AL: Joni, the last time that we met you said some soul-stirring things about heaven and how real it will be… much more real than anything we experience here on earth.
JONI: You know it, Al. And best of all, we will be with Jesus… an eternity with God can’t be any more real than that.
AL: … What do you think has contributed most to your excitement about heaven? You’ve written a book on it and all the rest, because many of us just don’t, well… we don’t seem to be as enthusiastic about leaving this life for the next. Joni, what is it that has stirred your heart so?
JONI: Well, Al, sitting in a wheelchair for almost four decades, I tell you what, it’s helped, hasn’t it? Loading me down with a lifetime of memories of what it was like to be on my feet; I look back and I think about, well, feeling my fingers on the cool keys of a piano or diving through the breakers at high tide. I’ll recall what it felt like to peel an orange or hold the hand of someone I love. And these memories flood every nerve and fiber of my being… thus, these same memories ignite my imagination, because whatever it is I have lost here on earth, whether the ability to hold things or feel things, or walk or run… whatever it is I have lost, I’m convinced I’m promised it will all be regained in heaven. And not just regained… but the best things about memories of walking and running, well… those are only inklings and whispers of how much more I will have in heaven.
AL: I like that. I like looking at heaven that way you’ve suggested, Joni. Even our relationship to our Savior… even that will be much “more” in heaven.
JONI: It better be! Because the whisper of every good thing on earth will find completeness and fulfillment in heaven. Oh man, and I’m gonna just do so much more than peel an orange or touch a flower or run across a meadow… those are good things, good memories… but they are only promises of more wonderful things yet to be fulfilled. I love my Savior down here on earth, but in heaven? Wow. I will love him as purely and as perfectly and as completely as he loves me. I can’t even begin to imagine how wonderful that will be, but the Bible promises me that one day in heaven, the earthly Joni will step into the glorious Joni God intended me to be all along. And I can’t wait!
AL: So, let me ask you: What’s the best thing about heaven for you?
JONI: That’s a good question. It’s not even running, it’s not walking, it’s not touching or holding things. But Al, the best thing about heaven is a pure heart no longer weighed down by sin and pride and selfishness. And I can say that from this wheelchair. Oh, it would be great to have a glorified body. I mean, I can’t wait. But a glorified heart that praises Jesus? That’s the best!
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JONI AND FRIENDS
P.O. Box 3333
Agoura Hills, CA 93176
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