All We Could Ask of Heaven…

Some thoughtful words of Addison suggest a subject: “The grand essentials to happiness in this life are something to do, something to love, and something to hope for.”
In other words we need work (which, of course, includes purpose), loved ones, and assurances for the future.
Life and work and loved ones can be so sweet and meaningful, that many would ask little more of heaven—a heaven which we could all but have here, except perhaps for the fear of losing life, or the fear of losing those we love.
(The fear of death for ourselves is often not so fearful as the fear of losing those we love.) But with these fears taken from us, with the good and beautiful earth, with life and loved ones, with work and peace and opportunity for progress—these might well add up to about all we could ask of heaven, here or hereafter.
And even separations are not irreconcilably sorrowful if there is some assurance of reunion, some promise of return.
We recall the comment of a boy who had been separated from a beloved brother for many months: “Wouldn’t it be wonderful,” he said, “to look up and see him here just as he used to be?” No matter how long since we have seen our loved ones, we never quite completely lose the expectancy of looking up and seeing them there, in fond and familiar places. This is one of the hopes which is essential to happiness.
And to those with hearts aching for loss of loved ones—to mothers and fathers who have lost children, to those who have lost parents, family, friends, to beloved husbands and wives whom death has sent on separate journeys, this we would say with earnest assurance: The ties that attach us to life are not just nebulous. Life is personal and purposeful. Truth and personality and intelligence are perpetuated. And those we have loved are more than merely a memory.
“Something to do, something to love, something to hope for”—these the Lord God has given—and not hope only, but solid assurance. He who has given us life here is our assurance of the certainty of life hereafter. And forever is not too long with those whom we have loved in life.