New Perspectives - Heaven and Hell

[00:00:00]Let me say present good morning to each and every one of you and uh some of the things that Wayne said not necessarily true. Everybody here would not necessarily know me.

[00:00:16]I left this parish a number of years ago about 54 or 53 years ago and I'm only 40.

[00:00:27]So you see how long I left this parish and uh I remember some of you because I moved and had my being among some of you but some others I would not necessarily remember and let me disabuse your thinking about uh flattery from Canada about um persons um that are gifted. you've asked me to deal with a subject that I don't know how I can be gifted in because I have no experience in it.

[00:01:04]But anyhow, what I will try to do this morning is to explore a few thoughts on what some people think heaven and earth might be like.

[00:01:21]You've had two sessions already and I assume that you might have come across the the value of story not just fibs but actual stories that people told in order to express the meaning and in order to understand what it is that life was offering to them.

[00:01:50]So since story is such an important part in uh our development of our human narrative I'll begin with a story a story just outside of this church at St. Bartholomew many years ago, long before there was a a fairground, the fairs were held in church.

[00:02:18]And at one of these occasions there was a little altercation between I say altercation may may not have been an altercation between a man called Eustus Mosley some of you will remember him and uh and a lady I say elderly lady because I was young then and everybody look old to me at that time.

[00:02:50]I don't know what it is she was doing, but right outside the door there, she and Mr. Mosley had this little encounter.

[00:03:01]And she was heard to say, "You don't know that heaven is already full?"

[00:03:13]In other words, for her, heaven was a place.

[00:03:22]It was a place and it was a place that you would get to or go to as a result of your efforts. So in other words, I understood then and still now to be fair to Mr. Mosley that his efforts were useless because heaven had no more space. So therefore he could not get in to heaven.

[00:03:54]From that conversation as well I understand that she was saying that heaven is a place that is predetermined.

[00:04:07]144,000 which comes out of the revelation story and so on. 144,000 and those 144,000 have already been taken from the 12 tribes of Israel.

[00:04:24]So therefore don't hope to get into heaven.

[00:04:30]So I asked myself on reflection, where did she get this idea from?

[00:04:39]Most likely some some church somewhere.

[00:04:44]Um I do not know she got it from St. A's church. I didn't think so. Um I think there was a New Testament church in in China still, right? She probably got it from You probably got it from the New Testament church in China. somewhere but somewhere somewhere or even from her own reading she got it somehow. But what was important is that at that point in time the story she had about heaven was influencing her life.

[00:05:21]She had a story and she was building upon it and that story shaped her life. And let me ask you uh this morning what are the stories that you have about heaven, hell or death?

[00:05:43]And how are these stories shaping your own life?

[00:05:54]When I was teaching at primary school, I was encouraged and advised to have a lesson plan.

[00:06:07]And in that lesson plan, I was supposed to have a aim or object.

[00:06:16]I would have a body content and uh I would have a conclusion.

[00:06:24]So before I started, I should have known what the end would be like, what the result would be like.

[00:06:42]I do not know here what the result would be like. I do not know here what you would have learned at the end of the session.

[00:06:58]I was better able to predict if a 10year-old because the experience of the 10year-old was fairly limited and much of what I would be saying to that person would be new knowledge or information.

[00:07:15]So I could judge at the end what it is they have learned. But with you it is different in the sense that uh your world has been shaped by far more experiences than a 10 year old.

[00:07:38]So I'm asking you where have you got your knowledge from? I'm not asking you if you have knowledge because I assume I don't think that I'm making up myself.

[00:07:53]I assume that all of you who have come here this morning have come with your own ideas of what death is like, what heaven may be like, or what hell may be like.

[00:08:19]So for the few minutes that we have, I'm not sure how long it's going to take, but for the few minutes that we have, I'm inviting you to be participants.

[00:08:30]Participants. The child the child you may think is is more a a recipient. The child sits and and receives. But here this morning, I'm expecting that you be participants.

[00:08:46]I have no problem if you interrupt me, right? Because sometimes somebody may say something and a thought comes to your mind but you cannot express it then and by time you get a chance to express it, you forget what it was.

[00:09:08]You forget what it was. So it is not useful. So, I hope that I'll be able to entertain interjections.

[00:09:18]Questions? Yes. Questions?

