Then I heard what seemed to be the voice of a great multitude, like the roar of many waters and like the sound of mighty peals of thunder, crying out,
“Hallelujah!
For the Lord our God
the Almighty reigns.
Let us rejoice and exult
and give him the glory,”
Revelation 19:6-7
“… and I certainly don’t want to spend eternity singing praises to God!” This is how many people conclude their expression of distaste for Christianity. The idea of heaven sounds all well and good, as long as God isn’t there – and most definitely as long as we don’t need to praise him (or so the objection goes).
Recently something happened to me that caused me to reflect on this. In March I went to see Jack Johnson play in Centennial Park. It was great! A really nice atmosphere, good music, good company. Everyone knew all the words, and we all sang along.
It hit me: we love singing along to good music, and we love watching great performers, and we really love a combination of the two! I was struck by the fact that thousands of people were watching a man play songs about life - and loving it!
How much better will heaven be! The music will be better – it will be perfect. The company will be better - we will be surrounded by our family of saints. The atmosphere will be better – we will be overflowing with pure joy! And most of all, the performer will be way better! If we like singing about every-day stuff and watch an ordinary man, how good will it be to sing about how great God is and be in the presence of the most awesome Person ever!
If people enjoy concerts now, why would anyone think they won’t enjoy them in Heaven? It’s going to be sweet!
Gah no thanks. You’re not thinking of it in the infinite sense. It’s not singing for a bit then you go home. It’s not singing for a day then you go do something else…
It’s forever, and ever, and ever. Never-ending, ever. All you will be doing is singing praises or whatever.
The other problem with an eternity of existence, is that you will run out of things to do. Even if you do every single activity in existence, every single POSSIBLE activity, in every possible way, wearing every possible set of clothing, with every possible combination of every possible person… You will get bored. Because you’re there INFINITELY. Forever. No matter what you do, no matter how long your activity takes, you’ll finish it. Then there’s the next one, and the next, and the next. You’ll do everything so many times over and still have an infinite amount of time left to do things in. Even if you waste and infinite number of years doing infinitely many things, it’s the nature of infinity that you’ll still have an infinite number of years you have to fill up.
Bring on the sweet blissful nothingness.
hahaha oh HH you know so little! (I don’t claim to be wise, I am not! But how assertively you claim things about which you have no knowledge!)
How could it take any less than eternity for us to enjoy an an infinite God! You considered only finite activities; God is infinite. Infinitely good, infinitely beautiful, infinitely wise, infinitely holy. There will be grace afresh each day, for eternity – a new reason to praise God each day.
There needent be any more than one activity, though I am sure there will be, for that one activity is itself eternal.
Bring on the sweet blissful fullness!