My UK co-grandma, Sarah, is married to Cliff, who recently traveled to London and brought back something special. It arrived yesterday: an in-tact 6” x 9” envelope, plump-full. (See yesterday’s blog.) Inside was a beautiful linen tea towel depicting the British Parliament – House of Lords, House of Commons, and the familiar London landmark, Big Ben.

I hadn’t expected a replacement towel for the one that was lost in the mail, so this gift was a charming surprise. Having been to London twice, I recognized the landmarks, but even if I hadn’t, I would have known Big Ben from movies, pictures, and textbooks.

As I studied the towel, I thought of all the well-known places in our world I haven’t visited but still would recognize, for example, the Taj Mahal, The Great Wall of China, Stonehenge, Niagara Falls, The Sphinx. As school children we studied these impressive wonders and saw pictures of them, becoming acquainted from afar.

Last night Nelson, Birgitta, and I had an interesting dinner-time discussion about the biblical new heaven and new earth. Although there is no way to visit these places, we do have textbook pictures of what they’ll be like, which invites us to get acquainted with them as we did with the famous places in our school books.

God wants us to know that one day he’s going to bridge the gap between heaven (the spiritual) and earth (the physical) by bringing them together. The Bible tells us he’ll make a new heaven and earth for us, describing what they’ll look like after he combines them, although much is still left to our imagination. But since he’s calling our new home “earth,” he probably intends for it to be familiar to us, a better version of what we know now.

Maybe he’ll eliminate all the undesirables of our world, then enrich all the good parts, and add heaven. If that’s true, when the time comes to go there, we’ll probably find it pleasantly familiar (but greatly enhanced). Maybe we’ll find roses without thorns, water without floods, gardens without weeds, and seasons without storms. But roses, water, gardens, and seasons will make our heavenly-earth feel very much like home.

Perhaps God is excited about our reaction to his new heaven and earth the same way parents anticipate a child’s response to a longed-for gift. Since he tells us some of what eternity will be like, he must want us to develop a longing for it, not just in his textbook version but in actual experience.

I’m grateful to have visited the famous landmarks on my stunning new tea towel from Sarah. And maybe someday I’ll get to see a few more of the legendary sights our world has to offer. But most of all, I want to see what God will show us, knowing it’s going to be out of this world.

“This is the plan: At the right time he will bring everything together under the authority of Christ – everything in heaven and on earth.” (Ephesians 1:10)