Heaven and Apathy: Any Relation?

Heaven and Apathy: Any Relation?

“It seems to me, rather, that belief in the afterlife and an existence in the hereafter encourages apathy toward our life in the present, the only life we know we are assured of enjoying.” 

Nathan Dickey

I recently engaged in a Facebook theological argument with the person quoted above.  I have found arguing with atheists on Facebook to be a fruitless and unsatisfying endeavor. It usually just makes me uptight and anxious so I try to resist the temptation of commenting. However the topic of heaven and the afterlife is one of my buttons. My primary concern is not with what heaven is going to be like but with how the idea of heaven plays out in my life today.

I have a Christian friend who is fond of saying that some Christians are “so heavenly minded that they are no earthly good”. I object to this notion.  I will admit that it appears to be true but in reality it is false. Apathy as I believe Mr. Dickey means it, is when you stop caring about the problems of the world and set yourself apart in a religious isolation. Why bother with the world’s problems if it is all going to end soon anyway? That is what I believe people mean by the apathy of the heavenly minded person. I argue the complete opposite. In a sense it would be nice to wash one’s hands of the suffering, pain and evil of the present world. But to shut your self off from the bad things of the world is in a sense a desire to try and find comfort on earth. By this point one has become earthly minded and no heavenly good.  Apathy is a thing of this world and not the next.

What then does it look like to be heavenly minded?  I reproduce two scriptures, which I believe illustrate the point.

^“ Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. ²⁵ Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. ²⁶ Therefore I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air.”  1 Corinthians 9: 24-26

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, ² fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith.” Hebrews 12: 1-3

In these two passages the Christian’s life is compared to a race. Those whose belief in heaven has lead them to apathy have simply stopped running. But the one who is really concentrated on the prize will run the race. The Christian who desires heaven can’t simply walk idly toward the finish line, they will give it all they have.

On the other hand you might say that Christ has already won the race. Why run if you have already won? Christ is the example of how to run, not the excuse for not doing it. Even when you are assured victory you still have to cross the finish line. I think that rabbit that got beat by the turtle is a good example. The first step toward the finish is as important as the last. It does matter how the race is run. Heaven is in each step of the way. Heaven is a goal and a reality.

I will throw in a quote by C. S. Lewis for good measure.

“If you read history you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were just those who thought most of the next… It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this. Aim at Heaven and you will get earth ‘thrown in’: aim at earth and you will get neither (p. 134).” Mere Christianity

To finish I would like to quote the great Lutheran theologian Dietrich Bonheoffer to whom I give most of the credit for my view on this matter.

 “So long as Christ and the world are conceived as two opposing and mutually repellent spheres, man will be left in the following dilemma: he abandons reality as a whole, and places himself in one or the other of the two spheres. He seeks Christ without the world, or he seeks the world without Christ. In either case he is deceiving himself…There are not two realities, but only one reality, and that is the reality of God, which has become manifest in Christ in the reality of the world.” (p. 195) Ethics