[00:09:22]I don't know if I can answer the questions you ask, but you can ask them nevertheless.

[00:09:27]If I think I could venture an answer, then that is what I will do.

[00:09:39]So let me ask you then, what are you here for this morning?

[00:09:47]What are you expecting?

[00:09:52]is at the end of this session and somebody asks you what you got from being being in the session this morning, you should be able to say something. I got this. I got that. I ain't got nothing at all. as as has happened fairly often at the end of church services sometimes. I ain't getting that at all this morning. I don't know if you say that. I don't think you say that. But it is said that some people say that. So I'm asking you to reflect upon what it is you have brought to the church this morning. you have brought to this session this morning.

[00:10:47]What is your objective for being here?

[00:10:52]Are you at a position you think where you may change your mind that you may hear something not necessarily from me but something from somebody else that may cause you to change your mind?

[00:11:11]Or are you here to make your idea of earth, of death, hell and heaven more concrete.

[00:11:24]You have a position and all you come here to do this morning is to make that position stronger or whatever the case may be.

[00:11:34]What I will do as the objective is to give you an opportunity to give you an opportunity. And very often we do not feel that we have the opportunity.

[00:11:54]We are afraid.

[00:11:58]We afraid of what we think and afraid to express it because sometimes in Christianity, I guess in other things too, but in Christianity, you may have an idea that you're not sure if it fits with the general thinking and you're afraid to express it.

[00:12:27]Because if you express it or you feel that if you express it, the person next to you, the person who's hearing you may ask, "How could you believe that?

[00:12:39]It's just that you're a Christian."

[00:12:43]We do it for ourselves. We do it for other people. We listen to other people say certain things. Charles Morris, we listen to and say, "But how could he be a Christian? How could he be a priest?"

[00:12:52]We do that. So be afraid to express what it is that we think. So really all I want to do this morning is to give you an opportunity to reflect upon what you already believe. I am not going to change your mind.

[00:13:11]You think so?

[00:13:14]I'm not even attempting to change your mind.

[00:13:17]I'm just giving you that opportunity to think about where your mind is to ask yourself what is happening as I go through the session.

[00:13:33]So part of my plan is that I move now to the role of language.

[00:13:41]Language shapes our thoughts and our behavior.

[00:13:51]Shapes our thoughts and our behavior. We are exposed to language at different areas and phases in our lives.

[00:14:01]There's a language in the home. There's a language in the church. There's a language on the street.

[00:14:08]These things help us to become who we are because they give us a shape.

[00:14:19]So how often do we use words like heaven and hell and death without thinking without understanding how they are shaping not just our thinking but how they are shaping our behavior.

[00:14:48]If you hear the language of heaven as a place of reward that you get there after you have done good deeds that language shapes your behavior. If you want to get to heaven then you feel that you must do good deeds. So it's already shaping your behavior but you haven't sat down to say oh and calculated if I do A B C D F G then I get XYZ or whatever the case may be. So we say things, we hear things, we even sing things.

[00:15:24]So in our songs in the in church, the song there there few of them, but only one I have here. Sing the wondrous love of of Jesus.

[00:15:36]They say um when we all get to heaven what?

[00:15:49]>> Aha. where we see Jesus and I ask the question often when people hear people saying that I say will it be such a wondrous day because sometimes you feel that in life you couldn't get along with that person and when death comes enough to get rid of them you want to see them in heaven surely not But we sing it and we sing it with a lot of gusto.

[00:16:27]We will all have a wonderful time when we get to heaven.

[00:16:36]Heaven for some people is a place of reunion.

[00:16:42]We set at funerals to we set at funerals to go along until I get there.

[00:16:51]And there is that thinking that sometime we will all meet together.

[00:17:01]But heaven can be a place of surprises.

[00:17:07]Surprises.

[00:17:08]I sometimes amuse myself by saying if you get to heaven if you get there you may see somebody there and your first reaction is wait how you get here we can't be in the same place so it can be a place of surprises life is a journey And we see heaven as a possible destination.

