things passing away or the goats and the sheep, so how literal do we need to be regarding all of this?

Honestly, allegorize it, because Paul does with the Thessalonians in his second letter. Heck, that's what the Church historically has done with this material. The key is not how Jesus returns, but that he will return.

So, how come Jesus never came back? Because it isn't the time to come back. We're almost done getting his name to every language on this planet, and we may have other people among the stars to tell as well. I mean, Christianity grew silently for the first three hundred years, spurted out for a century in the Roman Empire, silently again until 1500 with colonialism, though I would contend that the true growth in that regard, much like in Rome, came also silently through the true-hearted missionaries and Christians who lived the faith.

Here's an excellent book that I think really encapsulates eschatology and the mission of the church. I know I used quite a few odd words, so if you have questions, I'd be happy to clarify or expound a bit more.

I always wondered why N.T. Wright didn't see that he was right at the threshold of Universalism refusing to cross over. I remember reading one particular quote from "Surprised By Hope" and thinking "you're almost there! You've opened the door, just step inside!" The quote:

>Likewise, the majestic but mysterious ending of the Revelation of John leaves us with fascinating and perhaps frustrating hints of future purposes, further work of which the eventual new creation is just the beginning. The description of the New Jerusalem in chapters 21 and 22 is quite clear that some categories of people are “outside”: the dogs, the fornicators, those who speak and make lies. But then, just when we have in our minds a picture of two nice, tidy categories, the insiders and the outsiders, we find that the river of the water of life flows out of the city; that growing on either bank is the tree of life, not a single tree but a great many; and that “the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.” There is a great mystery here, and all our speaking about God’s eventual future must make room for it. This is not at all to cast doubt on the reality of final judgment for those who have resolutely worshiped and served the idols that dehumanize us and deface God’s world. It is to say that God is always the God of surprises.

Source [amazon.com] Heaven by Randy Alcorn (and the Bible of course)

Heaven will be earth without sin period.

When I say heaven will be earth I mean it. Heaven will be the manifestation of "heaven on earth." This means be our actual physical present earth, the one your feet rest upon at this moment will be heaven (where God lives). It will be all of the good of the present earth without any of the bad. If you Imagine everything good in this world without corruption you may have a glimpse at what heaven will be like for the Christian

Nope, you're incorrect. The idea of an eternal soul and "evil" body that perishes is modern Christian thought that is a concession to platonic philosophy. It's our own little form of gnosticism.

Most Christians get it wrong and like this idea of fleeting to heaven when, in fact, there is no scriptural evidence to support the idea that Christians sorta peace out. You can blame the "Left Behind" series of books for that.

Anyway, if you'd like further reading into the scholarship that is trying to change that thought, I'd recommend you check out N.T. Wright's "Surprised by Hope" as he attempts to correct this issue (http://www.amazon.com/dp/0061551821).


But yeah, Chocobean shouldn't really have even said anything, the original comment was pretty funny and didn't need nickled and dimed based on its theology.

>Oh! So, Heaven is kind of like a neat place to hang out until we get a new body?

That's exactly it! The way Heaven is described in the Bible, it'll be some mix of rest, worship,and somehow relaying prayers for those still "in the body".

>What happens then? Will we return to Heaven with our bodies?

Nope, this is the weird bit - when we get our "new" bodies (better to call them "renewed", since they will be our old bodies, but repaired and transformed), we will stay on the Earth. But the Earth will also be renewed, and in some way, Heaven and Earth will merge. Or maybe not merge, but become very "near", and we'll in some way be in both places at once.

If you want to read about the resurrection, check out [1 cor 15 nrsv] and [1 thess 4 nrsv]. For this merge, or "marriage", check out [rev 21 nrsv] [rev 22 nrsv]. And if you want a good book to read, I'll recommend Surprised by Hope for the second time today.

Praying With The One You Love

Surprised By Hope

The first one I am currently reading with my fiancee and I highly recommend to strengthen your relationship with your girlfriend and with God.

The second is one I just received yesterday in the mail. I know there's some debate on his New Perspective of Paul but from what I've read, one of his greatest works is Surprised By Hope and is something everyone can appreciate.

My first step into the world of progressive Christianity was Brian McLaren’s A New Kind of Christian series. I really liked Scot McKnight’s blog as well. Eventually I found NT Wright; I definitely recommend his Surprised by Hope. You should check out Sojourners magazine, which has some really great content as well.

