The Four Glories of Heaven<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\""It is not in heaven that we find God, but in God we find heaven." Studies of the new heavens and new earth, and I'm thinking especially of Tom Wright's\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2012\/03\/07\/the-four-glories-of-heaven\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Four Glories of Heaven\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\""It is not in heaven that we find God, but in God we find heaven." 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{"id":26108,"date":"2012-03-07T00:08:19","date_gmt":"2012-03-07T06:08:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/?p=26108"},"modified":"2012-03-07T06:31:58","modified_gmt":"2012-03-07T12:31:58","slug":"the-four-glories-of-heaven","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2012\/03\/07\/the-four-glories-of-heaven\/","title":{"rendered":"The Four Glories of Heaven"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

$\"\"$ <\/a>\u201cIt is not in heaven that we find God, but in God<\/em> we find heaven.\u201d Studies of the new heavens and new earth, and I\u2019m thinking especially of Tom Wright\u2019s Surprised by Hope<\/em><\/a><\/strong>, have brought heaven back to earth because they have urged us to look again at what the New Testament actually says about heaven (not up in the sky somewhere where we flit to and fro as disembodied souls). This has been a noteworthy improvement for theology in the last two decades.<\/p>\n

But Tony Thiselton, in his book Life after Death<\/em><\/a><\/strong>,\u00a0wants us to focus less on the where<\/em> of heaven and more on the essence<\/em> of heaven by examining four dimensions to the word \u201cglory\u201d when it comes to heaven. Heaven is not so much about projecting our ideals onto a future state of affairs (that is, new heavens and new earth and new Jerusalem) but to see that the word \u201cglory,\u201d which dominates visions of that future, final state of affairs, is about the presence of God<\/em>.\u00a0Throughout the Bible glory refers to a visible manifestation<\/em> of God\u2019s proximate presence. He cites texts especially from Ezekiel and Revelation.<\/p>\n

What do you think of this focus on \u201cglory\u201d?<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

A second dimension of glory derives from the word in Hebrew meaning \u201cweighty\u201d or someone who has gravitas<\/em>. In other words, what makes a person impressive. The startling feature of the glory of God is that God\u2019s gravitas is found in his self-emptying in the incarnation and cross<\/em>. In other words, God\u2019s gravitas is Christ himself. Glory and Christ belong together. It is to see the beauty of God in the face of Jesus Christ (2 Cor 3:18\u20134:4). That is, God\u2019s glory is Christlikeness.<\/p>\n

The third dimension of God\u2019s glory is love God for his own sake, to enjoy God as he is in himself, to relish God for who God is. Glory is the sheer celebration of God. \u00a0And as we sustain and retain our individuality, relishing God means relishing that in which God takes delight, and that means his Son and his people, and that means an element of glory is enjoying others as they are in God.<\/p>\n

The fourth element of glory, and one Thiselton thinks is an extension of what has already been said, is face-to-face encounter with God<\/em>. The \u201cpresence\u201d of God is often associated with God\u2019s \u201cface\u201d (panim<\/em>) and God\u2019s \u201ceyes\u201d (ayin<\/em>), and God as light \u2014 so that heaven is the enjoyment of knowing and experiencing of God face-to-face in all of God\u2019s glory and endless depths.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"