[00:17:49]Our thoughts, our ideas about heaven are reinforced in a lot of the things that we do and say almost every Sunday. Every Sunday we do the Lord's Prayer every Sunday, but we could do the Apostles Creed, but they they're set as part of our worship in the Lord's Prayer where heaven is portrayed as a model or as a pattern of behavior. here. So what do we say that things on earth may happen like things in in heaven? Heaven is the pattern that we use as a copy here on earth. So we say every time we say the Lord's prayer, may our existence here on earth be like that. We we may use the word reality, the reality that we perceive heaven is like.

[00:19:12]We have the apostles creed.

[00:19:16]In the apostles creed we say Jesus ascended to the dead.

[00:19:22]Sometimes that's referred to as as hell and then ascended to heaven and is seated at God's right hand.

[00:19:35]So when we speak of heaven, we speak of the abboard of God.

[00:19:44]God came down from heaven. God did these things and God went back to where he came from.

[00:19:54]So God lives in this place called heaven.

[00:20:03]Language and the meaning that language creates cannot be ignored.

[00:20:14]Many of us would have grown up with a concept of a three decker, a three decker universe, heaven, earth, hell. You go up to heaven and you go down to hell. So heaven is the place in our thinking where God dwells.

[00:20:51]Hell is a place where Satan dwells.

[00:20:58]Earth is the place where humans dwell and where God and the devil are fighting for territory.

[00:21:16]You may you may think of the the story of of Job.

[00:21:26]How does that story begin?

[00:21:29]The Lord and the devil in conversation.

[00:21:34]Cahoots.

[00:21:36]And the target was a faithful character called Job.

[00:21:43]What do you think about him? And they they have the conversation and they decide, all right, I'll give you a chance. Try your best. Try your best with him. So they told them they're fighting for territory. So heaven to earth is sometimes seen as this place of duality, good and evil fighting for its own survival.

[00:22:13]These are powerful images that we repeat often.

[00:22:22]To change our thinking, we may have to change our language.

[00:22:30]To change our thinking, we may have to change our language.

[00:22:40]Heaven and hell come into play after death.

[00:22:50]The parables may give us a different the a different opinion especially the parable of the kingdom the kingdom of God or the kingdom of heaven or whatever it is a suggestion of a a a transformed state within our present existence.

[00:23:13]But usually when we think of heaven and earth or hell and heaven, we think of something that comes into place after death. So we ask the question, what is what is death? What is death? And people have very different ideas about what is death. I wouldn't try to go into any of those at this point in time. But what we accept is as human beings we form relationships.

[00:23:56]We have experiences of grief and experiences of loss.

[00:24:04]We feel pain and we ask the question why.

[00:24:12]We ask the question why.

[00:24:15]We cannot find an answer. We ask it nevertheless.

[00:24:20]So since death is something we cannot avoid, we ask what happens after this life?

[00:24:33]What happens after this life?

[00:24:38]Some may say or think that even 100 years here is very small in relationship to the fold.

[00:24:53]So persons find a help with their ability to grapple with their pain and so on into the thinking that there must be some existence beyond this. How often when you think of your own mortality that you come to the conclusion, man, this can't be all.

[00:25:24]How often do you say that to yourself?

[00:25:26]This can't be all.

[00:25:28]There must be something else beyond this.

[00:25:32]Some persons would encourage you, you better enjoy what you got now because you don't know what you're going to get.

[00:25:39]So the thinking about that but since this this short period of time seems so inadequate there must be something thereafter and the concept of a soul and we took it on to in one of our hands um CPW508 I don't think you know it but um you knew it from the other Great talks about uh a charge to keep I have a god to >> uhhuh and never dying soul to save and do what it >> fit for the skies. And that is the hymn that we taught children. That's a hymn that you would have been taught as a child.

[00:26:33]So if we teach children This concept that there's a never dying soul to say regardless to what you try to do thereafter they will never get away of that idea.

[00:26:49]They will always be thinking that so that thinking develop but in Genesis we don't have the concept of a never dying soul.

[00:27:05]In Genesis we are told that the life in the human being is the breath of God. The story I believe John might have dealt with it uh when he the story that humankind is a a lump from ashes to dust pulled together.

[00:27:34]But what made it what we think it is is the injection of God's spirit ra whatever you choose to call it and then we became living beings. The question is if the breath defines life when the breath is no longer there. I had two thoughts. I had the what I I I settled for when that breath is given up and to to to use that term and I'm I'm suggesting that we have some choice I don't think we have a choice but let's be comfortable think we have some choice so we give up our breath as opposed to the violent action of death being taken away from you which you prefer to say death has been taken there or I give it up.

