Freshman year of high school my best friend and I tried out for the JV basketball team. It was three days of intense basketball drills, conditioning, and playing ball. There were limited spots available for the JV team. We worked hard, we pushed through sore muscles, and we gave everything we had.
Then cut day came. The JV coach posted the list of those who made the team. My best friend and I walked to the list that was taped on the locker room door. Our eyes scanned the list from top to bottom hoping to see our names on that lest that we had made the team.
With a sense of excitement, I saw my name. Out of the corner of my eye I saw my best friend slowly walk away from the locker room. I then scanned the list to see if my friend was on the list. Thinking I had missed his name, I looked again, but he had not made the list. My best friend had been cut from the team.
A mix of emotions came over me. Excited that I had made the team, but deeply saddened that my best friend had not made the team. I wanted to cry as I felt for my friend. We walked down the school hallway together in silence realizing that we would no longer be playing basketball together this next year.
I wonder, is this what heaven will feel like? Imagine one day getting to heaven and sitting down with your family and friends for the great feast. As you look around the table, you realize there are people that are missing, your grandma, a cousin, one of your college friends, etc. I’m not sure about you, but I will be devastated. I would go through emotions of sorrow, anger, and pain. Tears would be streaming down my face.
Yet, In Revelation 21:1-4 :He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. All these things are gone forever.” NLT. My question, my doubt, is how can this verse be true, if friends and family members don’t make it to heaven, but are spending an eternity in Hell?
What am I missing? Maybe I am misreading scripture?
What if this isn’t how the story ends and in fact, there is a better ending to this story, one that is beyond our hope and imagination? If God’s love/mercy endures forever (mentioned 26 times in Psalm 136) and if God is a good God and if God is love, what if there really is a better ending to the story?
What would it take for Heaven to have no tears, pain, crying, sorrows, death?
Phil Steiner 