Get ready for heaven. Practice love now.

In church we often here about how important faith is. The Bible says that without faith, we can’t please God. The Bible says we are saved by grace through faith. Jesus commended those who had faith in God, whether they were Jewish or Gentile.

Faith is important, but we won’t need it forever. And the same goes for hope. I know that probably sounds strange, but stay with me.

We don’t know much about heaven, but we do know that in heaven, we will see God clearly. He will no longer be hidden. Thus, there will be no need for faith. We know that in heaven there will be no death or suffering. Emotional pain will be gone. Thus, there will be no need for hope.

But there will always be a need for love. Love is fundamental to human experience. Every parent knows that loving our children is more important than almost anything else. To be loved, is to feel loved. And to feel loved, is to feel valuable. And to feel valuable, empowers us to contribute to life. And that is what we want for our children, and it all starts with love. (God’s love can do the same for those who don’t feel loved by their parents.)

We all need people who care deeply about our wellbeing and work for that. We all need the companionship of compassionate others who affirm us. We all need people who show us affection. That’s not going to change, even in heaven. Paul wrote about love in his letter to the Corinthians; he compares it to every other spiritual gift and concludes that love is superior to them all. “So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”

Faith can be challenging. Hope can be daunting. But love is always within our reach. It’s a good thing to practice, because we all need loving, and we’ll be doing it literally forever.

— Nelsonia