In this introduction, we set the stage for a series of 9 videos, 9 puzzle pieces, as we unpack the big picture of the Bible and see how the pieces fit together. When I was a kid growing up, I did puzzles with my Grandpa. He would setup the box so we could see what the puzzle would look like. It gave the big picture and showed where the pieces needed to go. Similarly, when talking about heaven (or anything in the Bible), it is important to see what the big picture is. What is the grand narrative in the Bible and how do the puzzle pieces fit together?
Again, when I was a kid growing up, I thought the end goal was to go to heaven when I died. I wasn’t sure what that entailed, but as a kid it seemed a boring place to go. I didn’t want to go floating in the clouds somewhere just singing forever. That is the picture that I had painted for a long time. Heaven was some ethereal, abstract, disembodied reality.
It wasn’t until I started reading the big story of the Bible that I saw that heaven was important, but it was not the end of the story. There was something more robust, something more exciting. The Bible portrays the vision of a holistic renewal of all of creation (Acts 3:21; Eph. 1:10; Col. 1:20; 2 Pet. 3:13; Isa. 65:17; 66:22). God never gave up on the creation that he called good.
I came to the realization that the end goal isn’t heaven.
The end goal is a new heaven and a new earth, with humanity having more-than-real resurrected bodies, fulfilling our original role as God’s royal-priestly image-bearers and stewards on a more-than-real new heaven-earth reality in the full, more-than-real presence of God. The end goal is a complete restoration of creation, both human and non-human.
But in order to gain this big-picture view, we must start at the beginning. Look out for future videos as we discuss more.
#Bible #WhatistheBible #PuzzlePieceExegete
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