Robert M. Edsel published a very interesting book in 2009 entitled “The Monuments Men.” The book tells about a group of men in World War II who traipsed through bombed-out Europe tracking down and recovering valuable paintings, statues and other cultural treasures filched by Adolph Hitler and his high-powered Nazi thieves during the war. “Monument man” Walter Hancock was with the U. S. army as it moved quickly cross Germany toward a rendezvous with Russian troops at Dresden (yes, we were allied with Russia against Hitler at that time!). Hancock wrote his wife a letter that told her his 16-hour days were spent, “half in the pain at seeing beauty needlessly destroyed by those we might have hoped would show more signs of being civilized, and half in the joy of seeing spring days returning to rural Germany.” The letter continued: “How can I describe the strange, strange combination of experiences each day here in this beautiful place brings?! ... Flowering trees everywhere and the charm of the romantic little towns and the fairy tale countryside is enhanced by all this freshness. And in the midst of it all – thousands of homeless foreigners wandering about in pathetic droves. Germans in uniforms, mostly with arms and legs – or more – missing. Children who are friendly, older ones who hate you, crimes continually in the foreground of life. Plenty, misery, recriminations, sympathy. Such an exaggerated picture of the man-made way of life in a God-made world. If it doesn’t prove the necessity of Heaven, I don’t know what it all means. I believe that all this loveliness showing through the rubble and wreck are just foreshadowings of the joys we were made for.” Hancock’s words described both hurt and hope, beauty and brutishness – all mingled together as the world sought to right itself after a terrible, horrible World War II.”
Consider this – in the world as God originally made it, Adam and Eve had access to a beautiful place the only true Paradise that ever existed on earth. There was no sin, sickness, sorrow, suffering, or death; no war, want, hunger, hatred; no prejudice, poverty, perversion, and no pandemic viruses! They lived in the presence of God who sometimes walked in the garden (Genesis 3:8). The only time when all was right with the world was before mankind, with the devil’s help, created a man-made way of life on God’s earth – a world now marred by all the sin and misery and sadness we sometimes see and hear and / or experience. The simple if sobering fact of the matter is that if there is ever to be a place of true, ultimate beauty and blessing, a place free of sin, stress, suffering and death, a place where God is ever-present and where we live forever in peace, harmony and eternal happiness – Heaven is a necessity! And according to the Bible, Heaven is a reality! Hours before His death on the cross, Jesus assured His troubled, worried disciples: “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am you may be also” (John 14:1-3). We live in a fallen, devil-dominated world where sin makes for a lot of man-made misery. But another God-made world awaits those who are faithful to God and His Son, Jesus Christ – a place of eternal beauty and bliss beyond description, a place where the soul is at home with God, forever. Read about it in Revelation 21-22 – it’s out of this world! It will be an eternal God-made world, unmarred by the miseries man’s sin has made in this one. Don’t miss it for the world (1 John2:15-17). Think about it.
Dan Gulley, Smithville, TN
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