Heaven: When Faith Becomes SightSýnishorn

Eye Has Not Seen

Heaven. It’s your glorious unending. Your forever home. The place your faith becomes sight. I’m so grateful we’re spending the next six days in Heaven together! (Grin!) So, settle in, take a deep breath, and let’s start.

As I write this, I’m standing at my glass-top desk, feeling the warmth of sunlight bathe the room. Sometimes I stand here in my office and sense the soft afternoon light seeping through the window. Though I can’t see it, I know it’s there, and I lift my eyes and imagine what lies beyond the pane. In my mind’s eye, I see the carpet of grass and the unruly limbs of the lazy oak that often scrape my window frame on a windy day. But then I imagine beyond; I see the blue flowers. Full disclosure: there are no blue flowers outside my window, but I’m looking way beyond my front yard. I’m casting my imaginative gaze to a faraway place where I dream blue flowers grow.

You see, the blue flower in literature represents longing. It was a central symbol of the Romanticism movement, portraying a desire, yearning, and love of the eternal.1 And oh, how I ache for the eternal. C. S. Lewis called himself, “a votary of the Blue Flower.”2

But here’s the thing: my physical eyes can’t see a blue flower. A degenerative retinal disease caused me to lose my eyesight when I was fifteen, so I have lived in physical darkness longer than I ever lived in physical light. And quite honestly, I don’t even have a good visual memory of a blue flower. But my fingertips have brushed the delicate petals of a blue hydrangea. I have breathed in its sweet, subtle fragrance. This has awakened in me a beautiful longing for that which I can’t even see. It awakens what no eye has seen—images of Heaven, the place where I hope blue flowers grow.

It’s interesting that often what we see or feel here awakens in us a longing, a desire for there, for Heaven. Even the temporary pulses with the echo of the eternal. Even the tangible can quicken our heartbeat and cast our gaze toward the transcendent.

Jesus came from Heaven and has exclusive expert authority on Heaven. He called that place, “My Father’s house” (John 14:2). His eye had literally seen it, so we can trust what He says about what our eye has not seen.

Jesus used figurative language to communicate what our dwelling with God will be like.

In most modern translations (CSB, NIV, ESV, NASB), it says there are many rooms in the Father’s house. But in the KJV, mansions was how it was translated. So, maybe you’ve grown up thinking we get a palatial dwelling with opulence and a coffee bar! (Okay, the coffee bar is my idea of Heaven.) That wasn’t the point Jesus was making, though.

The Greek word for house in the phrase my Father’s house is tēoikia, which can be used to communicate a physical house or a family. Perhaps the message here is not about rooms or mansions or dwelling places but about identity and family? You belong. I belong. There is plenty of room. We are family, and we have a home.

Oh, my friend, whatever wonder our eyes have seen here dims in light of what God has prepared for us there. Whatever beauty I imagine in the hue of a blue flower is sepia tone compared to the radiance that will burst forth before my seeing, enlightened eyes in Heaven.

Why think about Heaven?

In John 14:1, our compassionate Savior knew the troubled hearts of His disciples needed comfort. His words about His Father’s house affirmed and assured them of the truth that there was far more to this life than the uncertainty they felt. This same truth can untrouble our hearts, too.

Read John 14:1-3. Think about what is unsettling you. Then ask God to use your growing understanding and anticipation of Heaven to bring comfort to your troubled heart.

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1. Britannica, T. Editors of Encyclopaedia, “the blue flower,” Encyclopedia Britannica, August 11, 2009, britannica.com/art/the-blue-flower-literature.

2. C. S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life (Harcourt, Inc., 1955).

3. Strong’s G3614: oikia, Blue Letter Bible, blueletterbible.org/lexicon/g3614/niv/mgnt/0-1/.