In the book “The Eyes of the Heart”, Frederick Buechner is having a conversation with his grandmother who died years before and is asking her about her experience of afterlife. The quote from Buechner quoting his grandmother is as follows. "I have always assumed that when you died you would no longer see through a glass darkly but face to face as St. Paul quite inaccurately predicted. However such was not the case. On the contrary, it was like stepping out of a dark house into a greater dark of night."
She pauses for a moment, glancing up into the shadows as though they are the sky. One lens of her glasses catches the lamp's light.
"The moon' she says. "The Milky Way unwinding like a scarf, the constellations. All those fathoms upon fathoms of darkness. Who knows what other moons and stars there are further still. What deeper depths."
"You'd think it would quite take your breath away, if you had breath to take,"she says. "But it doesn't. It's almost as if it is your breath." She glances down at the pattern of cards on the table for a moment. "Or as if it's breathing you." "Eyes of the Heart" Frederick Buechner. p78.
If there was one thing that I crave as a person, it is a sense of wonder. It feels hardwired into me. A beautiful sunset, a newborn child, the vastness of the universe. I look for wonder. I long for it. I am moved by it, and sadly, when it stares me in the face, I don't know what to do with it. Most of what creates wonder in me is far beyond my grasp.
I've struggled with the visions of heaven that have been painted for me, how we would lay prostrate in rapturous delight, throwing our crowns before God, while declaring our unworthiness (well at least the 24 elders in Rev. 4:10).
I mean no sacrilege here. I understand in the puniest mortal way that I am completely insignificant in the presence of God. But it is HE who called me friend.
When I am told that I will spend my eternity throwing any crowns I have, falling on my face, and declaring my unworthiness, I wonder how that fits with what moves me now? In my own insignificant existence, wonder drives me. Wonder even drives my baser interests, which robs me of God given wonder. If wonder is something that I long for and feel I am created for, then it seems that a world of declaring my unworthiness and crown throwing, is stripped of wonder, unless, of course, God sends fresh waves of wonder through the prostrated peoples to keep up their motivation for self-abasement.
Does wonder then become how to best throw your crown to get closest to God’s feet (if he has feet)? How many skips can a crown make before it sinks to the bottom of the river that flows from the center of the city? Do we purchase crowns to throw from hawkers pushing vending carts down the golden streets? How do you throw a crown with any accuracy when you are in the prone position?
On the other hand what if heaven is a ramping up of what we know as wonder, heightening our senses, far beyond what we as mortals have been able to comprehend? What if when we move to the next level of existence, we find that we are not given the answers we were hoping to receive, but are given the capacity to see more mystery and wonder than we had any notion even existed?
What if heaven is more about wonder and less about answers? Wouldn't my discoveries drive me to worship wonder's creator even more?
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