In September’s NZ Baptist letters, Murray Harris challenges the proposal around “Who is in Heaven?” presented by Myk Habets. Whilst there is some merit to Murray’s challenge I would posit one additional point. When Prof Harris stated, “If you do believe that the eternal Son is permanently incarnated,” he is correct in his supposition.

However, I would suggest that most of Myk’s audience does not believe that the eternal Son is permanently incarnated in Jesus. I suspect that most of Myk’s audience would have an understanding that says Jesus is now a disembodied spirit, no longer a human. Most of Myk’s audience would not believe that Jesus is currently the incarnated Son of God.

The idea that Jesus has a body right now seems strange to this audience, maybe even shocking. Yet this physical, exalted, human Jesus is what we have throughout the NT and in orthodox Christian theology. In not appreciating how far from orthodoxy Myk’s audience lay, Prof Harris may have misunderstood Myk’s intention.

Given the nature of the audience I think the two-being image of “who is in Heaven?” Myk put forward consisting of a) the spirit Father, Son, Spirit and b) the embodied human Jesus, is a helpful counter-thrust to the completely unorthodox, “Jesus is now only spirit and kinda indistinguishable from God” view.

A completely human image of the ascended Jesus is at the heart of much NT teaching – Jesus as priest, firstborn, apostle and king. These are all human images. And Jesus’ current humanity is certainly the core of our hope – that one day all followers of Jesus will also be humans in a state of heavenly dwelling.

I have limited knowledge of Myk but I would expect that he is all at once a) horrified that he may have been understood to be expressing a non-trinitarian view and b) pleased that his view so clearly highlighted the “other than God, human” aspect of the ascended Jesus that it was contentious.

Myk may well respond: “There are two beings in Heaven – the first being spirit, the three persons of God: Father, Son and Spirit. The second being is the physical human Jesus – who is the incarnation of the second person of the trinity, the Son. How that hangs together, God only knows! But it is the core of our hope.”

Given the images of the ascended, exalted human embodied Jesus in the NT and Christian theological tradition, I find it impossible to disagree.

– Wayne Sheddan
Auckland