Going Down to Heaven

Originally preached on July 27, 2008

Pentecost 11

Text: Matthew 13:31-33; 44-52

Heaven.

Where is it? What is it like?

Are you going there?

What comes to mind when you think of “heaven”?

As a child, I was taught that heaven is “up there.” And “up there” in heaven, God – with flowing robes and a big bushy white beard – sits on a golden throne. Jesus, God’s Son, is seated at the right hand of God, and all around are the angels – flying and singing and playing their harps. And from the great throne room “up there” in heaven, God watches all of life and rules over the affairs of the universe.

He’s making a list, checking it twice, gonna find out who’s naughty or nice. He sees you when you’re sleeping, and knows when you’re awake, he knows if you’ve been bad or good so be good for goodness sake!

Wait a minute! That’s not theology! That’s the Santa Claus song! But in my little child’s mind there was not a whole lot of distinction between God up in heaven and Santa Claus up at the North Pole.

What comes to mind when YOU think of heaven?

It should not surprise us that we think of heaven as being “up there” because this idea has been around since the dawn of creation. Ancient people placed heaven “up there” because they believed that the gods resided in “the heavens”. And the places where heaven and earth intersected were the mountaintops. Do you remember where it was that Moses met God and received the Ten Commandments? It was on Mt. Sinai. The mountaintops were the haunts of the gods. And, in fact, in ancient thought there was an ongoing competition between the gods to see which of them was the biggest and best of all. And that is why we have language in the Bible that calls our God, “God Most High.”

As the angels sang on Christmas morning, “Glory to God in the highest…”

So when we hear the word “heaven” most of us quite naturally look up.

Which is why it is so interesting to me that when Jesus spoke about heaven, he made us look “down here.” Did you hear our Gospel lesson?

Heaven is like a mustard seed a man plants in his field…and it grows into a tree big enough for birds to build homes in!

Nothing there about clouds, or harps, or even there being no beer in heaven!

Heaven is like yeast that a woman mixes into the flour until it is worked all the way through the dough.

Heaven is like treasure hidden in a field…heaven is like a merchant looking for fine pearls.

Have you ever notice where the kingdom of heaven is located in all the parables of Jesus?

Not “up there”! But rather, down HERE! And do you notice who the agents of heaven are? Farmers, bread bakers, treasure hunters, merchants – people like you and me!

Why do you suppose Jesus works so hard to bring heaven down to earth?

I suspect it has something to do with cancer – and AIDS – and war – and poverty – and child abuse – and Alzheimer’s – and tsunamis.

A friend of mine experienced a crisis of faith following the devastating tsunamis in 2004 that killed more than 225,000 people in Indonesia, Sri Lanka and Thailand. Like many of us, my friend found himself asking, “Where was God in this? How could a loving God allow something like this to happen? If God can intervene in the world and part the waters of the Red Sea for the Israelites, then why didn’t God part the waters of the tsunami and save all those innocent people including little children?”

You’ve asked those kinds of questions, haven’t you? So have I.

And the answers we come up with are usually so inadequate. Some say that human disasters of this sort are God’s judgment against people. Others say that God has a reason for doing things like this that we just can’t know now, but we will come to understand “in the sweet by and by”. Still others simply defend God’s right to end human life by saying, “The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.”

But all these answers presume an idea that I believe the teachings of Jesus challenge. They all place God “up there” – beyond the fray – in heaven above, from which God occasionally pokes his finger into the world to bless some of us in special ways and sometimes to lay disaster on others. So the 80-year old woman who misses the flight that crashes with all aboard believes that it was God who miraculously intervened, causing her to be late and thus saving her life. Meanwhile, the pregnant wife of the man who at the last minute was able to get onto the flight because that woman missed it is left wondering why God didn’t intervene to save her husband and soon-to-be father of their child.

I think Jesus wants us to be careful about this sort of thing. I think Jesus wants us to be careful about where we locate God.

Is God above us, outside the universe, pulling the strings of history like some puppeteer – arbitrarily blessing some and not blessing others – changing weather patterns to accommodate the prayers of a wedding party while not responding to the prayers of a drought-stricken nation – helping a basketball player make a critical free throw but not helping a critically ill child – helping one nation in its war effort or jihad against another – blessing some of us with wealth while never answering the prayers of others for just a little daily bread?

Is God somewhere “up THERE” beyond us?

Or is Jesus pointing us in another direction?

The parables of Jesus reveal a very important secret – that heaven is intricately interwoven with LIFE – and that God is not BEYOND us, but AMONG us and WITHIN us! Mustard seeds and farmers, women and yeast and dough, treasure hidden in a field, merchants in search of fine pearls – all of these and more are the dwelling places of God!

When my children were small, they used to crawl up onto me as I sat in my recliner watching the nightly news – one on the left side, one on the right. One Saturday evening, there was a report about a famine somewhere in Africa. There was graphic video footage of little children with swollen bellies and shrunken limbs and big eyes glazed over with hopelessness as flies flew circles around their tiny heads. And as we watched the story, my little children began to cry. Bethany, our daughter, started sobbing, and with tears streaming down her cheeks said, “Daddy, can’t we do SOMETHING to help those children?”

Those who think that God is “up there somewhere” need to heed Jesus who reminds us that we human beings were made in the very image of God, and that God breathed into our nostrils the very breath of God himself! God resides within you and me! And if you have ever looked into the face of a human tragedy and felt something tugging at your heart to do something to redeem it, you have felt the very presence of God within! It is not someTHING tugging at your heart. It is someONE!

I don’t know why bad things happen in this world. No one does. All I know is that bad things DO happen and that life is hard.

And I know one other thing from what Jesus taught:  that God is not “up there” watching it all from a distance. No, God is “right here” – in ME, in YOU – stirring up within us compassion and mercy and the desire to heal the wounds of the world.

So God tugs at us to plant mustard seeds of God’s grace that will grow up into safe homes for God’s creatures – birds and animals and people! God tugs at our hearts to add yeast to the flour so that bread can be provided to all who are hungry. God calls us to see, to celebrate and to affirm the treasure hidden in the fields of every nation, race, culture and religion. God tells us to look for the pearl of great price hidden deep inside the rather unattractive oyster shell of every human being we meet.

Have you ever felt the “God-tug” in YOUR heart?

But faith is not just about feeling. Ultimately, faith is about DOING.

“Daddy, can’t we do SOMETHING to help those children?”

And the answer is “Yes, we can! Yes, we must!”

Jesus made it clear that God is not interested in worship services or acts of praise that do not result in acts of mercy, love and compassion. So Jesus tells us that to follow him, we must take up our cross every day. And it’s not easy to bear a cross. It’s not inexpensive. It’s not without danger and great risk. It’s not without sacrifice.

In Alan Paton’s historical novel, Ah, But Your Land Is Beautiful, the human tragedy of apartheid in South Africa is described in the relationship between a white man named Robert Mansfield and a black man named Emmanuel Nene. Mansfield has resigned as a school headmaster because he can no longer support the government policy of apartheid. He is without work, without income, without friends because of his decision to work for racial justice. Nene comes to see him and to express his respect and support. As they talk about the wounds Mansfield is suffering for the stand he has taken, the black man makes it clear to Mansfield that there are always wounds and suffering that go along with the fight for justice. But, Nene says, “I don’t worry about the wounds. When I go up there, which is my intention, the Big Judge will say to me, ‘Where are your wounds?’ and if I say I haven’t any, he will say, “Was there nothing to fight for?” I couldn’t face that question.’”