Removed comment posted by /u/enlilsumerian at 04/02/14 16:20:36:

> Heaven or any afterlife is not exclusive to any religion or any god. A Muslim will have the same experience as a Christian or Atheist. Life is just that.
> http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2547133/The-children-near-death-experiences-lead-charmed-lives-Study-reveals-youngsters-young-six-months-lucid-visions.html

... in response to submission With the new movie "Heaven is for Real" coming out, what good resources do you point people to for a better understanding of Heaven? posted by /u/Eagle9183 at 04/02/14 15:54:52:

> As a pastor, I have had several conversations just this week about this movie and other books like it where someone supposedly travels to heaven and comes back with the juicy details. My message it that our hope for heaven and information about it doesn't come from supposed experiences, but from God's Word.
>
> I've pointed people to Randy Alcorn's book "Heaven" - http://www.amazon.com/Heaven-Alcorn-Randy-ebook/dp/B000FCKCJC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1396452599&sr=8-1&keywords=heaven+alcorn
>
> and ordered a stack of his booklet "Heaven: Biblical Answers to Common Questions" to hand out - http://www.epm.org/store/product/heaven-booklet-packet-20/

NT Wright has a great book on this topic called "Surprised by Hope" http://www.amazon.com/Surprised-Hope-N-T-Wright-ebook/dp/B0010SIPOY/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1397096717&sr=8-1&keywords=surprised+hope

It has the best description I have read about this issue from a Christian Perspective (and... it actually IS pretty surprising!). I did not find that it clashed my own beliefs in science, etc... indeed, it clarified them.

If you want something really good pertaining to the topic at hand, I recommend N. T. Wright's excellent book Surprised by Hope. It is the best articulation I've seen of a Biblical view of heaven and resurrection and whatnot (or, to use Wright's phrase, "life after death and life after life after death).

not sure if your cup of tea, but i am currently reading Never Give Up!: Relentless Determination to Overcome Life's Challenges by Joyce Meyer. It is faith-based and has a lot of tie-ins with scripture. Very encouraging and motivating for me!

A really great book to read that touches on this topic very well I think is Heaven by Randy Alcorn. It's well researched, though he is clear on areas of speculation, for instance the reason for marriage not being in heaven is that there would no longer need to be a legal covenant, relationships would simply continue to develop on a higher level... if I remember correctly, it's been years since I read it. It's an excellent read though, I highly recommend it.

I would recommend looking into open theism.

http://opentheism.info/

Here's an article from the site:
The Problem of Evil in Process Theism and Classical Free Will Theism
http://opentheism.info/information/problem-evil-process-theism-classical-free-will-theism/

To add to it, I would recommend these books.

The God Who Risks: A Theology of Divine Providence by John Sanders

The Doors of the Sea: Where Was God in the Tsunami?

God of the Possible: A Biblical Introduction to the Open View of God

Others here have recommended other Christian approaches to the issue too. Seek the truth. God honors that.

Last year I was fascinated with eschatology and found a rather extensive book on this subject. Heaven by Randy Alcorn. Some of the content of the book is speculation based on verses concerning this throughout the Bible, but as a whole it's an extensive overview of the afterlife. I grew up thinking the afterlife was heaven, a non-temporal realm as it's portrayed in the media.

I don't know how highly contested the new earth theory of the afterlife is among Christians, but from reading the verses associated with it I can't come to any other conclusion.

Anyways, good article. Wright is always a good read.

I am really, really sorry. My wife had a miscarriage in March of 2015. It was an incredibly difficult time; we had been trying for almost 3 years with no success, then that happened. It really threw her theology for a loop; she was angry with God, me, and generally anyone who had a baby.

I highly recommend going to see a good biblical counselor. I am an idiot and didn't have us start going to a counselor until 6 months after the miscarriage, and it would have radically helped her healing process in the moment, I believe.

Also, I can almost guarantee there is another woman in your church that has dealt with this tragedy. I've seen some studies that claim almost half of pregnancies end in miscarriage (granted, many occur even before the mother knows she is pregnant). But the point is that this is extremely common and, like /u/rdavidson24 said, we just don't talk about it, to the detriment of our people.

So, go talk to one of them, often. I think my wife would be able to say now that she can see the incredible ministry opportunity that has come from her miscarriage. Our struggle with pregnancy, the pregnancy itself, the miscarriage, and the recovery were all very public in our church: we were prayed for by the whole congregation for in the worship service a few times and I know that several small groups prayed for us each week during all 4 phases of the journey. And now, my wife is the go-to person in our church for women to talk to because they know she went through it, they saw her pain and (if we're being honest) hatred toward God for a while, and now they see her recovery and complete trust in Him for what has happened.

