William H. Willimon - "Heaven" (October 31, 1999)

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-	As we were preparing to come to chapel this morning,	0:05
	we heard the news of the downing of the Egyptian	0:11
	Airlines plane and perhaps a reminder that in this world,	0:19
	there is much pain and heartache, so much so	0:27
	that it cannot be set right through human doing.	0:33
	Thus, our gospel for this All Saints, Jesus begins	0:40
	his ministry by going up on a mountaintop	0:45
	and speaking to the crowds about God's promised future,	0:48
	God's blessing on those whom the world	0:57
	has often cursed.	1:00
	When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountian	1:05
	and after he sat down, his disciples came to him	1:08
	and he taught them, saying, "Blessed are the poor in spirit.	1:12
	"Theirs is the kingdom of heaven.	1:17
	"Blessed are those who mourn.	1:21
	"They will be comforted.	1:23
	"Blessed are the meek, they will inherit the earth.	1:26
	"Blessed are those who hunger and thirst	1:31
	"for righteousness, they will be filled.	1:33
	"Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.	1:39
	"Blessed are the pure in heart, they will see God.	1:44
	"Blessed are the peacemakers, they will be called	1:49
	"children of God.	1:53
	"Blessed are those who are persecuted	1:56
	"for righteousness' sake.	1:58
	"Theirs is the kingdom of heaven.	2:01
	"Blessed are you.	2:04
	"When people revile you and persecute you	2:06
	"and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely	2:08
	"on my account, rejoice and be glad, for your reward	2:10
	"is great in heaven, for in the same way,	2:15
	"they persecuted the prophets who were before you."	2:19
	This is the word of the Lord.	2:23
	Thanks be to God.	2:27
-	Thanks be to God.
-	This summer, I received a long email from a student	2:31
	who was in the wilds of Montana counting birds,	2:36
	and to pass the time, he had begun reading	2:40
	Augustine's Confessions and he sent me this long list	2:44
	of questions about his reading of Augustine.	2:49
	Why was Augustine so troubled by sex?	2:54
	Isn't sex good?	2:58
	What was the deal with the stolen pears?	3:01
	Why was that such a big thing?	3:04
	Had he not an odd relationship with his mother?	3:06
	I suggested in my reply that when reading Confessions,	3:11
	one ought not to get bogged down in the details.	3:16
	It's good to read it as a kind of love story.	3:22
	Augustine is a young man, about the age of a Duke sophomore,	3:27
	was obsessed by the fear that we might be alone	3:33
	in the world, we might be on our own,	3:41
	and the Confessions is the story of his astonishment	3:47
	not only that there is a God, but that this God	3:50
	was looking for him.	3:55
	This God desired him even more than Augustine desired God,	3:56
	and that changed his life.	4:03
	Maybe you ought to read the Bible as a love story.	4:06
	An account of God's relentless yearning for us,	4:12
	God's determination to get a family.	4:17
	Each of us has a pressing question that persists	4:20
	throughout life, do you love me?	4:26
	We ask it first of our parents I suppose,	4:31
	but we know they are a stand in for some larger	4:33
	presence by whom we want to be loved.	4:38
	Neurosis transforms the do you love me	4:42
	into the sad am I worthy to be loved?	4:46
	Or now, what can I do to make you want to love me always?	4:51
	It's sad if in our ceaseless attempts to get an answer,	5:01
	we're too busy to hear God saying,	5:05
	yes, open yourself up to my love.	5:08
	Enjoy it, revel in it, return it always.	5:14
	Jesus said he had come to seek and to save the lost	5:21
	and then he told us these stories about the lost coin	5:27
	and the lost sheep, and the lost boy,	5:31
	all about the persistence of a God who just loves	5:36
	to seek and to save lost, and then loves to throw a party	5:41
	for when the lost have been found.	5:48
	We are not alone, we're not living our lives	5:52
	purely for ourselves.	5:57
	Our lives are not merely our decisions,	5:59
	and our choices, and plans.	6:01
	No, the Bible depicts us as moving inexorably,	6:05
	sometimes being tugged and pulled, yes,	6:10
	sometimes being jerked through that narrow needle's eye	6:13
	of salvation, moving toward embrace, eternal embrace.	6:18
	Where are we headed, where does it all end?	6:27
	Maybe it's sad we rarely ask that question until someone	6:32
	we love dies or maybe we get a whiff of our own mortality	6:37
	and realize this life is terminal, and it's then we ask	6:43
	where are we headed, where does it end?	6:53
	And maybe it's a pity that we wait for such moments	6:58
	to ask such a pressing question because where we're headed,	7:02
