Board index ‹ Heaven and Hell

[Blue Pig]

Will I meet people I know in heaven, and will they be the same? As many people realize, we change. Many people in their 20s are liberal, in their later years conservative. People pick up habits, and drop them. When I go to heaven, I am told that I will meet up with my family/friends, but what period of their life? Like what personality? My grandmother died at 70, would she be 20? and that same 20s personality?

In a similar case, say someone is hit in the head, and gets a radically different personality (there are cases of this), and that person goes on to live another 20 years. Do I meet the pre- or post- person?

[jimwalton]

You know, we're not told many things about heaven, especially the questions you're asking, but I'll do my best to help out.

Will you recognize people? There is every reason to think so.
- When Saul saw Samuel's spirit, he recognized him (1 Sam. 28.14)
- When the 3 disciples saw Moses and Elijah on the Mt. of Transfiguration, they recognized them even though they had never met them or seen pictures of them (Mt. 17.3-4). You can be sure they weren't wearing name tags.
- When the rich man saw Lazarus in "heaven," he knew who it was.

We can also assume, then, that identities persist in heaven. Moses will still be like Moses. Elijah, Samuel and whoever will still be the person they were on earth. And yet we know that a transformation will have taken place (1 Cor. 15); there will definitely be a difference. 1 Cor. 15.37 lets us know that what comes up (wheat) is different from the seed (piece of grain seed). So also the new body will be different from the old, but still a recognizable identity (back to the Moses and Elijah example, or even Samuel in 1 Sam. 28.12-20).

What's going to be purged out is not their personality, but the sin. The Bible is clear about that God is remaking his people. 1 Corinthians 3.13-15 (also 1 Pet. 1.7) lets us know that here, and especially in the afterlife, God is working to eliminate all that negative stuff that has no place in the life of a believer, but in the afterlife it will be purged out completely. Also Phil. 1.6.

What age will they be? Heaven is portrayed by the Bible as the ideal state. It's set forth as "us at our best." The epic ME. Woo-hoo. I think, though we're not specifically told, that you'll be the best version of YOU there is. You at your finest. Word. Jesus made the lame walk, the blind see, and the deaf hear. The message behind those healings is that God is a God of wholeness and life, leading me to extrapolate with confidence that in heaven there will be no unwholeness. Get rid of all the junk about me, and keep the good stuff about me. Liberal or conservative will be meaningless terms when we all have perfect access to perfect truth. We'll see things as they really are. Can somebody still be ornery, or funny? Sure. Those things don't pertain to sin or righteousness.