Those would be my top recommendations. We need community and people to talk to. There is a reason we are part of a body of believers.

As far as books and other secondary resources, you might try:

• A Place of Healing by Joni Eareckson Tada
  
  
• Trusting God: Even When Life Hurts by Jerry Bridges
  
• Definitely this one Inheritance of Tears: Trusting the Lord of Life When Death Visits the Womb by Jessalyn Hutto.
  
  Jessayln also blogged about miscarriage for a while, but I can't find the exact articles, I'm sorry. Here is her blog, though.
  
  Some other articles include:
  
  
• Looking to Christ in the Loss of a Child
  
• THROW OPEN THE DOORS
  
• Life after Miscarriage: God’s Goodness & Mercy in Pain
  
  Again, I am so sorry you are going through this. God loves you. God loves your baby. I know that's hard to hear and sounds like a bunch of crap right now. But do not let Satan tempt you to doubt in the dark what God has revealed in the light. I will be praying for you and your husband.

> if Earth is not our real home

Earth is our real home, in some sense. Heaven as most people think of it is the antechamber of the New Creation. (Ever read The Silmarillion? That's what the Halls of Mandos are.) In any case, the New Creation is the current creation redeemed. We are not disembodied souls if we are saved---we are resurrected, body and soul. In the Nicene Creed that's what the line "the resurrection of the body" refers to.

For more on this, read N.T. Wright, Surprised by Hope. It's a pretty brief read.

He could be a rock star and you could be his guitar

You could do the jetpack if he was Boba Fett

He could be a motorcycle and you the rider

Thanks for the contest!

I'd like this ebook from my "hubby" WL if I win please :-)

The following works are pretty nerdy, I would say. They were assigned throughout the course of my undergraduate studies in theology and think that they serve as excellent primers to the intellectual side of Catholicism.

Joseph Ratzinger, The God of Jesus Christ. Highly recommended as a beautiful exposition of the Catholic concept of God.

Ratzinger, Introduction to Christianity.

Ratzinger, In the Beginning...: A Catholic Understanding of the Story of Creation and the Fall.

Ratzinger, God and the World. A fantastic survey of essential Catholic doctrines and beliefs.

Gustavo Gutiérrez, A Theology of Liberation. A genius work that reminds us that God is on the side of the poor, that he casts down the mighty from their thrones and lifts up the lowly.

Hans Urs von Balthasar, Life Out of Death. A short but beautiful meditation on what it means to die and rise with Christ.

And then, of course, there are the classics. Augustine's Confessions, Aqunas' Summa, Athanasius' On the Incarnation, Benedict's Rule, Anselm's Proslogion, Bonaventure's Mind's Road to God, etc.

David Bently Hart can come off a bit snarky sometimes but he wrote a nice essay entitled "The Doors of the Sea: Where was God in the Tsunami?". It's worth checking out.

Here are their top picks for each category:

​

Apologetics/Evangelism - Evangelism in a Skeptical World: How to Make the Unbelievable News About Jesus More Believable

​

Biblical Studies - Lexham Geographic Commentary on the Gospels

​

Children and Youth - The Friend Who Forgives

​

Christian Living/Discipleship - The Gospel Comes with a House Key: Practicing Radically Ordinary Hospitality in Our Post-Christian World

​

The Church/Pastoral Leadership - Preaching as Reminding: Stirring Memory in an Age of Forgetfulness

​

CT Women - Perfectly Human: Nine Months with Cerian

​

Culture and the Arts - Why Should the Devil Have All the Good Music?: Larry Norman and the Perils of Christian Rock

​

Fiction - An Extra Mile: A Story of Embracing God’s Call

​

History/Biography - The Spirit of Early Evangelicalism: True Religion in a Modern World

​

Missions/Global Church - Megachurch Christianity Reconsidered: Millennials and Social Change in African Perspective

​

Politics and Public Life - Scars Across Humanity: Understanding and Overcoming Violence Against Women

​

Spiritual Formation - Subversive Sabbath: The Surprising Power of Rest in a Nonstop World

​

Theology/Ethics - Seeing God: The Beatific Vision in Christian Tradition

I'll throw Randy Alcorn's Heaven in the mix. Its a little long winded and has a candid evangelical slant but his attitude agrees with you, if not all of his theology. He emphasizes stewardship as well as pointing out there will be work to do when heaven comes to earth. It won't be all harps, clouds and singing songs.