[00:28:42]Which one makes you more comfortable?

[00:28:46]Let's let's leave that for the ending.

[00:28:49]So when when the breath is no longer present, we die.

[00:28:58]We die.

[00:29:00]But the question remains, the question lingers, what happens thereafter?

[00:29:09]We come to funerals and uh we hear the words ashes to ashes dust to dust.

[00:29:26]What does that suggest to us?

[00:29:29]It suggests to me that we go back.

[00:29:34]We go back from where we came. We go back to the dust. Now that may be a very uncomfortable thought for some of us.

[00:29:51]I watch a a program sometime astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson.

[00:30:00]He said there was a point in time when he was thinking of cremation but then he changed his mind and said he want to be buried because when he was alive he fed on the plants and now that he's dead he want the plants to feed on him. So the cycle the cycle continues.

[00:30:29]Yes. Yes.

[00:30:36]To change our thinking.

[00:30:38]>> Mhm.

[00:30:40]>> We need to change our language.

[00:30:42]>> Mhm.

[00:30:43]>> And I'm wondering how does the church because we've always been taught by the church. Even the schools were church related. Correct. Mhm.

[00:30:54]>> So, how does the church um propose to change the way of our thinking when we've always been thought that we will all go to heaven and to die to get to heaven, you got to die.

[00:31:14]>> Yes.

[00:31:15]>> So, and like you said, there's heaven and then there's earth or the world, whatever, and then there's hell.

[00:31:24]So, and every day we hear the end of the world is coming. So, in fact, when you die, isn't that the end of the world?

[00:31:36]>> I think so.

[00:31:38]Your word, but but your world doesn't end when you die. You know, there's something uh >> but how we how we know already >> your No, I'm not talking about the physical.

[00:31:50]Your influence, your influence will not die when your breath is given up. Somebody will remember you. Somebody will say because of you I am this. So you live on. It's interesting for me to to listen to people talk. Your legacy lives on. Huh?

[00:32:10]>> You call you call it legacy. I call it life.

[00:32:13]It's just just a different way of thinking about life. It's a different way of thinking about life. I am um amused sometimes to listen to people talk and they will say you know I was going to do something but I remember my mother told me something mother dead but she isn't dead because in reality she still has influence over you so I would like to think of life more than just this physical kind of structure here like say it beyond beyond that how does the church would change the thing now.

[00:32:52]Courage. The church needs to grow a little courage.

[00:32:57]Yeah. It's not going it's not going to be an easy thing even to change the language. I have traveled with persons who understand their life their life experiences differently but they can't get out of that tub because every time they make a step forward they remember what the church said to them. Then it's a difficult task.

[00:33:29]It's a difficult task but you are attempting here in the the freedom of each other's company to at least try to do a little bit of different thinking. So incorporate courage, great courage. The church has done made a few little little steps here and there, but they're not all that significant.

[00:33:54]It's fear is going to prevent the church from cuz if I take away this from you, the question is what do I leave you with? But I always think if I take away something from you, you are not going to have an empty space.

[00:34:09]You're going to fill it with something.

[00:34:11]And with the and I would hope that what you fill it with is better than what you give up. But it's going to take courage.

[00:34:18]Yes. Andrea.

[00:34:20]>> Yes.

[00:34:22]>> Is it what the church says or what the Bible says?

[00:34:25]>> Agree that the Bible the church the Bible is the church's book.

[00:34:29]There's no Bible without the church.

[00:34:33]And uh as you start looking there's some I I you there's some interesting discoveries that are being made very interesting the about the the way how the Bible was structured and we can't now well I can't now say the Bible says this and Jesus says this morning we read I think it's in the the the um gospel If you have a quarrel, tell it. Jesus says it prophes Jesus says if you have a quarrel tell it to the church. Jesus couldn't say that because there was no church in Jesus day. So he can say that it's what is the the faith of the people that is very much represented in the context of the scripture. So scripture is open to interpretation and if you accept that there is a God who is still alive then that God must still speak. There's a lady now um he has a little sister who would always refer to Acts chapter 29. How many of you have ever read Acts chapter 29?

