“Tin Roof”

It might have been 20 feet long and 10 feet wide but there’s really no way to know.  The eyes of a child see things larger than they usually are simply because everything is larger than they are.

It wasn’t my favorite place to go growing up because I was the youngest, the only girl cousin, and usually left to play alone with my dog, Mitzi. The little lake cabin that my parents built with their own hands had a small bedroom, a bathroom, a tiny strip of a kitchen, a living room large enough for the 5 of us to sit around a table and play dominoes and the influential screened in back porch that ran the length of the  cabin. I remember pouting all too often as we drove there for long weekends or vacations and how my parents would tell me I could make the best of it or just be miserable. I usual made the most of it and breathed it in for years. The  tangible experience of that place has never left me.  I can still see Mamaw and Papaw’s larger cabin over the hill and down the road.  Smell the pine trees. Feel the mud between my fingers and toes. But, more than anything, I can hear the sounds from that screened in porch.

Depending on the season, the sounds and related feelings changed. In the summer, we would crawl into our bunkbeds with sun-kissed skin and wet hair, feel the stillness of the air and hear the crickets singing as we fell asleep. The autumn brought the sound of leaves rustling as they fell, a cool breeze blowing across our faces and a harvest moon brightening up the entire yard like God had turned on a light .  Winter was cozy as mom would pile stacks of handmade quilts on top of us and we would listen for owls in the distance. But, the most influential season to me was spring.  Waking up with the dawn to the sound of a bird chorus was magical.  The whistle of a cardinal punctuated by the steady cry of a  blue jay and the underlying trill of a warbler worked it’s magic on my soul as the ever present and characteristic call of a crow made me feel connected to a time and place in a way that I wouldn’t recognize until it was gone.  I often hear a crow as I sit on my front porch in the morning and it immediately takes me back to those times with my family.  Moments of simplicity.

Now I can see the depth and beauty of the times we spent there.  We were together and there were no distractions. Nature was our teacher and the lessons we learned seemed to be endless. We  had plenty of space when we were there and God always uses those moments of silence to speak in subtle and beautiful ways. The most beautiful was when I would fall asleep on that porch, under colorful quilts as a spring rain fell on the roof and splashed to the ground.

I wish I could describe the sound and feeling of that concert but the best I can do is to say it sounded like love and it felt like safety.  At times, it was melancholy to my emotional little soul.  The darkness of night and the sound of the rain sometimes made me feel like nature was crying, but more often than not, I felt peace.  Maybe even hope for what the next day would bring because everything was getting a shower and the next day would be fresh and new.  The rhythm of those raindrops on the roof sang me to sleep with a consistency that made me feel surrounded and protected by something larger than myself.

Those memories came flooding back a few days ago as I heard a song called, “Tin Roof.” I wasn’t sure why it resonated so deeply in my heart because, honestly, the words seemed a little poetic without much real meaning at first.  But then I remembered those evenings of hearing the rain on the roof of our little cabin.  That cabin that my parents built. It wasn’t fancy but it was purposeful and life changing.  That’s where I learned about setting aside time for peace, beauty and family. That’s where Daddy told us stories as we fell asleep. That’s where  I was a princess with her own rock “throne” overlooking  the lake. Nothing could break the spell of love that ruled in that little cabin and nothing could break the spell of peace in that 10 X 20  foot sanctuary as the rain would fall.   

I think  heaven is more like that than we realize. More than mansions, streets of gold, and constant worship. I’m not saying those aren’t true but I am saying it’s probably much more.  Scripture says God will make all things new.  A new heaven and a new earth where God’s people will rule and reign with him. It sounds like the completion of what he had planned from the very beginning… coming to dwell in his creation with His children.  A perfect creation similar to what we know here and now but far surpassing it.  Seasons, beauty, diversity, and adventure minus the sin and pain that scars the world as we know it.  A perfect creation full of worship that is far more than singing but that flows through everything done  for God’s glory.   Jesus’ mission was to complete God’s work and to redeem and restore all that had been lost.  He wasn’t making something completely different.  He was, and is, perfecting all that God had already done. Every beautiful, loving, good and pure thing in this life is a signpost pointing us to the truth of what will be. To the reality of the Kingdom of heaven. It’s all meant to give us a hunger for more because we are created for more. We are destined for more.

In “The Last Battle”, CS Lewis says this. “But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at least they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story, which no one on earth has read: which goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.”

So, what if heaven really is more than we’ve ever imagined? If every chapter is better than the one before?   What if it’s peace, wholeness, joy and truth but also excitement, beauty, purpose, purity and completeness?  I think it will be all of that and then some.  But, at a certain level, I think it will be as simple and comforting as my memory of falling asleep while listening to Daddy sing hymns with rain falling on the roof.  It will be perfect, calm and complete. It will be full of love.

It will be home.

That’s the ticket, as my daddy would say.  Heaven is home.  The mansions, streets of gold and heavenly angels may be impressive, but the beauty of heaven is found in the person of Jesus and  in knowing that we are finally under the same roof as the one who has made us whole.  That will be more than I can imagine and plenty more than enough.