Eternal Life and Other Whatnot: Beyond the Vanishing Point

Ever been on an airplane? I used to hate flying. It isn't bad now. I've done it enough that I've actually come to enjoy it some. One of the great parts about flying is the "endless" view out your side window. Unless, of course, you are in the aisle seat where you get to count the rows until the drink cart gets to you. And God forbid you end up in the middle seat, wedged unceremoniously between Jake and Fat Man or two Bolivians who don't speak English but insist on trying to communicate with you. But I digress...

As I was saying the view is amazing. It's the horizon that simply numbs the mind with its shear size. A million miles out beyond the wingtip is the place where earth and sky vanish into one another.

The word for this in Hebrew is olam and it means "to the vanishing point." The New Testament is full of examples of a particular phrase that we translate as "the world to come." In the Hebrew it is the phrase olam haba, which can also stand for eternal life. Olam haba was used as a descriptor for a quality of life lived with God in wholeness and completeness and peace. In Jesus' day jews did not presume to see beyond the horizon from our 30,000 foot vantage point, Jews did not presume to look past the "horizon" of life into the eternal. That was God's prerogative alone. Forever was too large a concept. This life is what mattered to God. The commands of Scripture were given to guide us in the way to live in harmony with God here and now, not get us into heaven. eternal life isn't simply something that happens to us down the road someday; it is happening right now. Since we cannot see beyond the vanishing point we concentrate our efforts on living in the here and now, living in the present moment with both God and humanity. Whatever is beyond the vanishing point is the sleeping dog we leave to lay inside the doghouse and will one day awaken.

shalom, matt