Exploring Heaven: What Great Christian Thinkers Tell Us about Our Afterlife with God

by Arthur O. Roberts

Book Overview

"If you have ever wondered whether the idea of heaven is merely a theoretical human construct, then this book is for you. If you have ever entertained doubts or questions about a future existence... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0060530685
• ISBN13: 9780060530686
• Release Date: August 2003
• Publisher: HarperOne
• Length: 224 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.8" x 8.6"

Customer Reviews

Excellent book with a lot to ponder

I enjoyed this book. In "Exploring Heaven" Arthur Roberts covers a huge area of topics. He does so from a very reader friendly position. He admits that there is much to heaven that we can only speculate about. His speculations are based on solid logic and fact. This makes his ideas very plausible and believable. He even covers a bit about hell. I was especially helped by his understanding of how believers in heaven will have a new and perfected body. The social aspects of heaven being both in ways like a rural setting and in other ways like a city were also helpful. As we can only ponder the afterlife, we can here on this fallen world still find joy in following Jesus Christ. For Jesus is the only one who can get us to heaven. The love we experience here between people is a glimpse of what God has in store for those who love Jesus as Savior and Lord.

Worth Reading

Arthur Roberts demonstrates his capacity to blend solid scholarship, accessible writing, profound faith, and abiding hope in the pages of this excellent book.There is no gnostic foolishness here--just deep wisdom from a man who has studied deeply and walked faithfully through the many years of his life.This is a book for everyone who has wondered about life after death, and a great encouragement for those of us who dare to place our hope in exploring heaven.

"Let heaven fill your thoughts" (Colossians 3:2)

Arthur Roberts has provided a thoughtful and encouraging book to anyone who wants to explore heaven. Roberts considers many views of heaven, finally declaring why he finds the Christian view as taught in the books of Christian scripture the most convincing.Roberts explores what heaven will be like, taking his clues from Christian scripture, and also speculates further into what heaven may be like - again using Christian scripture as the guide for his exploration.I've not read quite so gentle and encouraging a book on heaven before. C.S. Lewis' writing was the most helpful to me on this subject before I read this book. Roberts' approach is consistent with, but flavored differently from that of Lewis. While following a quite sound line of reasoning, Arthur Roberts manages to transfer something of his own encouragement about heaven. In a disarming and subtle way, he draws the reader in to his encouragement, "letting heaven fill your thoughts".I highly recommend this book. Don't read it all at once, though it is an easy read. Or refer to it over time to let Roberts' thoughts percolate through your own, and be encouraged."Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God ; trust also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am." [NIV]Roberts' book helped make Jesus' words real for me.

Exploring heaven

Arthur Roberts' book, Exploring Heaven, is an attempt to collect, categorize and comprehend all we can know about an unknowable subject. It reminds me a bit of Paul's prayer for the Ephesian believers, that together they come to know the love of Christ, which is beyond knowledge. The subject of heaven is also, in this same sense, beyond knowledge. But the world is full of hints, and Roberts essentially takes these hints, holds them up to the light like a diamond, explores the different planes and angles, then describes what he sees.The book covers such topics as location of heaven, nature of "eternal life," what we will be like, what we will do, how we will relate, and the implications for the whole cosmos. Roberts' approach is rational, well thought out, and clearly articulated, apt for lay people as well as trained theologians.Roberts doesn't provide all the answers, but he does clarify the questions and give a sound basis for imagining the possibilities. He leaves room for mystery, intuition, celebration, and awe. I found myself stimulated intellectually, but also with a heightened sense of worship and longing for "home."

It really is about exploring

The subtitle ot this book may be a bit misleading if it causes us to assume this is a book only for historians and theologians. Though they will surely enjoy it, this is really a book for all us who wonder whether there is a heaven at all, and if there is, what it might be like for ourselves and those we love. That must be why Arthur Roberts used the word "Exploring" in the title. The book is in one sense an exploration of the various historical and theological interpretations of the biblical teaching about heaven. But it is much more than that. Though Roberts is genuinely fair to other views about heaven, he early in the book declares his own view that heaven is an actual place in which people will each have an actual body, however different from our present body. And from that point on he explores with great fascination what heaven might be like, given what we know from scripture, from science, and from human thought.This book stimulated my thinking and my curiosity to know still more about heaven, but it also encouraged me greatly. The encouragement was not of the proverbial "pie in the sky by and by" variety, but came through well reasoned and clearly articulated explanations of why it is that "the software of eternity lodges in our systems." It is exciting to think that we have good reasons to believe that "heaven won't diminish but rather will enhance the values and experiences we enjoy on earth."