Book review: Picturing Heaven

The other night I went for a walk with my 6-year-old around the track at our local high school. The sun set far quicker than I anticipated, and we found ourselves strolling in the dark. Of course, it wasn’t completely dark because as we rounded the bend we looked up and saw the sky was lit up with stars. I smiled, savoring this sacred moment with my youngest girl.

We wandered into a conversation about stars, and then, as is common in our family, we started talking about Heaven. We chatted about whether we thought Daddy in Heaven could see the other side of those stars.

“I love my daddy so much,” came the sweet voice of my girl.

“I know you do, sweetie,” I said.

I have learned to let her share freely when she starts talking about her daddy. These conversations are a part of our rhythm. We wondered aloud if he could see us walking around the track. We imagined him talking with his grandma. My girl perked up because she knows she is named after her great-grandma. She remembered our chef friend, who died recently, and talked about him making cream puffs for Daddy in Heaven.

As I reflected later, I remembered that our initial conversations about Heaven happened with the help of author Randy Alcorn. After my husband died, I immediately tracked down a copy of Randy Alcorn’s Heaven book. My daughters were asking lots of questions, and I heard the book was a primer on all things Heaven from a Christian perspective. It’s a dense book packed with 25 years of research and answers to questions anyone might have about heaven.

I still use it as a bookend on my shelf, joining my other books about grief. I also bought Heaven for Kids.  After their dad died three years ago, I read chapters of the book aloud after dinner. Even though some of it was over my girls’ heads, those two books invited us into conversation and using our imaginations about what Heaven would be like.

Recently, I was scrolling through Instagram and happened upon the cover image of a new coloring book devotional using some of the content from Alcorn’s book. I ordered Picturing Heaven right away, thinking it would be a great gift for my. What I discovered is that God intended to use the coloring book to minister mostly to me.

This book features beautiful spreads illustrated by Lizzie Preston with special gold overlays and short devotionals by Randy Alcorn. The beautiful images to color attracted my attention initially, but it was the deep reflections paired with scriptures that invited me into the Heaven conversation anew.

What I like most about this book is that it breaks down some of the main themes from Alcorn’s Heaven book into easy-to-understand nuggets. For example, I was reminded in the first devotional that the “present Heaven” is the place believers in Jesus go when their physical bodies die, but it’s not our final destination. The Bible reminds us that we are destined for another place – a resurrected Earth.

Alcorn writes, “God’s children are destined for life as resurrected beings on a resurrected Earth. We must not lose sight of our true destination!”

I have been reading this devotional with my family – my new husband and my three daughters, who are now ages 6, 8 and 11. We all have resonated with it on our own terms. We also love getting out our colored pencils and coloring the pages while we chat about the content.

I would highly recommend Picturing Heaven for any individual or family, especially those navigating grief. It would make a great gift to share with friends along with a nice set of colored pencils!

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