[00:35:56]H any any of you you can't because there's no Acts chapter 29.

[00:36:02]Acts starts at chapter 28. There's no chapter 29. But she believes that Revelation continues.

[00:36:10]So it doesn't stop with Revelation, the last chapter and the last verse. So the Bible is the church's book. The church determine what's in there. The church determines how to interpret it, which is the church's book. You may not want to accept that, but that's that's part of the reality of life.

[00:36:37]All right.

[00:36:39]Any more interjections there? You comfortable? Still you're still here.

[00:36:46]But every church is theible necessarily what the church is saying. When I say the church, the church say open interpretation.

[00:37:07]>> Yes.

[00:37:07]>> Don't necessarily have to follow what the church.

[00:37:10]>> Why say you got a say got follow?

[00:37:14]I just >> I right what what I will encourage you to do is to what we looking for in life is certainty and uh there is no certainty in life.

[00:37:37]There is no certainty. There are some things that that that that follow a a natural pattern like the left foot goes in the front, the right foot that that's really natural.

[00:37:49]You're certain about that.

[00:37:52]But even that comes into to question sometime not so good. Make sure whether you're the right foot going left or not. It become uncertain. So walking becomes difficult.

[00:38:04]Even that becomes difficult. Yes, the church has opened this thing. The church has developed something called the orthodoxy that which is believed by the majority but is more well people it's not even a democracy but that which is believed by the majority. So if you're going to make a decision, you can make it by yourself or you can have a collective decision hoping that if you are in the church, you will say um it seems good to us and to the Holy Spirit. So therefore, that is the action that we are going to that we are going to take. All right. So we get back to the to the the thing. Heaven and earth is uh places where the dead may go, right? Where the dead may go. And if we come to extend this notion of where the dead go, the notion of judgment comes to prayer.

[00:39:16]We all we all say every time you say the apostles he will come to judge oh everybody those who are dead and those who are alive you can't get away you can't get I'm struggling I've been struggling for a little while with this the whole notion as well of sin S you sin and thought word and deed. I struggle with that all the time.

[00:39:52]you sending thought and you say well if I send thought because I do it I send any out so what's the value to a very artist the the church has been involved over the years in the social control right was necessary it probably was necessary to uh because they thinking is this is not necessarily true that um if you do not have religion you will not have morality. I don't think so.

[00:40:34]I don't think so. Human beings will organize as best they can for the benefit of the whole.

[00:40:47]Is that so?

[00:40:49]>> You don't think so?

[00:40:51]you depends >> depends the whole if if you if you come to agreement that in order to get out of this um car part here I got to lift this car out they will lift it out they will lift it up but they the whole sense of survival depends upon that and I I think that what what drives human beings is this concept step of survival.

[00:41:23]People don't always do things for their own sake or for the sake of somebody else do it because they think that if I do this then I will benefit. Even in the Christian thinking, if we say, if we say that we get to heaven by our good deeds, people who want to get to heaven will do good.

[00:41:56]It doesn't have to be anything anything religious. It is your own survival that you are looking after. So that's why the the the scripture would say do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Use yourselves as a kind of judgment for your your behavior as well.

[00:42:15]So we have the the notion of separation.

[00:42:21]Separation is not only something that comes after death.

[00:42:25]separation is an earthly thing because it comes with the the concept of justice and righteousness and all that kind of thing.

[00:42:38]So the life on earth for many is lived as an entrance exam.

[00:42:49]uh I wouldn't say 11 plus but an entrance exam if you want to get to heaven these are some of the things that you should do and if you do them well you may get there so we come to Matthew so Matthew chapter 25 yes because because the whole of life is an examination Your whole life is an examination. It is not a oneoff a a oneoff thing. You know, otherwise >> continuous assessment.

[00:43:33]>> Life is a continuous assessment.

[00:43:36]Life is a continuous assessment.

[00:43:39]All right.

[00:43:40]This Timothy calendar story um St. Jew village where the thief said to the farmer, "I'm coming for your bananas at 2:00 tomorrow."

[00:43:57]The man watched until about 2 minutes to 2 and said to himself, "Oh, it's almost 2:00. He ain't coming anymore." And by then the man looked roundly, "Bananas are gone. M come at two. What you about to do?"