The Doors of the Sea: Where Was God in the Tsunami? by David Bentley Hart.

Though it is a small book, it is fairly dense. I will come back to it when my theology is stronger, as I did not fully grasp all of the concepts in the book. But from what I did understand, it is a very well written book with very good "explanations".

It is so hard...and hard to see anything good of it in the midst. You deserve some good alone time!! Seriously...we should never feel guilty for filling up our tanks. it is necessary!! Here is a great book from two ladies that dealt/deal with Chronic illness. I thought it was so helpful. https://www.amazon.com/Hope-When-Hurts-reflections-suffering/dp/1784980730

There is a great book byr Randy Alcorn on heaven
https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B000FCKCJC/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1

Everything you described boils down to one thing: You are lonely and starving for love. Feeling "well-liked" or approved by others, pornography, and so forth are all shallow "foods" to feed this one hunger. And as long as you remain hungry for love, you will find yourself continuously eating the wrong things.

Some ideas:

1. Trade being "approved/liked" for being "known." You want to be liked, so you wear masks tailored to the people you are with. (Extreme forms of this can turn into Borderline Personality Disorder.) Try working some parts of your life that only seem acceptable in one "sphere" and tip-toeing them over into other areas. Then live with the tension...or acceptance...that this creates.
   
   
2. ADD can often be accompanied by huge impulse control problems and emotional imbalances. This is a neurochemical issue, and the reason why ADD/OCD/antidepressants exist. (ADD, OCD, and mood disorder can overlap a whole lot.) I would suggest looking into asking a doctor or therapist about those options.
   
   
3. Consider some healing literature. Books like Abba's Child and More Than an Aspirin (or other therapeutic Christian reading materials) can work wonders for making Christ's healing practical and effectual. While scripture devotion/study is a good thing, the act of reading the Bible is NOT a one-habit-solves-all-problems solution.
   
   
4. A word on pornography. This is an addiction. Treat this not primarily a some kind of secret, hidden sin (even though it is also that), but as a neurochemical drug you are unable to stop using. Groups like Celebrate Recovery or Sex Addicts Anonymous can be crucial to breaking out of such patterns. ("I can't stop" is different from "I can't stop on my own.")
   
   http://www.amazon.com/More-Than-Aspirin-Christian-Perspective/dp/1572932570
   
   http://www.amazon.com/Abbas-Child-Heart-Intimate-Belonging/dp/1576833348/
   
   http://www.celebraterecovery.com/index.php/cr-groups
   
   http://saa-recovery.org/Meetings/
   

Part 3: Book recommendations:

If you want to dig deep into this topic, here are some book recommendations. Perhaps you would want to read N.T. Wright's Christian Origins and the Question of God series (this is very heavy, scholarly reading). N.T. Wright is the foremost scholar on the New Testament and this is possibly the most thorough literature on the historical Jesus, early Christianity and the Apostle Paul:

https://www.logos.com/product/37361/christian-origins-and-the-question-of-god-series

Anything by N.T. Wright is well worth reading (Simply Christian and Surprised by Hope would be good introductions). Likewise, anything by Ravi Zacharias.

The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus by Gary R. Habermas and Michael R. Licona: https://www.amazon.ca/Case-Resurrection-Jesus-Gary-Habermas/dp/0825427886

Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus: A Devout Muslim Encounters Christianity by Nabeel Qureshi: https://www.amazon.com/Books-Nabeel-Qureshi/s?ie=UTF8&page=1&rh=n%3A283155%2Cp_27%3ANabeel%20Qureshi

No God But One: Allah or Jesus?: A Former Muslim Investigates the Evidence for Islam and Christianity by Nabeel Qureshi: https://www.amazon.com/God-but-One-Investigates-Christianity/dp/0310522552/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1517050609&sr=1-2&refinements=p_27%3ANabeel+Qureshi

On Guard by William Lane Craig: https://www.amazon.ca/Guard-William-Lane-Craig/dp/1434764885/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1526542104&sr=8-1&keywords=on+guard+william+lane+craig

The Case for Christ: A Journalist's Personal Investigation of the Evidence for Jesus by Lee Strobel: https://www.amazon.ca/Case-Christ-Journalists-Personal-Investigation/dp/0310339308

Bonus reading: Heaven by Randy Alcorn: https://www.amazon.ca/Heaven-Randy-Alcorn/dp/0842379428/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1526542237&sr=1-1&keywords=randy+alcorn+heaven

Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis: https://www.amazon.ca/Mere-Christianity-C-S-Lewis/dp/0060652926

Read anything by G.K. Chesterton, especially, The Everlasting Man


Answers to Common Objections and Questions:

Jesus’ Resurrection and Christian Origins: http://ntwrightpage.com/2016/07/12/jesus-resurrection-and-christian-origins/

The Evidence for Jesus: https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/popular-writings/jesus-of-nazareth/the-evidence-for-jesus/

The Resurrection of Jesus: https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/popular-writings/jesus-of-nazareth/the-resurrection-of-jesus/

The Resurrection of Jesus Christ as Christianity's Centerpiece: http://www.cslewisinstitute.org/The_Resurrection_of_Jesus_Christ_as_Christianitys_Centerpiece_FullArticle?fbclid=IwAR0oE22vtBvR2u--R78tSyW-51OpIbWBfWDNH2Ep8miBc9W6uUJMwMsz0yk

Origin, Meaning, Morality and Destiny: http://rzim.org/just-thinking/think-again-deep-questions/

Accompanying video to the link above: Why is Christianity True?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5qJPZySo7A

How Do You Know Christianity Is the One True Way of Living? | Abdu Murray: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14ze_SVg-0E&app=desktop

What makes Christianity unique among the world’s religions? Verifiability is a Christian Distinctive: https://coldcasechristianity.com/writings/verifiability-is-a-christian-distinctive/

Is Jesus God? (Feat. Craig, Strobel, Habermas, Licona, Qureshi...): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8dLoKCyDDAg&app=desktop

How Can Understanding Eyewitness Testimony Help Us Evaluate the Gospels?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tCDDsPXQSQ&app=desktop

Historical Evidence for the Resurrection - Can a Scientist Believe in the Resurrection? - Nabeel Qureshi: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hD7w1Uja2o

‪Questioning Jesus: Critically Considering Christian Claims with Dr. Nabeel Qureshi‬: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UpuEDp4ObA

Did Jesus Rise From the Dead? | Yale 2014 | William Lane Craig: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NAOc6ctw1s&app=desktop

Historical Resurrection of Christ?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0Dc01HVlaM

‪Are The New Testament Documents Historically Credible?: ‬https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgdsIaqFAp4

Are the Gospels Accurate?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxrDy_G8h88

(Answer to the common objection: ‘the gospels are anonymous’)
Gospel Authorship—Who Cares?: https://www.reasonablefaith.org/question-answer/P40/gospel-authorshipwho-cares

What is the Evidence That Jesus Appeared Alive After His Death?: https://youtu.be/96WIa3pZISE

On Extra-Biblical Sources for Jesus' Post-Mortem Appearances: https://youtu.be/-Dbx7PPIIsQ

Did Jesus Rise From The Dead Or Was It A Hoax By His Followers?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aELRKdxV7Wk

Follow up to the previous video: ‪Did Jesus rise from the dead, or was it hallucinations by his followers?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29224I3x_M0&feature=youtu.be‬

‪Did the Disciples Invent the Resurrection?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HOHUWsNDPZc‬

‪‬Facts to show the Resurrection is not fiction, by William Lane Craig: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8AduPVkqbis

‪‬Did Paul actually see the risen Jesus, or did he simply have some sort of vision?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8yNdynwqtWI&t

What Do You Mean By ‘Literal?’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxQpFosrTUk

Evidence For Jesus' Resurrection: https://youtu.be/4iyxR8uE9GQ?t=1s

Death, Resurrection and Afterlife: https://youtu.be/HXAc_x_egk4?t=1s

Did Jesus Really Rise From The Dead?: https://youtu.be/KnkNKIJ_dnw?t=1s

4 Historical Facts That Prove Jesus Really Did Rise From The Dead: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RmKg62GDqF4

‪What About Pre-Christ Resurrection Myths?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrCYVk6xrXg‬

Jesus and Pagan Mythology: Is Jesus A Copied Myth or Real Person?: https://www.reasonablefaith.org/writings/question-answer/jesus-and-pagan-mythology/

Zeitgeist - Is Jesus A Myth: https://alwaysbeready.com/zeitgeist-the-movie

Did Greco-Roman myths influence the Gospel accounts of the resurrection of Jesus?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pt9rlG7ABo&app=desktop

‪Does the Resurrection Require Extraordinary Evidence?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLN30A0vmlo‬

