Praying for the future

Jason’s post on the possible afterlife of animals (or a subset thereof) raises a larger issue. In the nature of the case, prayer tends to be future-oriented.

Now, there are situations in which it’s possible to pray about the past. While the past is unchangeable, we don’t always know the outcome. God isn’t bound by the timeframe of my prayer. Just because an event is past in relation to me doesn’t mean that event is past in relation to God. God is timeless. And God knows our prayers before we pray.

So there are situations where a prayer in the present could affect the past. If I know that my brother died in a plane crash, then it’s too late for me to pray that God spare him. But if all I know is that his plane crashed, then I can pray that God spare him.

In general, though, prayers tend to be future-oriented. And when we pray for the future, it’s only natural that, to a great extent, we take this world as our frame of reference. This is the only world we know.

Now, we do have some descriptions of the future in Scripture, and these futuristic descriptions also shape our prayers.

It’s also possible that in the afterlife, we won’t feel the same way about certain things. But, for now, we don’t have the benefit of eschatological hindsight. We can’t pray in the retrospective light of an experience to which we’re not yet privy. So we can only use this world as our frame of reference. And God knows that. God put us here.

When we pray about the future, we should make allowance for the fact that, in the future, there may be many adjustments in our perspective. But, for now, we can’t prematurely assume that viewpoint. Our outlook is necessarily conditioned by experience. Our experience here-and-now. Our experience here-below.

There is a Christian tradition which posits a radical dichotomy between the present and the future. It is apt to equate the intermediate state with the final state, and it treats heaven as ineffable.

For example, in his commentary on Revelation, Philip Hughes says, “The use of symbolism is a distinctive mark of apocalyptic literature. It is not surprising, therefore, that symbolism has an important role in Revelation, and in a serious work of this nature this is far from being just a conventional device or custom. There is need for symbolism because the reality of the scenes revealed and recorded is transcendental in character. Vistas of eternity and infinity cannot be fully described by our human language which is finite and bound by time. But human language is our only medium for setting down and passing on disclosures on the transcendental realm; and so the seer must do his best to communicate what he has seen to others by means of analogical approximations and images which suggest and point beyond themselves to realities that far exceed all that can be said” (8)

I agree with Hughes that Revelation is full of symbolism. But not for the reason he gives.

For one thing, he fails to distinguish between the intermediate state and the final state. The final state is literally down-to-earth. Physical. Concrete. Edenic. Eden was a real place, in time and space, and the new earth is, in some ways, a new Eden.

But even with respect to the intermediate state, a disembodied existence is not a timeless, transcendental existence. Rather, it’s a dreamlike state. And dreams can be quite vivid. More vivid than real life.

God enjoys a timeless mode of subsistence. God is transcendent. But angels and disembodied souls retain a temporal mode of subsistence. And while they don’t move in real space, dreams and visions simulate space. Simulate sensory input.

It’s a mistake to treat the afterlife as so airy-fairy and ineffable that it defies comprehension. For Christians, the afterlife will be better than we can imagine, but it’s not a totally alien experience.

This ethereal view of the afterlife also leads to a very otherworldly piety, where the sensible world is treated as a dangerous distraction or snare. Now, it’s certain possible to idolize the sensible world. For God’s handiwork to become a substitute for God himself. But the Bible treats the sensible world as revelatory of God. And because it’s God’s handiwork, we ought to enjoy it.

So, with certain caveats, we can use the past and present as a vantage point to pray about the future.