Pastor’s Lenten Blog 17

Last week I went to visit the daughters in Illinois, who were home from spring break.  I’m always delighted to be with them, yet it was also one of those visits, full of cross-purposes, where I was also somewhat glad to come back to Minnesota.  The time had a certain tension to it, with Corrie wanting to get certain things done, Katie wanting to spend time with her friends and not wanting to do what Corrie wanted to get done, etc.

Moments of tension in life are always part of our reality.  As human beings we may want to sit under our vine and fig tree, live in peace and be unafraid.  However, too much time under the fig tree would get to be very boring, wouldn’t it?

I don’t know whether heaven and/or hell are realities or metaphors for life, but if I would characterize the principle property of hell, it would be boredom — a grinding, soul-depleting power of purposeless.  Heaven, on the other hand, would be a realm of continued challenge and joy — maybe with a little less pain than we experience here?

At any rate, daughter time was, as it always is, a joy, even if there was a little angst in the middle of it.  I definitely was not bored!