The Fixed Chasm

Our Lectionary group yesterday spent most of our time discussing the chasm. We noted, thanks to my blatant theft from bill's comment on Monday, that in the beginning there is no chasm, the rich man and Lazarus are sharing the same space, but, by the time of their death's, the chasm is so wide as to be impossible to cross.

Since then, I've spent a lot of time thinking about that chasm. Having teetered on the edge of heresy a few weeks ago, I'd like to walk with you to that precipice again this time with "works righteousness" on my mind. My thought comes from a theology of heaven and hell that has been brewing in my mind for the last three years or so. I am in that school of uneducated, drooling, evangelicals that still believes that there are two final destinations when this ride is over; we'll call them heaven and hell for ease of conversation.

I believe that heaven is eternity spent basking in the love of God; what form that takes, I have no idea. I believe that hell is eternity spent in the absence of the love of God; what form that takes, again, I have no idea. What I have been working out recently is how one arrives at a ticket to one or the other destination... and I think it might be the result of choices. A life lived actively choosing to reject God will result in an afterlife in the absence of his love. A life lived actively choosing to come to know God will result in an afterlife in "the bussom of Abraham." My hunch is that there is one last chance, post-death, at the final judgment to make that choice for good. If the burning fire of the love of God is too much, then one can choose the burning fires of hell. Anyway, I think it is all about choices, or as [gulp!] Barbra Brown Taylor puts it "Who do you think fixed that chasm in the story? Was it God or the rich man? Sometimes I think the worst thing we ever have to fear is that God will give us exactly what we want." (Bread of Angels, 113).

And so the chasm, that fixed place in between the heaven and hell that I so foolishly believe exist, is a foundation dug by our choices; are we going to live a life that fills in those holes, are will we use our shovel to dig deeper and wider?