Healing and Heaven

I was working on a sermon about healing last week and had an amazing insight. Usually when we think about heaven we imagine a place where everything is perfect, a place where nothing is broken. We imagine a place where our physical and mental selves are whole and strong and healed. We envision healed relationships with loved ones who have died before us. And we envision an eternity in the presence of God; spiritual healing, if you will. In this picture of heaven all of the broken places in our lives have been healed.

But then I thought of the Gospel stories of Jesus’ resurrection.
He tells Thomas to, “Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side.” (John 20:27). It seems to me that Jesus was carrying the wounds he endured, not the scars that would indicate that the healing was completed.

And then I thought of the picture of the Kingdom of Heaven that John saw in his vision. The Tree of Life grows along the banks of the river that flows from the throne of God and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations (Revelation 22:2). It made me think that perhaps people returned to the tree for healing more than once, using the leaves as a poultice or as medicine when necessary.

Both of these made me wonder if the process of healing continues after this life. Is it possible that healing is an ongoing process in the kingdom of heaven that begins now and continues forever? If so, that would mean that there is something sacred about our brokenness, that it is not something to run from, to deny or to avoid at all costs. Nor is it something that we should rush to fix. Yes, there is pain in brokenness but there is joy in the process of being healed.

Perhaps the fullness of our humanity and our wholeness is found, not in reaching some perfected state of body, mind, spirit and relationships, but in the experience of brokenness and  healing in all of these areas. Isn’t this what Jesus means when he likens us to the branch of a vine that is pruned so that it will produce better fruit? (John 15:2) Why do we assume that this kind of thing will stop someday in the future?

Maybe I’m reading too much into these verses but this notion gives me more hope than the thought that one day everything will reach a perfected state. It gives me hope because it is something that I am already experiencing today. It gives me hope because it relieves the stress of brokenness to know that healing is already happening. It removes the expectation that everything should be perfect and stifles my 21^st century impatience to have everything I want now.

It is enough to know that even in the midst of brokenness things are already moving in the direction of healing. That is really good news for me.