I recently had the chance to get a copy of Scot McKnight's new book The Heaven Promise. Scot is a respected professor at Northern Seminary in the Chicago area. Scot also blogs regularly at The Jesus Creed. Scot is one of the few I've read & heard speak who also sounds like one of us. He has a way of talking about & writing about deep, weighty, philosophical & theological issues in a way that is simple & easy to understand, no matter what level of theological education you may have. That's just one reason why The Heaven Promise is such a great book not only for those of us in ministry but also for the average church member who wants to hear what Scripture actually teaches about heaven rather than what culture or someone who claims to have
been there tells us.
It's that commitment to biblical teaching that makes this a must read for anyone interested in the subject or any pastor or teacher who is preparing to address the doctrine of heaven. There's no need to leave it to pop culture images of endless harp playing, which by the way doesn't sound all that appealing, or to the mysterious visions of people who claimed to have seen something in a near death experience. While I'm not discounting 100% of those stories, I don't really need them, & neither do you? Why? Because God has gone on record about what heaven is like now & what we have to look forward to when the Kingdom is fully consummated in Christ's second coming.
And here's the good news: our imagination's picture of heaven isn't imaginative or glorious enough to contain all that God has in store for His people.
In the book McKnight tackles the idea of heaven right now & what most of us think of when we think of heaven, which is actually the new heaven alluded to in Revelation. Then McKnight tackles what he calls "God's Six Promises About Heaven" which almost always forces the reader to expand what they had previously thought about heaven, & that's good. It means heaven is bigger, grander, & more glorious than we ever thought, mainly because God is bigger, grander, & more glorious than we ever thought. McKnight's last section focuses on "Ten Questions About Heaven" such as "will there be families?" & "what about children who die?". Most everything he covers in this last section are issues that we've all wondered about & talked about, & he handles them in a biblically sound way.
In conclusion, I would say this is a must have. I thoroughly enjoyed it & went through multiple highlighters while reading it. It challenges your notions of heaven while pointing you back to scripture. So if you read this book & find yourself arguing, you may want to remember you're not arguing with Scot but with scripture.
Disclaimer: I received this book from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing for this review.
