How do we explain the hope of heaven to children?
Randy Alcorn,who has studied extensively about
heaven, has written an engaging story for
children that presents heaven in an understandable,
scriptural manner.
The story centers around a young boy who suffers
with spina-bifida and his relationship with his
grandfather who is dying of cancer. Both love
baseball. The grandfather had been a major league
baseball player in the Ted Williams era and the
grandson is unable to play baseball because of
his condition, but longs to play.
Wait Until Then deals gently with the very
real problems of suffering, death, and the
heart's longing for life's difficulties to be
resolved and set right in heaven.
Our children grow up fast, and face a world
full of pain and sorrow. As much as we would
like to shield them from suffering, we
probably would do better to equip them
spiritually from their youngest years.
In this story, grandfather and grandson
both have reason to look forward to heaven,
while enjoying their relationship on earth.
The book is a great tool to use to get a
conversation going about what God promises
us in heaven, and how we can best cope
with the sufferings of life on earth.
No suffering is easy, but God promises
that one day He will wipe all the tears
from our eyes in a new heaven and new
earth (Revelation 21:1-4).
The last page of the book also gives
some scriptural information for parents
about heaven to further aid discussion.
The life-like illustrations by Doron
Ben-Ami are wonderful and enhance
the book greatly.
The book is published by Tyndale, 2007,
and is aimed at grade-school children.
heaven
explaining death to children
explaining suffering to children
Randy Alcorn
Doron Ben-Ami
children & faith
hope
book reviews
2 comments:
An interesting article. I would perhaps like to one day supplement my theodicy research with a dissertation on what the Biblical culminated Kingdom of God would possibly look like.
Russ:)
Yes, that would be interesting. I think about things like that. I noticed that Stephen Hawkings is taking a zero gravity flight and it reminded me of the little boy in this story who could not experience the joys of playing baseball til he got to heaven. Imagine what Stephen Hawkings will feel when he is in zero gravity. I just hope he makes it to heaven in the long run, too!
Post a Comment