Moral Argument For God’s Existence: How Can A Good God Allow Evil? Does Life Have Meaning?: https://youtu.be/it7mhQ8fEq0

‪Are there Inconsistencies Between the Four Gospels?: https://youtu.be/sgdsIaqFAp4‬

‪Why Are There Differences in the Resurrection Accounts?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtz2lVGmXFI‬

Don't the Gospels Contradict One Another?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gt9kCwttVY

Why Differences Between the Gospels Demonstrate Their Reliability: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zimP8m3_hCk

Why the Gospels Can Differ, Yet Still Be Reliable: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=An5wU2hxIfM

Four Reasons the New Testament Gospels Are Reliable: http://coldcasechristianity.com/2015/four-reasons-the-new-testament-gospels-are-reliable/

Find Contradictions in the Bible All You Want: https://www.thepoachedegg.net/2019/05/apologetics-find-contradictions-in-the-bible-all-you-want.html

The Case for the Historicity and Deity of Jesus: https://coldcasechristianity.com/writings/the-case-for-the-historicity-and-deity-of-jesus/

Bart Ehrman is one of the world's most renowned ancient historians/New Testament scholars, and he is an atheist. Listen to what he has to say on the matter of Jesus' existence: ‪The Historical Jesus DID Exist - Bart Ehrman: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43mDuIN5-ww‬

‪Bart D Ehrman About the Historical Jesus: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6U6TJ4cwSo‬

Extra-Biblical evidence: In addition to the gospel accounts and the letters from the Apostle Paul, we have sources outside the New Testament with references to Jesus in the writings of Josephus, Tacitus, Thallus, the Jewish Talmud, etc:

http://coldcasechristianity.com/2017/is-there-any-evidence-for-jesus-outside-the-bible/

Is There Extrabiblical Evidence About Jesus' Life?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzP0Kz9eT_U&app=desktop

How do we know Jesus was really who he said he was?: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ksvhHEoMLM&app=desktop


YouTube Channels to browse:

William Lane Craig - ReasonableFaithOrg: https://www.youtube.com/user/ReasonableFaithOrg?app=desktop

drcraigvideos: https://www.youtube.com/user/drcraigvideos?app=desktop

Ravi Zacharias - Ravi Zacharias International Ministries: https://www.youtube.com/user/rzimmedia?app=desktop

J. Warner Wallace - Cold-Case Christianity with J. Warner Wallace: https://www.youtube.com/user/pleaseconvinceme/featured?disable_polymer=1

The Bible Project: https://www.youtube.com/user/jointhebibleproject

Unbelievable?: https://www.youtube.com/user/PremierUnbelievable

David Wood - Acts17Apologetics: https://www.youtube.com/user/Acts17Apologetics

Nabeel Qureshi - NQMinistries: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCepxnLs6GWAxAyI8m2U9s7A/featured?disable_polymer=1

Randy Alcorn - Eternal Perspective Ministries with Randy Alcorn: https://www.youtube.com/user/eternalperspectives?app=desktop

Frank Turek - Cross Examined: https://www.youtube.com/user/TurekVideo

Brian Holdsworth: https://www.youtube.com/user/holdsworthdesign

Other people have made good recommendations, but I have to say that Surprised by Hope by N.T. Wright is the book that gave me a faith worth having.

I'll buy you a copy if you can't afford one.

The Rapture is unbiblical, but I wouldn't say it's the worst thing to believe. It's just not in the Bible. Ask anyone who believes it to show you where they find it in the Bible. They won't be able to point to anything other than a few disconnected verses (like 1 Thess 4:16-18) that can be cleared up by a little cultural and literary context.

As far as actually engaging people concerning this idea, I'd recommend actually opening the Bible and seeing what it says, not just in a few verses, but in general. And not just in Revelation, either. Jesus talks about the New Creation, and he never once mentions the Rapture or the Tribulation, or any of that silly Left Behind nonsense.

Recommended reading:

Surprised by Hope, by N.T. Wright

Recommended listening:

Revelation lectures, by Shane J. Wood

Recommended watching:

Revelation, by The Bible Project

David Bentley Hart is unparalleled in terms of knowledge, wit, imagination, eloquence, and is perhaps the greatest living Christian thinker today.

He just put out a translation of the New Testament through Yale University Press which is incredible.

His newest book is called The Experience of God and it is mind-boggling.

Atheist Delusions absolutely eviscerates pop atheism.

His theological magum opus, The Beauty of the Infinite has been called the greatest work of theology so far this century.