[00:44:12]Right? So life is a continuous a continuous uh continuous assessment. So we have in so we have in Matthew's gospel the the day of reckoning the day when when the king will come.

[00:44:29]You say somebody people keep saying the world coming to an end. Few weeks ago I saw something in the newspaper but I didn't read it but the the headline was we must prepare for the second coming or something like that right and people have genuinely believed that that is going to happen and some people have taken advantage of that belief.

[00:44:58]Jim Jones is what an example of of that type of thing. People are still because what we are looking at we are it's it's a difficult thing now my opinion how do we control is a bad word.

[00:45:17]Control is a bad word. How how do we influence behavior as a as a more polite word?

[00:45:25]How do we influence behavior though? and and for many of our young people there's a a a new term come up come now um this question is a a YouTube influencer who are the influencers in our our modern modern day the church tried in the past but it's not the influence now right so the day of judgment the day of reckoning when the king comes We have another story in gave an account of your stewardship.

[00:46:06]Those who saw people in need and responded were the ones who were deemed as righteous.

[00:46:18]the ones whom the parable say enter into the joy of the Lord.

[00:46:27]The others said, "But I didn't know what I don't know what you're talking about.

[00:46:31]When did I see you?" And they're told, "In as much as you didn't do it to one of the least of these, you didn't do it unto me."

[00:46:41]So, so there is that day of separation.

[00:46:46]Whether you go right or left according to this parable has to do with your actions. St. Paul may tell you something. It's different. St. Paul may say we are saved not by our action. We are saved by our faith. But that's another another um discussion for another point in time. So heaven and hell have become the place where the dead go.

[00:47:13]And very early African thought they were very simple about this.

[00:47:20]They developed the concept of ancestors.

[00:47:25]Those who did well became ancestors.

[00:47:29]Those who didn't do too well were thrown in the bad bush. Story done.

[00:47:34]story done. In the in the Old Testament, we have the concept of shield, not hell. Shield is not hell. Shield is a kind of shattery shattery place where the dead go and they don't always stay in there. They stay in there until they forgotten.

[00:47:58]They say there forgotten. So we have moved over time in thinking of working out this concept of basically what happens to the dead where do they go and why would they go here and not there.

[00:48:21]So we've developed these concepts about heaven and uh hell and the latest one we will develop is the New Testament one that we shall not all die.

[00:48:38]We shall be changed in the twinkling of an eye. The concept of the resurrection, a bodily resurrection is where people are in terms of the Christian influence.

[00:48:54]Heaven was usually thought over the place.

[00:48:58]And one of Jim Ree sounds is this world is not my home.

[00:49:05]I'm just a passing through. treasures are lit up somewhere beyond the the blue and and all the other nice things that the angels beckon me.

[00:49:20]These are concepts that we have developed in order to help us to deal with whatever life throws at us. But hell is not for those who are afraid. Hell is not a place of burning.

[00:49:40]I don't don't think that if you go there that you're going the place where the worm never die there you burn all the time all the time all the time. That true there is it is not it is not considered to be that. culture more as um the absence away from God as opposed to because when I when I I try to respond to that I say to person when I was younger I made lorry a lorry I know what I made a a lorry to carry cane that time the a lot of cane people used to be on the street so I made a lorry I load up my lorry you can't feed any I said I've taken time to build put effort into this lorry you're telling me I can just turn so and mash it up like that no I behave so I behave so God I'm going to behave so I have console myself you can find a way of consoling yourself about that so heaven hell is not but the concept of this this thing was next door there was a just outside of Jerusalem um a place called Gehenna where it used to be a dump and people said the wicked we burned just as that dump is burning all the time. So I'm coming to this conclusion now to to end next two minutes actually done I know where if I heaven or hell or where I am but I will finish in the next two minutes or so. So we we look at the question what is is there something after death?

[00:51:35]Did Jesus preach hell or heaven?

[00:51:40]The kingdom of God is a place here on earth a transformed way of living because the thinking the thoughts to transform and the revelation is suggest that heaven will be a dwelling place among us. So heaven is where you are now.

[00:52:08]I will conclude with the the part of the story. If I could ask you mostly about that conversation and what his experience was like.

[00:52:29]It'd be interesting what he might say.

[00:52:35]The session is gone.