	the end, the T loss of existence, it makes a big difference	7:06
	for how we live now, today.	7:12
	These things are tough to talk about.	7:16
	Paul, when he gets into descriptions of what next,	7:19
	what about the future, what about the long view,	7:24
	life after this life?	7:29
	He tells the Corinthians it's a mystery,	7:31
	a (speaking in foreign language).	7:37
	For Paul, it's something that you know,	7:39
	but it is so large and unfathomable,	7:42
	it's very difficult to talk about,	7:45
	and Paul was really good with words.	7:48
	He says, "Eye has not seen nor ear heard the things	7:52
	"that God has prepared for those who love him."	7:58
	Heaven, heaven is that word we use to talk about	8:04
	the completion of God's creation, the world	8:09
	as God intends it to be, the consummation	8:12
	of creation, heaven.	8:16
	If heaven is the fulfillment of the highest and best,	8:20
	the triumph of God's love, oh, we earthbound, finite	8:23
	creatures are going to have trouble talking about it	8:28
	'cause we think mostly on the basis of what we know here	8:32
	and heaven is that great beyond	8:37
	everything we've experienced here,	8:42
	but maybe not everything.	8:46
	Heaven is where God gets what God wants,	8:49
	and so much of this present world	8:55
	is less than God's desire.	8:57
	On Sundays we pray.	9:01
	We shall pray today our father who art in heaven,	9:03
	thus defining heaven as that place where God is fully God,	9:10
	but we know even as we pray that, there's more to be said.	9:18
	And modern people tend to be frustrated	9:23
	whenever we're thinking about something	9:26
	that for which after all is said and done,	9:28
	there's still more to be said, and heaven,	9:32
	because it is heaven, is going to be	9:37
	about much, much more.	9:42
	For Christians, heaven is that place, that time	9:45
	where Christ is, where we are one with Christ,	9:50
	where all of those tuggings and pullings	9:57
	that we've experienced in life are fulfilled,	9:59
	when Christ is our all in all and we all are his,	10:03
	all of us.	10:08
	Our egos, so relentlessly searching,	10:10
	lusting with desire, or at last overwhelmed	10:14
	by having our heart's desire, our true desire met in Christ.	10:20
	I expect there we shall feel some pain there	10:28
	at how puny and silly have been so many	10:36
	of our desires here, those desires which occupy us here	10:39
	when we are given there what here we know not even	10:44
	how to desire, we who have spent our whole lives	10:48
	so restlessly trying to make it with God,	10:52
	trying to get all dressed up and right, we'll be overwhelmed	10:56
	at having received God, given God's self as gift	11:02
	rather than our heroic moral achievement,	11:07
	there at the end where God takes us and welcomes us home.	11:11
	But death, death that we had spent our entire lives	11:19
	avoiding, dreading, fearing, fighting, not talking about	11:23
	is in the light of heaven seen as a kind of final purging,	11:29
	a final opening up of ourselves fully to God,	11:33
	a last relinquishment of our miserly selves	11:38
	so that we might be embraced, and loved,	11:44
	and forgiven by God, transformed into our true selves.	11:47
	As Paul says, we who have only seen here God	11:53
	as through a glass darkly, there at last, face to face.	12:00
	Here, you know what it's like here.	12:07
	We have communion with God just in these little bits	12:11
	and pieces and some rare mystical glimpse	12:13
	and some rare momentary, transitory encounter.	12:18
	It may be one reason you come here on Sunday morning,	12:24
	just hoping for one of those glimpses.	12:26
	It can come in a hymn or a sip of wine, a bit of bread,	12:30
	is that's said, or read, or heard.	12:34
	Well, in heaven at the last, our union with God	12:37
	will be so intense, unmistakable, eternal,	12:43
	the God whom we've spent so much of our lives avoiding	12:47
	and disappointing and evading will be revealed	12:52
	to be the friend who all the time was out busy	12:57
	seeking, and waiting and desiring us.	13:01
	Charles Wesley described it better than I	13:06
	in the hymn Love Divine, All Love's Excelling,	13:09
	"Joy of heaven to earth come down.	13:12
	"Change from glory unto glory till in heaven	13:16
	"we take our place, till we cast our crowns before thee	13:19
	"lost in wonder, love, and grace."	13:23
	So you will note that the Biblical seer in say,	13:30
	the Book of Revelation describes heaven	13:33
	as a great banquet, and that makes sense,	13:36
	a kind of great communal, joyful sharing, a party	13:39
	when all those that had to go to bed hungry at night	13:43
	with nothing but their tears to nourish,	13:47
