"Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we will shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully even as I am fully known."
I just finished watching Tron Legacy with my kids. (BTW...It's a great sequel to one of the truly great movies from the 80's!) Watching the movie got me thinking about heaven. Yeah, I know it's a big jump...but not so much when you consider how much I love sci fi. It stirred up my ideas about heaven. What is heaven going to be like? Will it completely blow our minds? What will it look like? What will it feel like? I can't be the only one that wonders about all of this.
In the movie we meet a character named Quorra. Quorra is a sentient computer program like person that was born "on the grid" which is computer world of...well you will just have to see the movie to understand. Quorra dreams of seeing a real sunset but has no idea what one actually looks like. She lives in a dark and cold world that is almost completely devoid of color. For her whole life a distant bright light in the sky is all she has to help her imagine what a sunset might be like in the real world. At the end of the movie Quorra escapes the computer world with Sam Flynn and gets to witness an actual sunset. What was once beyond her imagination is finally made manifest to her. And it is an amazing experience. It marks the beginning of a whole new life for her.
I think the truly good news about heaven is that we don't have a clue what it is really like. I say good news because it's beyond our imagination or comprehension in a good way. We don't have any kind of framework from which to form an inkling of an idea of what it could possibly be like other than it will be an amazing place to be. According to Paul, God is able to do more than all we can ask or imagine (Eph.3:20). So our best and most generous guesses as to what heaven could be like will not even compare to the reality. We, like Quorra, live in a dark and cold world (relative to heaven). We have nothing here on earth to help us imagine the brilliance of heaven.
But whatever it is like, I believe it will be nothing but amazing. Like Quorra seeing her first sunset after a lifetime of only dreaming about one... I think heaven is going to feel to us like our deepest and most desperate dreams coming true in ways that we could never have imagined. It will be a whole new life for us...far superior to our lives now. Now that is hope!