[00:52:39]And uh I feel quite sure that he would say I have no problem because if you are going to serve milk and honey in heaven, I can handle that.

[00:52:56]So he may not be sorry that he did not go to that place.

[00:53:03]And if I were to ask the lady, I don't know what she would say as she would be able to say, but I thought it would be full.

[00:53:13]But when I got there, they found a little space even for me.

[00:53:21]Thank you.

[00:53:29]>> But Shannon, um um Your whole concept tells me that uh heaven and or hell is really a state of mind.

[00:53:40]>> Yes, it is. Rather than the place Yeah.

[00:53:42]>> your conscience in other words.

[00:53:44]>> So my my question is why why don't the church preach towards that concept rather than I mean the church has always told us that do the right thing you go to heaven or you might go to hell. So why don't why don't you get um the clergy address your actual state of mind? I think I think if you start listening sometimes sometimes you see uh there are some things that are changing but it is a very difficult thing if you start with one thing to how do you get people move from where they are comfortable with to a point of discomfort back to comfort.

[00:54:34]How do you get how how does that process work?

[00:54:36]And I think that's very that's probably the difficulty not only in religion in schools in schools you have great difficulty in changing what somebody said to me what primary school do primary school teachers here what primary school teachers say to children when they get the secondary school you can't unlearn them.

[00:55:04]So it's a very difficult very difficult thing changing the process.

[00:55:10]You're comfortable with what you have you most likely you will not you will not change it unless you feel that that where you are going is better than what you're leaving.

[00:55:22]>> Yes madam.

[00:55:23]>> Yes. Um can I'm formal today. I just want to make a personal comment >> about my experience which has shaped my concept of what heaven is and it's in a practical way because some of us may have had a relative who had what is called a neardeath experience and most of us based on our age would have had some experience with a relative who is passing away and I have had both.

[00:56:03]I had a relative who had a neardeath experience and he told us that it was the most beautiful experience that you can conceive.

[00:56:19]And he was able to say what the doctors were doing and what they said, what the nurses were doing and what they said.

[00:56:27]And he told us that he was floating and he didn't want to come back at all.

[00:56:34]But then some angelic being said, "Your work is not finished. You have to go back." And he actually he was not even in Barbados.

[00:56:46]He was in a hospital in the United States and the doctors and the nurses when he told them what was being said and so on they were not really astonished because they were used to that happening sometimes when patients are critical. So that tells me that there is some life beyond and I know that when my father was dying also he would say like the room the room that they're building for me is big things like that the light is very bright so that gives me hope and I also can draw from the Bible where and you would be able to tell us more where Paul said, "I know a man who was caught up to heaven."

[00:57:44]But the experience was so profound that he could not even find human words to explain all that had happened there. And maybe he was even forbidden to say exactly what he experienced.

[00:58:02]Well, I must also say that nobody can be certain that it was him, but the thinking is that it was him who had the experience. Thank you.

[00:58:11]>> Thank you for the share. Um I am not saying that there is anything I know I do not know but what I know is observing persons who are near death.

[00:58:38]they seem to have a reality that is different. Um, I've seen I've seen persons in the the death bed reaching out in certain corners of the house as though they are seeing something as though they're saying I can't say that they're not. I have concluded that we do not die alone.

[00:59:08]We do not cross Jordan alone. What it is like I don't know. But I have come to the conclusion now and to to change my thinking that death is not a lonely road. So don't be afraid. I think of death like being under anesthesia.

[00:59:36]I had a kidney stone operation sometime ago. I like talking to the to the to the doctor and then I know what happened.

[00:59:49]When I got up, I saw it was just a few minutes out three or four hours. death.

[00:59:58]So don't don't get too upset about it.

[01:00:00]What what I'm afraid of? I don't know if it makes much sense. When you having all this pain and suffering and death, I would prefer to fast man quick and easy rather than Yes, Ronnie. Sorry, >> just two quick comments.

[01:00:16]>> One, I think you describe heaven as a place of milk and honey.

[01:00:21]>> That's Moses, not me. Huh? You susp.

[01:00:26]But I was thinking that um since I'm milk intolerant, lactose intolerant, I may have problems if I get to heaven.

[01:00:33]But you do.

[01:00:36]The second thing is, don't you think that this concept of heaven and hell was to some extent used by the church and the state as a means of control of population?