	they shall be invited to sit down and eat	13:49
	and have their fill.	13:52
	The first promise Jesus makes to us	13:55
	is blessed are the hungry, you will be filled.	13:59
	Elsewhere in the Bible, heaven is described	14:05
	as a great raucous crescendo of song,	14:07
	and that makes sense because a lot of times in worship,	14:12
	that's where you come closest to it, music.	14:15
	When all those who've been silenced, and numbed,	14:18
	and dumbed by the pain of life will sing	14:21
	and there will be no end to their song.	14:26
	Last year here, Tony Campolo was asked	14:31
	about Christian Evangelism and Evangelism,	14:34
	Tony Campolo said, is not recruiting people to be saved	14:38
	or join the church, it's recruitment for a choir!	14:42
	Read the Book of Revelation.	14:46
	Who will be there?	14:50
	Well, of course, that's God's business, not ours,	14:54
	but I must confess that universalism, the notion	14:57
	that in the end, all, all shall be somehow, some way	15:02
	united with God, I think it makes sense.	15:06
	It makes sense because well, I'm amazed that I feel	15:11
	even here, now, at least to some degree united with God	15:16
	despite my sins and shortcomings in life.	15:21
	More than that, I suppose it's difficult for me to imagine	15:28
	that God's purposes for the world	15:31
	will ever be defeated, finally frustrated.	15:35
	I just can't conceive that there will be that moment	15:40
	when the shepherd stops looking for the lost sheep	15:43
	or the loving father finally says of the wayward	15:46
	prodigal son, I'm going to stop waiting.	15:49
	I believe this, not on the basis of some sentimental,	15:55
	sappy conviction about the future,	16:00
	but out of my own experience of God seeking,	16:03
	searching relentless love right here, now.	16:07
	God is so resourceful.	16:11
	I believe God's grace is triumphant, victorious,	16:14
	that God shall ultimately, despite us,	16:18
	have God's gracious way with us, all of us.	16:21
	USA Today reports 67% of adults in the USA	16:28
	are certain there is a heaven.	16:32
	Curiously, 88% of adults in the USA	16:35
	say they are going to heaven.	16:40
	(congregation laughs)	16:41
	However, I suppose I can imagine also,	16:48
	there are people who despite all of God's good efforts	16:55
	choose not to join the party.	16:59
	There's a lot of people out there that are just stuffy,	17:02
	that steadfastly want to stay out in the dark,	17:06
	even when the father's pleading with them to come on in	17:09
	with a younger brother and party.	17:12
	They refuse to join the dance, silent despite the invitation	17:14
	always to sing the song.	17:20
	And if that's true, I suppose heaven must also be a place,	17:24
	despite what Revelation says, of some sadness	17:28
	among the saved.	17:34
	If they are filled with God's love, they must be	17:36
	in great grief for those who have eternally	17:39
	rejected such love.	17:42
	I, again, have just found God to be incredibly resourceful	17:46
	in getting what God wants, and the Bible asserts	17:52
	repeatedly that God wants us all.	17:56
	And maybe I say that as a campus minister	18:01
	because I have the great privilege of sitting	18:04
	and listening to sophomores who report that God,	18:06
	despite their best efforts and the Department	18:10
	of Philosophy and everything, God is out getting them	18:12
	and I said that's amazing because I can't even	18:18
	get in the dorms without a ID card.	18:21
	(congregation laughs)	18:24
	When you think of the defenses
	we've got here against God, it's just quite a tribute	18:26
	to God's resourcefulness.	18:30
	Personally, I think there's a lot to be said	18:34
	for the Catholic idea of purgatory.	18:36
	If none but the pure of heart can fully see God,	18:39
	why not a place or a time where we're made to wait	18:44
	until our impurities are burned away, purged,	18:50
	our ground smooth until we are made	18:54
	to look at the mirror of honesty,	18:57
	until we're ready for heaven's searing vision of God?	19:01
	God has shown a willingness to wait a couple	19:10
	of thousand years to get us.	19:13
	What's a thousand years when you're talking eternity?	19:17
	Would I say that for like, a Hitler, or a Mao,	19:21
	or history's other great butchers?	19:24
	Well, as we've said, their fate is of course, left up	19:28
	to God and not me.	19:31
	However, I having been myself overwhelmed	19:33
	by the persistence, the resourcefulness,	19:36
	the dogged determination of God to have me,	19:39
	well, I can imagine God is determined	19:43
	to have them as well.	19:45
	I'm sorry if the prospect of spending eternity	19:49
	with the person who's seated next to you	19:52