The Doors of the Sea is required reading for anyone who struggles with the issue of evil.

His work is sublime.

On theodicy, I would recommend David Bentley Hart's The Doors of the Sea, a book expansion of this article.

On mental illness, God is perfectly just and can rightly weigh all factors in our salvation.

Surprised by Hope by NT Wright.

Along with his scholarly work on the Resurrection, The Resurrection of the Son of God, quite literally changed the way I looks at my faith.

I would recommend, if you haven't read it, this book: The Goodness of God: Assurance of Purpose In the Midst of Suffering by Randy Alcorn

Read Surprised By Hope by N.T. Wright. The concept of "Heaven" as a destination (as presented by the pastor you heard) is a lot different than the "New Heaven and New Earth" we are promised.

Jesus is the first fruits of a physical resurrection. He ate with the disciples to prove this point.

Read through the Gospels. That's where we find the root of our faith in the person of Jesus Christ.

It may be good to read a contemporary book alongside scripture that discusses a little bit about why we believe what we do such as Surprised by Hope, Mere Christianity, or Orthodoxy.

If you are really interested in this topic I would recommend you pick up N.T. Wright's Surprised by Hope

Here is an interview he did with TIME magazine: http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1710844,00.html

Here is a video interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZC6tbgpsl4&noredirect=1

There is a book by a dude named Randy Alcorn simply called Heaven. I thought it was well written and quite interesting.

I read this recently and it made me really look forward to eternity. There will always be something new because God is infinitely creative.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0842379428/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1474579308&sr=8-1&pi=SY200_QL40&keywords=heaven+randy+alcorn&dpPl=1&dpID=51%2BI-D0QHLL&ref=plSrch

"Don't Blame God!" is really good.

https://www.amazon.com/Dont-Blame-God-ebook/dp/B005LILUWI/ref=sr_1_3?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1315426677&sr=1-3

It's a non-fiction.

/u/ELN007: in addition to the above recommendation, NT Wright's Surprised by Hope is a much shorter read. I don't remember it touching on Christ's resurrection (much), but it addresses the hope in ours, and what that means.

The book I recommend most is Surprised by Hope by NT Wright. Among other things, it explains what the actual afterlife taught by Christ and the apostles is, which surprisingly few modern Christians are aware of, and portrays Christianity as life-centric rather than death-centric.

>We will actually be living on New Earth, and I believe (though I don't have a lot of evidence for this) that we will have a profession and be part of a society. This existence will be infinitely better than our current one because we will be in constant contact with our creator, but I think it will be anything but dull or repetitious.

NT Wright does an excellent job of exploring this in Surprised by Hope.

Check out the book Heaven by Randy Alcorn.

http://www.amazon.com/Heaven-Randy-Alcorn/dp/0842379428/ref=tmm_hrd_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1408045540&sr=1-1

There's a book about heaven by Randy Alcorn which may address this.

READ LOVECRAFT, or read this very short (<10 pp.) exploration of Lovecraft and the uncanny from Mark Fisher contained in this longer book: https://www.amazon.com/Weird-Eerie-Mark-Fisher/dp/1910924385

His entire thesis on Lovecraft is this: that Lovecraft makes the unreal real, the immaterial material, and that he in all cases makes the weird and uncanny of this world

The difference that Fisher establishes between Lovecraft's work and the fiction of other weird fantasy writers is to say that Lovecraft's work shows that the foreign/uncanny has the same materiality as does the native/normative.

It is not walden or thoreau. Not sure what you're writing about specifically but Fisher's book is a good help I think

lmk if you cite this, Fisher recently died and its important we get him reborn

I just posted about one I just read!! Amazing book. Confessions of a Funeral Director

Sorry if I was unclear on that in my first comment! I think suffering for good is the only kind of suffering Christianity accepts; not that all suffering can be explained or justified in terms of bringing some kind of good. So I don't believe or want to believe that everything happens for a reason or whatever. God can bring good out of anything that happens, but a lot of stuff that happens is just plain tragic, meaningless, and/or evil.

Some Christians believe in a less-interventionist God (although if someone believed that God never made interventions in the natural world, I don't see how they could be a Christian). As I understand it, being a Christian means believing that God's one really major intervention... is in the form of Jesus. Everything God is doing in the world, every project he is omnipotently working on, his "method" for accomplishing it is Jesus. Jesus is God's plan to put an end to death.

