Living "In-Between"

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Sonny1954

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If this question has been previously posted, then please forgive me and just ignore this.

I confess to having real problems with the prospect of human existence between an individual’s death & judgement and the final resurrection on the last day. After all, we will not be body and soul, i.e. “fully human.” It makes Heaven seem like a nondescript world which is only a shadow of our sensual life on earth. Considering that no man or woman knows the hour of Jesus’ 2nd coming, we could be live as such formless energy for thousands, millions or billions of years. That doesn’t sound very “heavenly” to me. It dulls my appetite for any world beyond this one.

I suppose that if I trusted God more, it wouldn’t bother me. But when I consider the sights, smells, sounds and tastes in which I can revel in this life, but which will be unavailable after death, the next life is decidedly bland.

Truly, I mean not to offend anyone’s sensitivity. I just wonder if anyone else has pondered this life “in-between?”
 
Does it help to realize that time, as we understand it, doesn’t exist in heaven? So, your appetites and cravings may seem like that blink of an eye. 🙂
 
Scripture says that we can’t imagine the next world - eye has not seen, ear has not heard… Try reading the diaries of some saints or the stories of saints and martyrs. Their lives living closer to God than most of us are described as “ecstacy” - that doesn’t sound too shabby to me! There is also a book called Glimpses of Heaven, which is a series of stories of the last moments of people’s lives as told by a woman who serves as a hospice nurse. What these people see is incredibly beautiful. God promises that there is something better. Just because we can’t imagine it doesn’t mean it isn’t true.
 
I recall Jesus telling the thief on the cross that he will be in Heaven that day. To me this means that when our body dies and we experience the first death that we exit time and become part of a spiritual realm without body that the Angels and Demons reside in where we are at Judgement and it is the end of time. That is how the Thief was in heaven because he was at the end of time and Judged and so he was to enter Heaven and not receive the 2nd Death.
 
Sonny1954 said:
If this question has been previously posted, then please forgive me and just ignore this.

I confess to having real problems with the prospect of human existence between an individual’s death & judgement and the final resurrection on the last day. After all, we will not be body and soul, i.e. “fully human.” It makes Heaven seem like a nondescript world which is only a shadow of our sensual life on earth. Considering that no man or woman knows the hour of Jesus’ 2nd coming, we could be live as such formless energy for thousands, millions or billions of years. That doesn’t sound very “heavenly” to me. It dulls my appetite for any world beyond this one.

I suppose that if I trusted God more, it wouldn’t bother me. But when I consider the sights, smells, sounds and tastes in which I can revel in this life, but which will be unavailable after death, the next life is decidedly bland.

Truly, I mean not to offend anyone’s sensitivity. I just wonder if anyone else has pondered this life “in-between?”
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It isn’t a “life between”. It is eternity, and you will have a body.

As was remarked earlier, in death you “exit time”, and therefore do not languish along the rest of time without being alive. You are a human being, a living being. You cannot “be” without being alive; you cannot be alive unless you have a body (actually, you are a body) because it is your body that holds and expresses life. Life is the union of psyche and body; if you exist, you are alive, and if you are alive, you are embodied.

It is true that existing without a body would be torture. No sight, no smell, no sound, no limbs or movement… hideous. But if you think this through, you cannot “know” without your head, any more than you can see without eyes or move without limbs. So if you did exist without your body, and therefore without a head, you wouldn’t know it and wouldn’t suffer. You would “switch back on” fully resurrected.

St. Paul has stated in 2Co 5 that “If our earthly tent…is dissolved, we have a building from God… eternal in the heavens.” The tent he speaks of is our body; the building from Heaven is our celestial body. You slip out of you flesh to be “clothed” with the building from Heaven (only one thing in our life is both like a dwelling and like clothing: our bodies!) and there is no waiting through time because in slipping from the flesh you slip out of time, and right into your new body waiting in Eternity. So you will continue to see, and touch, and smell and move, because in Heaven you will still be someBODY!

ICXC NIKA, GEddie
 
I thought that the Church’s teaching was that those who die BEFORE the general resurrection do not yet have their glorified body. As such they exist as spirit only? Am I mistaken? (I hope so.) It does seem to me that we cannot be human without both the body and the soul.
 
Sonny1954 said:
I thought that the Church’s teaching was that those who die BEFORE the general resurrection do not yet have their glorified body. As such they exist as spirit only? Am I mistaken? (I hope so.) It does seem to me that we cannot be human without both the body and the soul.
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Why do you think that we would still be “inside” time? Do our souls exist in space/time? No. Therefore, I see no reason that we wouldn’t “fast-forward” to the end of the Age.
 
I think our growing in the “trust” part of it is what it’s really all about.
 
“Trust” in error is no hope. As one man correctly stated it, “This is always already the other world.” It is, to me, one of the greatest tragedies on this Earth that the Church has devolved the actual meaning of the Jesus story and the intent of Sacred teaching to give believers a picture of life that is a cartoon diversion from actuality. Unfortunately, that does not make the feeling of devotion and piety any less real, thus fostering the error even further. If one was to simply question that part of us that is common among ALL the children of God, whatever their faith or lack of it, a profound Truth may be discovered, a Truth beyond the limits of belief.
 
Detales said:
“Trust” in error is no hope. As one man correctly stated it, “This is always already the other world.” It is, to me, one of the greatest tragedies on this Earth that the Church has devolved the actual meaning of the Jesus story and the intent of Sacred teaching to give believers a picture of life that is a cartoon diversion from actuality. Unfortunately, that does not make the feeling of devotion and piety any less real, thus fostering the error even further. If one was to simply question that part of us that is common among ALL the children of God, whatever their faith or lack of it, a profound Truth may be discovered, a Truth beyond the limits of belief.
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“Trust” in God is a great hope.
 
fhansen, I completley agree, and it goes beyond trust to knowledge. But I am not questioning that. I am questioning the accuracy of the christianist view of “god” which is materialistic and fabulous at best.
 
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