What really do peace, love and understanding mean? And who even cares whether or not we have peace or if we understand one another, let alone love each other? The one people that should care...the Church.
What if the Christian church stepped into God's radical, insane love? Maybe the world would come to recognize the profound need for peace, love, and understanding. And in doing so, the world just might be a better place to live.
Now in Farlowesque performance, what if I push the envelop just a little further...What if I throw in the reality of hell? That is, any comprehension of love, peace and understanding should seek to incorporate the realities of heaven and hell - if a Christian answer is to be rendered.
Now you might be asking, "What does a discussion about truth, love, peace, understanding, have to do with hell or heaven for that matter?" In some ways I think everything. I think any discussion that deals with love, with peace, with understanding, must, from a Christian standpoint, delve into the realms of heaven and hell as both represent the reality of eternity. And then we must ask, where are heaven and hell? Who will see heaven and who will see hell? Might it be true that in the end, God's love wins and and all will be saved?
In talking about hell I am reminded of the play No Exit, written by Jean-Paul Sartre with its depiction of hell as three self-consumed individuals locked up in a room with no escape, and whose eyelids cannot shut. As one of these three damned souls from the play exclaims, "hell is other people."
Today in a very real sense, heaven and hell are heart issues. Heaven abounds in hearts bent on loving God and loving the other. Hell resides in hearts and lives that are turned inward, consumed in self-love as opposed to being drenched in Savior love. The predominance of our self-love mindset today makes it very difficult to see how diabolical this orientation is, and blinds us from seeing that by turning inward we close ourselves off from making our exit and entering into true freedom.
It is a self-centered heart's orientation that continues to attempt to step beyond the performance of Christ, or simply say ‘no’ to His invitation. But this does not have to be the last word or society's final act. Through the church's incorporation into Christ’s reconciliatory performance we not only encounter our salvation, but through the leading of the Spirit, can bring this hope to the ends of the earth, thereby assisting in the mass exit of hell. We can, through a performance drenched in love, bring peace and understanding by giving people heaven now. I guess then, the answer to Costello's question is "What are you doing to close the gates of hell?" And in closing these gates we elevate the truth and reality of love, peace and understanding - nothing funny about that!
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