Better Than Eden?

“Then the Lord God planted a garden in Eden in the east, and there He placed the man He had made.” (Genesis 2:8 NLT)

In your mind and heart, what is the best part of living on planet earth? Granted, you’ve never lived anywhere else, but can you imagine life being better someplace else? It’s not hard, is it? All the evil, fear, uncertainty, sickness, death. Sometimes I just want to be done with life on earth and be in heaven with my Savior.

Then I think of life in the Garden of Eden before sin and evil. What would there be not to like? Originally Adam was alone, but God remedied that when He made Eve. Adam’s responsibility was to tend the garden, but the idea of walking with God each day in the midst of perfection seems very appealing. Yet, Nancy Guthrie wrote: “The new creation will be everything we have always longed for. It’s going to be even better than Eden.” But how could that be?

We are social beings. God made us to thrive in partnership with others. Can you even begin to imagine how it will be when everyone is equally beautiful, intelligent, physically capable, talented, loving, kind, and on and on. We’re very different now and I can’t imagine we’ll not be “different” there, I’m just not sure how. But whatever “different” looks like then, we’ll embrace and celebrate it.

Think of our differences now, even as believers. Some are very detail oriented, while some seem to “fly by the seat of their pants.” Some are brilliant, insightful, good at thinking, reasoning, figuring things out, while others take it as it comes, not concerned about the future or what it might bring. Some of us are very “home” oriented, while others don’t want “the grass to grow under their feet.”

Will that change in heaven? Will we lose our sense of adventure; our longing to explore? I imagine the Lord sending us to planets lightyears away just so we can see what’s there. It seems reasonable that we’ll have different ways to interact with other species. In conversation with them, will we learn why elephants have such good memories or why bears have such a strong instinct to protect their young?

Will we learn from the eagle who dominants the sky or hear lectures from whales about the depths of the seas? Will the Lord give us insight into why certain things on earth held such fascination for us or why we seemed so endlessly attached to certain ways of doing things? Will we remember what it was like living with a sin nature and bask in the glory of being freed from it forever?

Whether heaven will be better than Eden isn’t an issue for me. All that concerns me now is that I live in submission to Jesus’ Lordship and will joyfully do so throughout eternity. Oneness with my Savior is what drives my life from day to day and I can’t imagine wanting it any other way in heaven.

Being able to see and understand things that are a mystery to us now will no doubt bring a smile to our face and joy to our heart, and the sometimes stillness of His voice will, hopefully, be amplified and clarified for perfect understanding and obedience.

One thing I’m certain won’t be in heaven is a passion for lost souls. All souls that are going to be found will be found and settled into their new surroundings. I’m not sure how, but my sense is, we will no longer need to grieve for our lost loved ones and friends. Somehow, in some way that we can’t comprehend now, the Lord will enable us to come to terms with their decision to remain lost. But to have to live with the thought that they could have been saved had we been more diligent in our praying for and reaching out to them wouldn’t be heaven, but hell. We must not allow that to happen. We must do all we can to reach them now while there’s still time.

Food for thought.

Blessings, Ed 😊