What language will we speak in Heaven?
Now you may think that this is a pointless question. Some hypothetical conversation that we couldn’t possibly know the answer to… But the New Creation is clearly a place where there is praising, worship and relationship with God and one another. If Jesus’ resurrection body is anything to go by then we will surely be able to speak to one another – either with common language or common understanding.
But here’s the point, and why it’s a very relevant question. What if you’re deaf?
My instinct would be to say the deafness is a disability, there’s a sense in which being deaf is to be incomplete – ie. you can’t hear! Then of course this ability will be restored in the New Creation, in our perfect bodies. Now this happened to come up recently, preaching recently at a local church of which around 10% of the members are deaf. I was given Isaiah 35 as the text, which talks about the deaf being healed… awkward!
After having the debate about when we should expect this healing that is promised to happen, another discussion came about. You see, some in the Christian deaf community, don’t believe that they are ‘physically incomplete’ or ‘disabled’, they believe that this is how God has created them to be. Which I think we would want to concur with, to a point. The issue is that some go on to say… therefore I will be deaf in heaven too… so presumably will speak BSL in heaven?
I’d always have thought it an irrelevant question, but it’s actually massively practical and pastoral if you work with deaf people. You can appreciate the point that some in the Christian deaf community are making, but I think scripture is clear that we will be made complete and healed in the New Creation. We will receive perfected, resurrection bodies, deafness is surely only one symptom of a fallen, broken body. One that nonetheless will be healed and restored.
There’s lots of interesting questions surrounding the New Creation. I think the idea of knowing one another, and communicating with one another, seems very plausible and could probably find implicit warrant for in the Bible. I’m struggling to think of specific verses to justify this view. Thoughts?
9 Comments
jamespotts
December 17, 2011does God think or communicate within himself/themselves using language? if so, which one? Maybe that’s the one we’ll use.
Bob Hill
December 17, 2011My instinct would be to suggest that those in the deaf community who say God created thenm deaf are being tempted to find too much of thier identity in thier deafness (therefore it cannot be seen by them as a bad thing – otherwise it reflects badly on thier identity). That being said it’s my suspicion, not my experience based understanding. The answer then would be to find indentity and value in Jesus. It’s also worth remembering the heaven will be so much better than we can possibly imagine, so we need not worry about the details. I think it’s a worthwhile question to ask given the signigifcance of the issue for deaf people, but ultimately I think it isn’t something to spend too long on.
Anthony Smith
December 19, 2011I notice the image above stops just before “Welsh”, which I had been told is the language we will speak in the renewed creation…
I would agree with the people you mention that our condition now is not an accident, but is part of God’s plan for us, whether that is some physical disability, emotional or psychological scars from the past, etc. And that can be a powerful antidote to thinking “There’s something wrong with me, so I’m no use to God”. But I would have thought that when Christ returns he will give complete healing to us, including deafness, blindness, etc. Otherwise how could the healing of the man born blind (John 9) be any more than a demonstration of power? The healing miracles of Christ, I would say, are not just demonstrations of Jesus’ power, but are foretastes of what will happen when the kingdom of God is present on earth in its fullness.
A tangential point – we often use “heaven” as a short way of speaking of, well, the renewed “earth”, and say “we’ll spent eternity in heaven” to mean “we’ll spend eternity on the renewed earth”. Personally I find that problematic, as (1) it’s not biblical language, and (2) it can lead us to see everything on earth as insignificant (e.g., earth is temporary, heaven is eternal). But the use of that language is very widespread in the church. Thoughts?
Hugh
December 19, 2011Interesting thoughts.
James.
Maybe.
Bob.
Perhaps… I think Anthony’s point about understanding God’s plan for them is a positive way of looking at the identity theme.
Anthony.
Agree with your analysis, seems that Christ will bring complete healing.
You’re right to pick me up on this, I generally use Heaven and New Creation interchangeably, we could equally say God’s Kingdom. I’m not sure I see a big problem in terms of Biblical language…
Heaven or the Kingdom of Heaven is “where God lives”, the New Creation seems to be where heaven and earth come together. I think you are right inasmuch as it can be misleading. I think getting into the habit of talking about “renewed earth”, “new creation” is more helpful, or just some better teaching – when did you last hear a sermon that really helped to explain Heaven and New Creation stuff…?
Anthony Smith
December 19, 2011I’d love to hear renewed creation featuring more strongly in our teaching. I certainly hear versions of the (gnostic) “believe in Jesus then when you die you’ll go to heaven forever” gospel much more often than I hear the good news about the future coming of Christ, the resurrection of the dead and the life of the age to come. (I find it comes up particularly often in children’s talks, and in spontaneous prayer.) Probably we’re trying to avoid endless disputes about the Millennium, so we speak about being with God for ever, and leave it at that. It is indeed wonderfully true that God will be as present in the renewed earth as he is currently present in heaven. But it’s a bad thing if we stop there and end up with the gnostic hope for the future, instead of the Christian hope, and find ourselves longing to escape to heaven, away from all this messy stuff we have to endure in this world – bodies, work, gardening, cooking, eating, culture, society, etc.
Enough for now – take care!
Maxime Soumagnas
January 6, 2012Nice article Hugh! Hope you are well, we had a brilliant holiday in Brighton and didn’t realize you lived there. Hope you are well!
Maxime Soumagnas
January 6, 2012By the way, I’m pretty sure we’ll speak French in heaven, so your better practice your French grammar and conjugaison! Aurevoir!
AJW Smith
February 6, 2012It is important to realise that BSL is as real a language as English or Welsh. It is used to help a person understand who God truly is and in expressing a person’s love for God. For Deaf UK people, BSL is it their “heart language” and God treasures this expression of a person’s heart. The next point is that you don’t have to be deaf to use sign language. Many hearing people find sign language to be beautiful and meaningful for their own use. Could it not be possible that in the renewed creation, healed deaf people will continue to use sign language to communicate just as Welsh people may continue to sing God’s praises in Welsh?
But if you think this through carefully and humbly, you will realise that hearing people are impoverished by their inability to communicate visually. In fact all languages are lacking since Babel. I wonder whether in heaven (aka renewed creation) there will be a universal language that combines all the beauty and advantages of both spoken & sign language. If you are snorkeling the beautiful pools of the new earth, you’ll be able to sign what you’re thinking to fellow snorkelers – the limitations of oral-only language will be overcome!
Hugh
February 6, 2012AJW… I agree. Although I’m not sure Welsh counts as a real language!
I think the bigger concern that I had was that it seemed that *some* in the Christian deaf community seemed to think that their hearing wouldn’t be restored in the New Creation.