As we press on in the Christian life, as we advance from spiritual infancy to spiritual maturity, we find joyfulness increasing even when our comforts are decreasing. We find ourselves cheerful in trials, content in persecution, submissive even when we meet with sore disappointment. Things that may have seriously disturbed us in former days are powerless to derail or severely distress us in our later days. 

Infants are easily discontented. They cry when hungry, they cry when tired, they cry when uncomfortable, they cry when afraid. It often seems they cry for no reason at all! Toddlers are perhaps a little better, but they are still quick to fuss and complain, still quick to express every little sorrow and every minor dissatisfaction. It is only age and maturity that eventually allows children to endure discomfort without whining, tantrums, and hysterics.
If all of this wasn’t bad enough, children also fuss and protest when their parents correct their behavior—even behavior that might harm or kill them. Many a child has screamed and protested when their parents have scooped them into their arms just before they toddled into traffic or plunged into a pool. The Bible simply states what’s patently obvious when it insists “folly is bound up in the heart of a child.”
It’s not for nothing that the Bible describes Christians as children. We enter the Christian life as spiritual infants who act the part. We are immature and unformed. Like children, we are quick to grumble when we encounter difficult circumstances, quick to murmur when providence fails to grant what we desire. We may not quite demand that we be carried to heaven on Isaac Watt’s “flowery beds of ease,” but we may still gripe and moan when called to face a foe, to bear a cross, or to endure a thorn.
But time brings maturity. This maturity comes about in a few different ways.
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The liberalizing of Christianity is not a recipe for growth. And the selling off one of those liberal denomination’s headquarters is just the latest chapter in that lesson.

We often hear sad stories about how the Christian Church is shrinking in America. But what many news outlets fail to mention is the types of churches that are declining. It is not the faithful bible-teaching, gospel-proclaiming congregations that are hemorrhaging members. It is the more liberal denominations that have long jettisoned historic orthodoxy—denying the deity of Christ, the reality of sin, doubting the truth of Jesus’ literal death and resurrection in addition to embracing abortion, same-sex marriage and gender politics—that are shriveling up.
The latest such denomination is the extremely liberal United Church of Christ (UCC) which is in the process of selling the building that houses its headquarters in Cleveland, Ohio for seven million dollars. The heavily down-sized denominational staff will move from the massive nine story building which once housed 330 employees to a single-floor office space less than a mile away.
The United Church of Christ has been experiencing an uninterrupted purging of members for decades now as a direct result of their increasingly liberal theology and practice. Their membership, which one totaled more than 2.1 million people, is currently just over 800,00 and expected to be a mere 200,000 in 2045. The Institute on Religion & Democracy explains, “While the denomination traces its origins to the puritans of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, its spiritual antecedents would likely not recognize it today.”
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“Related to the finitude of our knowledge is our continued growth in it. What we know and experience in the eternal state will not be static but ever increasing. As created and therefore finite beings, we are mutable. This means that we are subject to change. Change, however, is not necessarily a bad thing if the direction in which we are changing is for the better. As we grow, we develop, enlarge, and actualize our capacities for enjoying God and his creation—from “glory to glory” (2 Cor. 3:18, KJV)”

Some Christians think our future life will be rather static – and perhaps even boring. They think we will be ‘perfect’ – whatever that means – so we will not be making any advances or developing in any way. But Scripture does not speak that way about the next life.
Yes, in some things there will be no change – for example we will not be sinning there. So that is something we can count on as not changing but remaining the same. But as I said in a previous piece, getting into heaven – or more precisely, the new earth – will not make us godlike: we will not all of a sudden become omniscient and the like.
So there will be a real place to grow, to develop, to expand in so many ways, including intellectually. We will be learning new things. We will develop in our minds. I spoke to this somewhat in the earlier piece I just mentioned: billmuehlenberg.com/2022/07/20/will-there-be-art-galleries-in-heaven-christianity-culture-and-eschatology/
In that piece I spoke about cultural pursuits and even artistic endeavours taking place in the next world. Here I want to develop all this further, especially looking at things like the mind, learning, and perhaps even reading and writing. Yes I know, my love of books is showing here, but I think a case can be made for what follows.
As I said in that previous piece, there is admittedly a fair amount of speculation here. We do not have a heap of detail as to what life in the next world will be like, but we can consider it, based on what we do know about life in this world, and God’s original intentions when he first created man. Part of this I already discussed in my piece on the cultural mandate: billmuehlenberg.com/2022/07/19/on-the-cultural-mandate/
Let me feature a few writers on this topic, firstly by looking at the slightly broader issue of thinking of heaven as a boring, static place where nothing new ever transpires. In his book 10 Mistakes People Make About Heaven, Hell and the Afterlife Mike Fabarez discusses this matter:
If your unspoken aversion to thinking about the afterlife is prompted by this concern, allow me to relieve your fears. Even in this life, the exaltation of God is not confined to the singing of worship songs. The Bible says that you can and should seek to glorify God even when you are having dinner (1 Corinthians 10:31). In your daily tasks and at your place of employment, the Bible says you are to be engaged in consciously and joyfully serving Christ no matter what your job title might be….
If every task in heaven wherein you could engage your creativity, apply your wisdom, and purpose your mind to work had no pain, frustration, or disappointment associated with it, I’m assuming you would rethink your ambition of lounging in a hammock for eternity.
As to the issue of learning and the like in the next life, let me start with some thoughts from Alan Gomes and his very useful book, 40 Questions About Heaven and Hell. As to my point about us not being omniscient in heaven, he quotes W. G. T. Shedd:
“We are not to understand that the creature’s knowledge, in the future state, will be as extensive as that of the Omniscient One; or that it will be as profound and exhaustive as His. The infinitude of things can be known only by the Infinite Mind.” Gomes then says this:
Related to the finitude of our knowledge is our continued growth in it. What we know and experience in the eternal state will not be static but ever increasing. 
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