Upper Path Valley Presbyterian Church

Selected Verses October 7, 2007

“Heaven – Part 4”
Rev. Meagan M. Boozer

World Communion Sunday

Over these last weeks, we have looked together at some Scriptures that help us know a little bit about the eternal home for believers in Christ – that place called Heaven.
We have learned that once we take our final breath on earth, we leave behind our earthly body. We learned last Sunday through the teaching of the apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 15, that our new bodies will be indestructible! Our new bodies will be recognizable. We will be able to eat in our glorified bodies, and we will find our bodies to be supernaturally powerful in Heaven because they will be spiritual bodies, not physical bodies. What that means exactly, we can only know by reading the Scriptures and studying what we can learn there about Jesus’ resurrected body. For as we heard last week from Philippians 3:20, “we will be conformed to the body of His glory,” and from 1 Corinthians 15:49, “Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust [Adam], we will also bear the image of the man of Heaven [Jesus].”
In Bible Study this past Tuesday, we were learning together about angels. We looked up a lot of different Scriptures that describe the different jobs that angels have in God’s creation. Messenger angels, ministering angels, guardian angels, and warring angels. The question was raised: “So we don’t become the angels after we die?” The answer is “no.” Angels are the highest of God’s created beings. They are immortal spirits, designed to serve and minister to God by fulfilling purposes and assignments that impact the lives of men and women on earth. Once we leave our physical bodies behind, our category changes from being God’s children on earth, to being God’s children in Heaven; from being the saints on earth to being the saints in Heaven. Our loved ones in Heaven are not angels now. Our loved ones are our loved ones in new spiritual bodies that are imperishable and completely free from earthly distress.
In the Scriptures, we learn that there is a present Heaven waiting for us. Jesus said, “I go to prepare a place for you.” He said to the thief beside him on the cross, “Today, you will be with me in Paradise.” But according to many biblical scholars, we can also interpret the Scriptures to teach us that there is a future, eternal Heaven waiting to be revealed. Many Bible teachers insist that after Christ’s return to earth, a new Heaven and a new Earth will emerge. Out of the new Heaven to the new Earth will descend the glorious, holy city of the new Jerusalem where it will be the capitol city for all who dwell there.
Randy Alcorn, in his book entitled, “Heaven,” describes it this way: “Suppose you live in a homeless shelter in Miami. One day you inherit a beautiful house, fully furnished, on a gorgeous hillside, overlooking Santa Barbara, California. With the home comes a wonderful job doing something you’ve always wanted to do. And not only that, but you’ll also be near close family members who moved from Miami many years ago. On your flight to Santa Barbara, you’ll change planes in Dallas, where you’ll spend an afternoon. Some other family members, whom you haven’t seen in years, will meet you at the Dallas airport and board the plane with you to Santa Barbara. You look forward to seeing them. Now, when the Miami ticket agent asks you, “Where are you headed?” would you say “Dallas”? No. You would say Santa Barbara, because that’s your final destination. If you mentioned Dallas at all, you would only say, “I’m going to Santa Barbara by way of Dallas.”
When you talk to your friends in Miami about where you’re going to live, would you focus on Dallas? No. You might not even mention Dallas, even though you would be a Dallas-dweller for several hours. Even if you spent a week in Dallas, it wouldn’t be your focus. Dallas is just a stop along the way. Your true destination, your new permanent home, is Santa Barbara.
Similarly, the Heaven we will go to when we die, the present Heaven, is a temporary dwelling place, a stop along the way to our final destination: the New Earth.”
Let’s listen to one of the key Scriptures from Revelation 21 with these thoughts in mind:
Then I saw a new Heaven and a new earth; for the first Heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of Heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them, he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.” And the one who was seated on the throne said, “See, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this, for these words are trustworthy and true.” Then he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give water as a gift from the spring of the water of life.”
In this new Jerusalem, which will be part of our heavenly dwelling on earth, everything will be holy. The “Wycliffe Bible Commentary” describes the holy city, “A holy city will be one in which no lie will be uttered in one hundred million years, no evil word will ever be spoken. No shady business deals will ever be discussed, no unclean picture will ever be seen, no corruption of life will ever be manifest. It will be holy because everyone in it will be holy.” Only those cleansed of their sins by the blood of the Lamb, Jesus Christ, will be able to enter the holy city.