	in the pew this morning is for you less than appealing,	19:54
	I just think all is grace	19:59
	and the transformative power of God's love	20:02
	really is amazing.	20:06
	Dante, maybe because he was Italian,	20:10
	knew a lot more about heaven than anybody else	20:13
	I've met and Dante noted in one of his writings	20:16
	that an angle at the center of the earth, an angle	20:22
	with even the very smallest of opening,	20:27
	say one millionth of one degree angle,	20:30
	that if you project that angle on out into infinity,	20:34
	it will eventually open up as wide as any other angle.	20:40
	Given enough time, given enough space, say,	20:46
	like eternity, maybe every person, even people	20:50
	with the smallest degree of love in their hearts for God,	20:58
	even with a tiny bit of faith, hope, and love,	21:02
	maybe eventually when it's all cast out into eternity	21:06
	is opened to the love of God.	21:11
	God's relentless determination to have us in life	21:17
	suggests God will not be deterred in death,	21:20
	and here I'm thinking like, of Romans 8	21:24
	where Paul claims nothing, not angels or not life,	21:26
	not death, nothing will be able to separate us	21:31
	from the love of God and Christ.	21:33
	And I've always liked that 'cause you think Paul	21:36
	might say I believe that death will not separate us	21:38
	from the love of God and Jesus Christ,	21:42
	but what Paul says is, "I believe that since life	21:44
	"and all of its necessitudes does not separate us	21:49
	"from the love of God and Christ.	21:53
	"surely God shall not be defeated in death."	21:54
	The pain of death, as those of you who are going	22:01
	through grief right now can testify,	22:05
	and by my count, that includes just about 99% of you,	22:09
	part of the pain of death is the separation.	22:15
	Well, heaven is reunion.	22:20
	Throughout my life, God has used any number of sly devices	22:25
	to reunite me to lure me toward reunion.	22:28
	I look back on my life,	22:34
	there's just been too many coincidences.	22:35
	C.S. Lewis once wrote that about the only sure way	22:39
	to avoid eternal communion with God is to, in his words,	22:43
	"keep hard at work, try to listen to no music.	22:48
	"Never look up at the earth, the sky,	22:53
	"and above all, don't ever fall in love with anybody."	22:56
	There is in this life a lot of pain.	23:02
	There's too much pain, and some of it	23:04
	is self-inflicted, yes, but not all.	23:06
	There is, as we've been reminded this moment,	23:10
	this morning, a kind of surplus of tragedy	23:12
	and injustice which no matter how much is done	23:14
	to make it right now, it isn't going to be made right	23:18
	this side of the grave, so the old spiritual,	23:21
	the slaves sang of heaven as a place	23:25
	where all God's children get shoes,	23:29
	and when I get to heaven, I'm gonna wear	23:32
	my shoes and I'm gonna walk all over the place,	23:34
	the song sings.	23:36
	At last, in other words, heaven is where God	23:38
	is gonna get what God intends for the world,	23:43
	I will at last be who I am meant to be.	23:46
	And when the church speaks of heaven,	23:51
	we reach for this poetic language of the greatest delights	23:53
	known on earth, melody, song, shining light,	23:57
	great banquet, embraced by the beloved,	24:02
	the marching in of the saints.	24:06
	It is that place, that time, that existence	24:11
	where all that is false and fictive, and cruel,	24:14
	and deadly has just been burned away	24:20
	and God's pure will for the world	24:24
	is visible and undeniable, real.	24:26
	Will we know those whom we have known and loved here there?	24:30
	I certainly hope.	24:39
	When Jesus was resurrected, though he had mightily changed,	24:42
	his disciples with just a little bit of coaxing knew	24:45
	for sure, yeah, it was Jesus.	24:48
	Maybe we'll have some difficulty recognizing those	24:52
	who have died, of whom we've loved,	24:55
	not just because they have died and are now alive,	24:58
	but because now they are transformed	25:02
	into what they most truly have always been meant	25:05
	by God to be.	25:09
	Odd that we should wonder if we will know	25:12
	other people in heaven whom we know on earth	25:15
	since heaven is that place where we shall be	25:19
	most fully recognizable as ourselves,	25:23
	as we've ever been before.	25:27
	God shall at last have God's way with us forever.	25:30
	As our choir always sings,	25:36
	at the end, God will be in our heads,	25:39
	and in our thinking, and in our eyes,	25:45
	in our speaking, and in our hearts.	25:48
	God shall be at our end, at our departing	25:52
	so that surprise, our departing	25:58
	was actually homecoming, reunion.	26:03
	Amen.	26:10