I wonder if you would enjoy reading David Bentley Hart's The Doors of the Sea: Where Was God in the Tsunami? I have only read excerpts from it, but folks I know who have read the whole thing really valued it. He is a very sensitive theologian who seeks tough questions and avoids easy answers. I don't agree with him about everything, but I think I do agree with his basic argument in that book.

NT Wright: “am I a joke to you?”


https://www.amazon.com/Surprised-Hope-Rethinking-Resurrection-Mission/dp/0061551821

Have you ever read The Doors of the Sea by David Bentley Hart? It's basically about this question, and while it's hard to summarize it meaningfully, I think it's worth a read, and it isn't very long.

Read N.T. Wright's Surprised by Hope. Oh, several Bible texts talk about the Second Coming. Acts 1 comes to mind.

>i know jews don't believe in hell; is it only mentioned in the nt?

Hell is in both testaments. Hell in the Old Testament is mostly known as the abode of the dead that was called Sheol or sometimes the pit. It could either represent the grave, or the afterlife. It was apparently divided into two places, a place for the righteous dead, and a place for the wicked dead. For an example of the wicked side of Sheol see passages like Ezekiel 32:17-32.

Jews, and then later, Christians, believed in a general resurrection of the dead, some to everlasting life, and some to everlasting death.

>i've heard the rare argument from a christian that hell is metaphorical; what is the point of disagreement?

I wouldn't call it a rare argument, as its rather well accepted. The idea that the imagery used is metaphorical comes from a number of clues within the imagery itself. First of all, when Jesus refers to "hell" in passages like Matthew 5 or Mark 9, the Greek is the word Gehenna. The Valley of the Son of Hinnom, from which the word comes, was a place mentioned in the Old Testament where followers of Baal sacrificed children by passing them through fire. The place was considered cursed by the Jews, and was later turned into a rubbish dump that continually burned day and night. The metaphor is invoking the imagery of this place. Other places in scripture hell is described as a bottomless pit or abyss, a lake, darkness, death, destruction, everlasting torment, etc. I mean, these all can't be literal descriptors of the place... you can't have a place that's both an abyss, or a bottomless pit, and a lake of fire, you can't have fire, and also a place of utter darkness. And other clear figures of speech are used throughout the Bible, so it isn't only hell that is exempt from a literal interpretation. Hell then seems to be eternal separation from the creator, and this separation appears to cause anxiety and torment.

I suppose the point of disagreement then is that some read the Bible in a more literal sense than others even where the Bible does not exactly grant an overly literal reading. I've seen both Christians and atheists read the Bible from an overly literal perspective. Most of the time, this is because they're reading the book as if it were written yesterday. When reading the Bible, or any ancient work, its needful to understand the historical context, the genre, and the original audience. Same is true of works written in the 1800s. You can't read Romance literature of the 1800s without some background on the context and the intentional use of metaphor and symbolism, so why expect you can with a book thousands of years older.

>is that similar to the jewish position at all?

The NT view would be a Jewish view (specifically, Jews of the Hellenistic period) since the NT was largely authored by Jews.

>how much does scripture play a role in these conceptions as opposed to tradition?

I'd say that scripture plays the larger of the roles. Tradition has added some concepts like Purgatory, and then later in Dante's Inferno we have all sorts of new imagery added that people use in popular media, but all of that can be stripped away by looking at what the Bible actually has to say.

If you're seriously interested in this subject, I think theologian, NT Wright's book, Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church is a terrific, and easy to read introduction into the actual beliefs by both ancient Jew and Christians on the nature of the afterlife. Its only $17 something on Amazon right now.

I mean that all human beings will someday be physically raised from the dead for the Judgement and the "world to come" similar to how Christ was raised. Whatever is left of our body will be transformed into a "new" body that can be touched and can eat (for example), but is not subject to corruption and doesn't always necessarily act like we think of bodies acting now. References to the resurrection of the dead is scattered all over scripture (1 Samuel, Job, Psalms, Isaiah, Jesus' teaching in the Gospels, Acts, many of Paul's letters), but the big passages are Daniel 12 and Ezekiel 37 in the Old Testament and 1 Corinthians 15 in the New. It gets a line in both the Apostles' Creed ("I believe... in the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting") and the Nicene Creed ("I look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come."), and two of the earliest post-Apostolic Christian writers we have access to (Irenaeus and Justin Martyr, both 2nd century) argue for a physical resurrection of all humans.

N.T. Wright has a good book, Surprised by Hope, that discusses this doctrine, its centrality to Christianity everywhere until relatively recently, and its implications on how we should live as Christians.