Backwards Eschatology

Therefore. since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses. . . - Hebrews 12.1

On Tuesday, February 28, in a speech to the joint houses of the United States Congress, President Donald Trump introduced the widow of William “Ryan” Owens, a Navy seal recently slain in an anti-terrorist raid in Yemen. The audience burst into an ovation that lasted for more than a minute and a half. The President then commented, "Ryan is looking down right now, you know that, and he's very happy, because I think he just broke a record."

He offered no basis for how Mrs. Owens “knew” this detail about the behavior of departed souls, but what interests me more is his assumption that the applause of earth gladdens the occupants of Heaven.

Of course, the President is the Commander in Chief, not the Theologian in Chief, and his intent was to comfort a grieving widow, not to deal with Christian doctrine. Still, my experience as a pastor leads me to suspect that the remark accurately expresses the somewhat squishy theology of many American believers. This is of more than passing interest. Examined closely, the President’s statement implies that a blessed soul would increase its joy by turning away from adoring the beatific vision of the Trinity to bask in earthly acclaim.

When John, from his prison cell in Patmos, finds himself transported to the throne room of eternity, he falls face-first before the blazing glory of his risen Lord. The open door of Heaven vaults him into a circle whose center is the throne of God. The centripetal pull of the divine presence draws all objects - eyes, praises, crowns, the works - toward itself. It would be hard, in that moment, to imagine the Revelator turning away to check the Amazon reviews for the book he is about to write.

This is not political partisanship; doctrine matters. If we posit a view that the worship of God in Heaven runs a poor second to a two-minute warning of earthly adulation; if we imply, however unintentionally, that accepting applause in the places of political power provides a satisfaction that giving praise in the throneroom of the Almighty cannot match; if we do this, we reverse thrusters on the very engine that drives our forward progress to the face of God. Heaven is a place to offer praise, not a place to receive it. The glorified saint gazes into the divine center, not outward to the earthly periphery. Sometimes we still sing good doctrine in church: “And the things of earth will grow strangely dim/In the light of his glory and grace.”

Not that Heaven’s saints pay no attention to our earthly struggles. Paul likens the Christian life to an athletic contest in which competitors strip themselves of all outward entanglements and strain every sinew toward the goal of glory. In the stands sits a great cloud of witnesses who, having finished the same race, now bear testimony to the value of the endeavor. In chapter 11, the author picks out a few of the more prominent faces among this throng: Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; Sarah, Joseph, and Moses; Rahab, Gideon, and David, and fierce women who refused to release their dead before the time had come. Now, says N. T. Wright, “they are there at the finishing line, cheering us on, surrounding us with encouragement and enthusiasm, willing us to do what they did and finish the course in fine style.”

There is, then, an exchange of applause between Earth and Heaven, but it flows downward, not upward, and it exists to exhort, not to exalt. Our purpose in eternity - for which we train each time we gather to worship with God’s church - is not to accept, but to offer, glory to Him who alone deserves it.