Item Info

Title:

William H. Willimon - "Heaven" (October 31, 1999)

Description:

Sermon start time: (Part 1) 0:05. Sermon end time: (Part 1) 26:10.
When talking about eschatology, the preacher optimistically argues that God’s love and grace is so triumphant and victorious, that God shall ultimately save everyone, despite the degree of evil in their lives. To balance his argument, the preacher mentions the idea of purgatory where the impurities of souls are dealt with. (Abstract created by Duke Divinity School staff.)

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https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4zk56189

Date:

October 31, 1999

Speaker:

Willimon, William H.

Liturgical Calendar:

Biblical Book:

Revelation

Chapter and Verse:

Revelation 7:9-17

Subject:

Contributor:

Duke University. Chapel

Identifier:

UA.17.01.0003 CS-0983
ref10121_47z
uachapelsermaud
duke:321079
dcrau001627
ark:/87924/r4zk56189
c2d62d22-dd5d-4699-a9fe-348d7a2b429b

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Duke Chapel Recordings

Source Collection:

Duke University Chapel recordings, 1954-2005

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Language:

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Location:

United States
North Carolina
Durham (N.C.)

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Provenance:

The Duke University Chapel Recordings were transferred to the Duke University Archives beginning in 1970.

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CC BY-NC 4.0

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This recording may contain 3rd party materials, such as music or readings that are therefore not covered by the Creative Commons license indicated here. For more information see https://library.duke.edu/rubenstein/research/citations-and-permissions.

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William H. Willimon - "Heaven" (October 31, 1999)

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1. William H. Willimon - "Heaven" (October 31, 1999)

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William H. Willimon - "Heaven" (October 31, 1999)

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