The foundation of the city walls is built from 12 precious stones to represent the 12 tribes of Israel. Look at verses 19 and 20 to read of the different jewels found in the foundation of the walls. “The foundations of the wall of the city are adorned with every jewel; the first was jasper, the second sapphire, the third agate, the fourth emerald, the fifth onyx, the sixth carnelian, the seventh chrysolite, the eighth beryl, the ninth topaz, the tenth chrysoprase, the eleventh jacinth, the twelfth amethyst.”
The gates to the holy city of the new Jerusalem are made of pearl. The pearly gates are real, folks! Look at verse 21, “And the twelve gates are twelve pearls, each of the gates is a single pearl.” Remember that pearls are formed in oysters as a result of a foreign body inside the shell. Isn’t it interesting to think that we will be reminded as we go in and out of the gates of pearl, that we are there only because Jesus allowed the whole body of our sin, a foreign body to him, inside his holy being?
Look just a little further in v. 21, and you will read of the streets made of pure gold, transparent as glass. Transparent gold? If it is written here, along with all the other words that have brought life to my soul, I believe it. Streets of gold. Now, someone said to me something like this, “I have a little problem with the whole streets of gold thing, because we’re supposed to be humble, not flashy in our faith.” On this old earth, that’s true, because we need the constant discipline of restraining ourselves from bringing glory to ourselves rather than giving glory to God. But in the new earth, we won’t have that problem! There will be no conflict between our flesh and our spirit. The streets of gold will bring glory to the One who sits on the throne.
He will be our light. We will not need light bulbs, candles, or flashlights. Verse 23 tells us, “And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God is its light, and its lamp is the Lamb. The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it.” Now, you might say, “What nations? What kings?” Well, if we’re on the New Earth, then there will still be nations, and there will still be kings. The difference will be that all the nations, and all the kings will be holy as He is holy.
Listen to these words from Simon Peter, a servant and apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ from 2 Peter 3:5ff. He is responding to the concern of believers that the Lord was taking too long to return. “But you must not forget, dear friends, that a day is like a thousand years to the Lord, and a thousand years is like a day. The Lord isn’t really being slow about his promise to return, as some people think. No, he is being patient for your sake. He does not want anyone to perish, so he is giving more time for everyone to repent. But the day of the Lord will come as unexpectedly as a thief. Then the heavens will pass away with a terrible noise, and everything in them will disappear in fire, and the earth and everything on it will be exposed to judgment. Since everything around us is going to melt away, what holy, godly lives you should be living! You should look forward to that day and hurry it along—the day when God will set the heavens on fire and the elements will melt away in the flames. But we are looking forward to the new heavens and new earth he has promised, a world where everyone is right with God.
I know this might be different thinking for some of us today. But when you read the Scriptures with an open mind to this, I think you’ll see how it all fits together in a way that only God could design.
The New Heaven and the New Earth will be the dwelling place of the saints from all the ages. It will be the dwelling place of God. Instead of us “going up” to be with Him, we read that with a renewed Earth, God himself, will come to be with us.
Jesus paved the way. He was Immanuel, “God with us.” When he was with people, they were amazed, they were transformed, they were convicted, and they worshipped him. After his resurrection, when he was with people, their hearts burned within them.
Jesus paved the way for a New Heaven and a New Earth. He prepared the place for us to go where he will wipe every tear from our eyes – a place where there will be no more death, or mourning, or crying, or pain.
Jesus prayed for us on the night he was arrested. He prayed, “Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world. Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them, and that I myself may be in them.”
In the Sacrament of Holy Communion, we share this meal of remembrance. In this meal, we know that Jesus Christ is powerfully present with us, for we are, by faith, taking him in. We do not believe that this bread and this juice actually become his body and blood, but we do believe that though Ruth Frazier made the bread with earthly ingredients, the love of Jesus is what holds it, and us, together. We come to this table as one, “in remembrance of him.”
Today, let us be mindful of those all over the world for whom Jesus died. Let us be especially alert to the promises given to us of new life beyond the grave. Let us envision believers from every land gathered together in the New Jerusalem! Let us come at Jesus’ invitation to ease our weariness as we think about those streets of gold. Let us come at Jesus’ invitation to satisfy our hunger as we receive him as the true Bread from Heaven. Let us come at Jesus’ invitation to renew our lives as we hold more tightly to him as the True Vine.
Holy God, may it all be for your glory in this life, and in the life to come. Amen.