How Kind!
You know the phrase, “heaven on earth.” You have used it perhaps about a place or the atmosphere of an event. When we have such an experience, we love it because we are transported out of the realm of plain old life-as-usual to something extraordinary. In some situations, it involves being transported out of a truly miserable circumstance to what feels heavenly. It could be a sensorial shift or relational, or emotional and mental shift.
Applying the concept of “heaven on earth” to the Christian experience, I can identify two categories. The first is pure grace and surprise, the second is the process of human effort, with God’s help. I write this on the Feast of the Transfiguration, which recalls to us the experience of the Apostles, Peter, James, and John on the mountain. At the start of this experience, they are present with Jesus just like they have been at countless other single moments. Then, without warning, Jesus begins to gleam, and with him appear the prophets, Moses and Elijah at his side. They encounter the glory of God, experientially, the six of them. It is heaven on earth.
Have you ever had an experience in life in which God surprised you with a divine and heavenly element with no warning? The priest, Nicky Gumbel, in The Alpha Course, from the Church of the Holy Trinity in the section of London, called Brompton, tells a story of an old bishop. Such an old hand as this is generally seasoned in church life, thoughts, ideas, experiences. Such a character knows layers of theology, Bible concepts, and stories of faith. This bishop had finished a confirmation service and was settling in on Sunday afternoon with a drink and a mid-day meal. Oddly, for him, he felt called to his little private home-chapel, his prayer kneeler. He felt prompted to pray. He put down his drink and knelt down. He felt God telling him, Give me yourself: all of you—soul and body. He said, “God what do you want with this broken-down bag of bones?” In this stretch of moments, he felt himself physically, internally warmed from core to extremity. He felt something like liquid energy coursing through him.
This old bishop might have previously thought himself heading out to pasture, but was instead sent on a brand new adventure in faith, ministry, and the experience of God’s presence. I have not had his experience, but I have had experiences of the Holy Spirit. It would not surprise me if you have also. They are not bidden; they cannot be manufactured, but they are real. Right within normalcy, something of heaven visits.
The second aspect of heaven on earth is slow and painstaking. Instead of an experience seeming to come from beyond you, or deep within you, this kind is a product of your effort to imitate Jesus, the Word made flesh. You come to know the forgiveness of Christ, so you cultivate forgiveness toward others. You encounter the kindness and gentleness of God, so show that to others from deep within yourself.
The Scriptures coming up Sunday introduce us to this possibility for heaven on earth. It is the kind that comes from your authentic self, sanctified by the indwelling Spirit, specifically as you share it through your thoughts, words, and actions. In Psalm 130 we give voice to our constant call to God for help and hope:
1 Out of the depths have I called to you, O Lord;
Lord, hear my voice; *
let your ears consider well the voice of my supplication.
4 I wait for the Lord; my soul waits for him; *
in his word is my hope.
In the odd story from David’s life, we find him calling for mercy and gentleness toward his son, Absalom, who has undermined his authority as king and conspired against him to take over the realm. As his armies go out to fight Absalom’s forces, David tells his commanders to protect his son. It is a poignant choice to show love, kindness, and redemptive mercy. David says, “Deal gently for my sake with the young man Absalom”. (2 Samuel 18:5)
In the Epistle, Paul wants the Christians in Ephesus to work day by day toward showing outwardly what Christ has shown to them.
Put away from you all bitterness and wrath and anger and wrangling and slander, together with all malice, and be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you. (Ephesians 4:31-32)
It is humanly natural to be malicious, bitter, and hostile, but to be instead this other way makes for heaven on earth. Perhaps we should be crying out to God from our depths for help in being this other way. I don’t think we find it without divine help. We need God’s grace to put away bitterness, wrath, and wrangling. We need to make a long project of choosing mercy and forgiveness over retaliation. Maybe we need to make a daily meal of Christ who calls himself, as we shall Sunday, the “living bread”:
This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” (John 6:50-51)
Partaking this bread daily, I believe strongly, will make us candidates for this transfiguration kind of encounter with the Christ of heaven. It also makes us disciplined students, cultivating the ways of Christ in all of our human encounters. We can then treat, ourselves, others, the earth, and life itself with kindness, tenderheartedness, forgiveness, and love. What heaven we shall have. Remember William Blake’s little clod of clay, trodden with the cattle’s feet? This Clod sang out: Love seeketh not itself to please, / Nor for itself hath any care, / But for another gives its ease, / And builds a heaven in hell’s despair. Look it up; it is so much better than what the Pebble said. Call out to God daily, and with your kindness be an agent in building heaven on earth.