[01:00:50]>> I have no problem with that thinking.

[01:00:53]Um things must make sense to us. People in Barbados we talk about gossip and rumor.

[01:01:05]In every gossip and Barbados there is some truth.

[01:01:11]What people do is they magnify the little truth and make it big.

[01:01:17]We must and we look for something that makes sense.

[01:01:22]refilling the spaces.

[01:01:25]But what we must be aware of is am I filling in with the best possible thing or is there something else? So therefore I would like to suggest that we hold things in suspense as we travel towards what may be the truth. And the truth is far bigger than any one of us can conceive. So what I have is not the truth. It is an approximation to the truth. So I agree. I agree. But you may not have to. We sometimes we probably go overboard and and think that we have to make harsh laws to control people. But not necessarily true. a gentler law or gentler idea, a thought, process or whatever the case may be, we achieve the same thing.

[01:02:27]But we do what we have to do, what we think we have to.

[01:02:32]All right.

[01:02:34]>> Yes, please.

[01:02:38]you earlier said um well just in summary you know life started with God breathing in the body and life ended when the breath whether voluntary given up or forcefully taken or but that's the end of it and then the question is is this all there is to life is is it going back to the dust is that the end of it all are are We missing something that we should have been taking account of. The the body is physical as well as spiritual.

[01:03:17]We seem to focus a lot on the physical and a little bit of the spiritual. And I'm thinking this is where the church has failed in that not much is done about the spiritual aspect. I'm not talking about rituals and doing prescribed things at prescribed times but that spiritual side of us to be nurtured and that spiritual journey I think we have fallen very short of I don't think that this is all there is to life we live yes our legacy our life the memories will go on but I still think there is something beyond that and this is just a transitionary period And the teaching for me is severely lacking in the church. I am missing that. I don't know. You go on YouTube and you will you know see various things on spiritual journey but the authenticity that's another thing we struggle with. I would prefer it coming from an institution like the church but it's not there.

[01:04:21]>> But the church can make the same mistake on YouTube. uh in terms of authenticity I don't know we as I said we want to feel that we are more important this is not connected to you more important than we really are I ask the question sometimes where were you before you were here >> I know Where were you? You see the the thing is that because we have because we have this experience however however it shapes out we think there must be something more. There was a concept of of reincarnation, right? Reincarnation that that this little period of time is not enough for one soul. So one soul jump from one to the other until it becomes actualized.

[01:05:29]So that was too that was to deal with the issue. Is this all that is the thing the Paul talks about?

[01:05:42]Um but sort of destroyed in in Corinthians this whole idea of soul and body and the body being just a machine or or incubator for the spirit and all kind of things. So we try to move away from this distinction between body and soul. I am who I am. Body and soul together. So for funerals now you may not notice it but funerals we do not commit a soul.

[01:06:18]I commit this body cuz you are nothing without that. So the we try to uh sort of play it down to some is the correct term. this whole concept of the spirit being an actual entity within the body and the body only there.

[01:06:37]So Paul the the Gnostics and Corinthians were looking at how soon can I get rid of this body in order that the soul may be liberated. Is that the way it is? We do not know really. We are all guessing this story of the man and the blind man and the and the elephant.

[01:07:01]It is it will be wrong for us who are all blind touching the elephant and describing what we say the elephant is.

[01:07:17]You cannot see the whole elephant and you cannot say because I feel the tail that that's what the elephant is.

[01:07:28]Elephant is far more than that. Truth is far more than that. And life is a discovery. Life is a journey. And I would encourage you keep journeying. The same spirit you talk about St. Paul says, "Searches out all things, even the depths of God." But we are afraid to search because we are not sure where it may lead us. So be courageous.

[01:07:58]Be courageous and we should enjoy the search.

[01:08:06]All right.

[01:08:08]Thank you for attending. Let me thank you for showing the interest and may thank you for participating.

[01:08:19]But I hope it doesn't end here that you keep exploring.

[01:08:26]I have been saying recently that the fun is in the journey not in the destination.

[01:08:39]Right? So keep Keep walking as I've used for one or two funerals, Johnny Walker. Keep walking.

[01:08:51]You will eventually end up. But enjoy enjoy your journey.

[01:08:57]Thank you, SIR.