Book review-"Seeing Through Heavens Eyes"

“SEEING THROUGH HEAVEN’S EYES” by Leif Hetland

This book is about trying to see through the eyes of heaven. His premise is that we tend to see things from the human perspective and fail to see from God’s viewpoint. Though the author says some good things I am afraid, at least in one spot, he has failed to see ‘through heavens eyes.’
The author, making reference to the fall of Adam and Eve in the garden, makes some good points in helping us recognize the tactics satan (the serpent) used to deceive Adam and Eve.
1. The first tactic is that he disguises who he is. In this case he transformed himself into a familiar serpent, a creation of God
2. The second tactic is to divide and conquer. He apparently approached Eve while Adam was not around.
3. Third tactic he uses is to cast a shadow of doubt on the word of God.
4. The devils final tactic is to call God’s character and His motives into question.

It seems to me that the author has fallen to the wiles of the devil. The author says that after the fall Adam and Eve were still Gods children and that their sin disgraced them but didn’t disinherit them. “And our sin -no matter how serious or how shameful-wont disinherit us…It is our position in the family-not our performance in the family- that establishes our identity and entitles us to our inheritance. We can never be downgraded, disowned, or disinherited.”

At this point the author seems to ignore what he has just said and allows his theology to take precedence over the scripture. Let me briefly explain:
1. Adam and Eve were cast out of the garden because of disobedience- that was their inheritance and they lost it.
2. Their performance did matter. They lost their inheritance because they listened and followed the serpent (satan) instead of God.
3. The devil would like us to overemphasis God‘s love at the expense of His holiness and wrath. He along with many modern day preachers and writers (including our author) would like to think that Gods love overlooks and ignores our rebellion and disobedience.
4. There is a sense that when Adam and Eve sinned we didn’t just forget our identity but we lost it. In Genesis 1:26-27 it says “ And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness…So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
Then in Gen. 5:3 it says “And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth.”
Evidently the image of God in man had become marred through the fall, that Adam’s childrens’ image is that of fallen man instead of the image that was first produced in the garden. Thus their identity had changed.

I am sure that this is the authors rational attempt to prove that even once we are ‘saved’ we will continue to be ‘saved’ irrespective of our behavior. But the rational does not meet with the simple truths of the bible and because of that I cannot recommend this book.