Introduction

For several decades now, Christians worldwide have been taught that the ultimate goal of the faith is heaven. Considering longevity, this idea has essentially achieved a canonical status in believers’ minds. Yet, Christians before the 1900s did not entertain such a thought. One major reason the notion became popular was the publication of the Scofield Bible in 1909, which presented the idea alongside the Bible’s text, not as one among many options, but as the only reading offered. Rapture theology became synonymous with eschatology. Other enabling factors, including the later rise of American fundamentalism and Cold War anxieties, contributed to the popularity of this idea.

I recognize that this can be an emotionally charged and potentially disorienting issue. There are people in their 80s who have believed all their lives that heaven awaits. So, I’m aware of the potential distress that this entry might cause. But I owe it to such persons to rigorously interact with Scripture to extract the truth. In this piece, I shall argue that the earth has always been and will forever be humanity’s destiny. Yes, there is a heaven, but it is not the residential home of humans.

In the Beginning

Let us take it from the beginning. Humans were not the first created beings. The Bible reveals that a host of heavenly beings were created before humans. For reasons best known to God, he made the angels, cherubs, seraphs, and others to reside in heaven. But when God made humans, he first prepared a cultivated portion of the Earth for them to dwell in. He could have made humans join the heavenly beings. Instead, heaven – that is, God – regularly comes to the earth to fellowship with humanity in the special spot he has earmarked for them. It was not long before things went south. The humans became corrupted, and God must act:

Genesis 3:22-24 NRSVUE
[22] Then the LORD God said, “See, the humans have become like one of us, knowing good and evil, and now they might reach out their hands and take also from the tree of life and eat and live forever”— [23] therefore the LORD God sent them forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from which they were taken. [24] He drove out the humans, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim and a sword flaming and turning to guard the way to the tree of life.

I have written elsewhere that knowing good and evil is not, in itself, a sin. In his famous prayer when he became king, Solomon asks: