Heaven and Comfort

I watched an inverview special with that name a few days ago. Kind of interesting, but it didn't answer any questions really.

To me, one of the interesting parts was Barbara Walters' chat with the Dalai Lama, the leader of the Buddhist religion. There was a strong emphasis on ridding yourself of negativity to achieve "nirvana," a state of perfection, bliss and peace; basically it's the state of being completely and perfectly boring. Anywho, it occurred to me that living on the edge of the Himalayan mountains, with a small community of other Buddhists (all pursuing perfect nothingness), shutting out the world, living mostly in silence or meditation, seemed to be the easy way out. Try living downtown and doing the same thing; it's more difficult to rid yourself of negativity when saturated by society. It could be argued that mystical Christianity has many of the same emphases, just with the understanding of the true God as the anchor. My point is that their version seemed like the easy way out.

Another observation. The too-long-for-it's-own-good film Seven Years in Tibet (great cinematography, lame plot, waste of three hours of my life), had a few scenes that saddened me for the Buddhists. The young Dalai Lama has a dream that his entire village is slaughtered, including his family. By his own words, he admits that there is no way to know whether they will get to Heaven (eh-hem, probably not, dude). Then when the village actually is attacked and his family is killed, he sobs and sobs ... but has no comfort whatsoever. He had nothing and no one to lean on, no one to comfort him. They have no answer for suffering, they have no judgment for wrongs, and they have no assurance of Heaven. How sad. How lonely. What a waste.

Jesus' heart is full of love; His heart is bursting at the seams with a voracious desire to be with you forever. And because of this desire, He went to the cross and took the judgment of God against our sins on Himself. But if we will not accept Him, it is as if we are saying, "No thanks, I'll take God's judgment myself." The bummer is that His wrath against our sins is eternal ... we will suffer forever if we decide Jesus isn't the way.

We have a comfort; we have someone to lean on; we have an answer for suffering and for every wrong thing that has happened in this world ... at the end we are not left on our own, or sequestered to boring perfection. Jesus will come to each of us personally and pay back every wrong that has ever happened to you. But he will do the same to others as well ... which means the ones you have hurt. But if you have come to Jesus, He will take on Himself the judgment you should have received for hurting others. God will make everything right. His plan is to be a judge for us, meaning in our favor. He doesn't want us to be in pain, He wants to be our comfort eternally. Allow the passionate Bridegroom-Judge to comfort you. Lean on Him and you will be with Him forever.