Is Heaven a Actual Place Proper Now?

Audio Transcript

At this time’s episode is a bit longer than regular as a result of it’s a particular episode — a celebration. However earlier than we get to that, we start with immediately’s query from an nameless listener who’s placing collectively just a few texts that we’ll be studying collectively within the subsequent week forward in our Bible studying. Right here’s the query:

“Whats up, Pastor John! In Acts 7:44–50, we learn that ‘the Most Excessive doesn’t dwell in homes made by fingers, because the prophet says, “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. What sort of home will you construct for me, says the Lord, or what’s the place of my relaxation?”’ So, it seems that God has a dwelling, one which he made. He’s not confined to human-built tents and temples. And Jesus calls heaven ‘the throne of God’ in Matthew 5:34. And Stephen, throughout his stoning, ‘gazed into heaven and noticed the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the proper hand of God.’ That account is in Acts 7:54–60.

“So, it looks like God has a dwelling place, a spot the place the resurrected Christ now dwells. If the incarnate Christ is there, I assume it’s a bodily place. Do you agree? Is heaven an actual place proper now? The place is it — inside or exterior of our identified creation? Is that this our everlasting dwelling? Is that this what descends on earth as the brand new Jerusalem? What have you learnt about heaven because it exists proper now?”

That’s an enormous one. Oh my goodness. What do I do know?

My counsel for all of us as we ponder what it signifies that God is in heaven, that the risen Christ along with his resurrection physique is in heaven, that we’ll die and go to heaven, that heaven will probably be a part of the brand new heavens and the brand new earth on the finish of the age — my counsel, as we ponder all of those, is to allow us to put the first emphasis on the relational dimension of heaven, not the spatial dimension of heaven. And I’ll attempt to defend that in only a minute. I don’t imply that we put no emphasis on the spatial, materials, creational dimension of heaven, however that or not it’s secondary.

Or to say it one other approach, I feel the Bible encourages us to give attention to our being with Christ — with God — as the principle blessing of heaven. And the truth that we are going to finally have resurrection our bodies in a brand new creation is a wonderful however a secondary actuality. Now, that could be a controversial assertion. I don’t know. I feel it’s proper. With Christ is main; a wonderful new resurrection physique, in a brand new creation, is secondary. If we don’t have this precedence, it will likely be as if we have been admitted to the king’s dwelling, and we have been extra amazed at his home than at his personal knowledge and energy and ethical magnificence, his personal private presence, which I feel could be offensive to the king.

God Is Spirit

Listed below are a few the explanation why I say that. First, God himself is spirit and isn’t materials. John 4:24: “God is spirit, and people who worship him should worship in spirit and reality.” And Jesus mentioned, “A spirit doesn’t have flesh and bones as you see that I’ve” (Luke 24:39). Subsequently, God has no spatial dimensions. Subsequently, when the Bible speaks of God being in a spot, it’s referring to his particular affect in that place or his particular, private, relational presence in that place. It’s not spatial.

I feel you’ll be able to sum up the truth of the presence of God — what does the presence of God imply? — in 3 ways. One, he’s in each place as a result of he has no limits. And he’s in no place, no spatial location, within the sense {that a} spirit occupies no dimensional area. And third, he’s in particular locations and individuals within the sense of exerting affect or displaying a private relationship.

So, to talk of heaven because the dwelling of God just isn’t a spatial assertion. It’s a approach of claiming that God is above, exterior his creation. So, Solomon prays in 1 Kings 8:27, “Behold, heaven and the very best heaven can’t comprise you; how a lot much less this home that I’ve constructed!” In different phrases, go up via the heavens, and while you get to the very best heaven, God’s not there. That’s not his home. That’s not the place he lives. He’s past. He’s exterior his creation. God won’t be there in a restricted approach.

He’s above and outdoors what he made. And there are not any spatial classes exterior the fabric creation. God is spirit and, due to this fact, doesn’t spatially inhabit area and time. He’s earlier than area. He’s earlier than time. Titus 1:2 says, “Earlier than the ages started” — that’s the place God was. And, due to this fact, he’s exterior area and time. He’s not housed within the highest heaven. That’s my first commentary for why I say we needs to be sluggish to talk of heaven as a spatial place for God to be.

Christ’s Physique Is Like and In contrast to Ours

Right here’s a second cause that I feel we must always emphasize the relational actuality of heaven above the spatial actuality. Despite the fact that Jesus immediately has a resurrection physique, and he may eat fish in that physique (Luke 24:42), at the least three biblical info hold us from being simplistic or naive about talking of his location in primarily spatial phrases immediately.

First, Christ immediately is seated on the proper hand of God. Colossians 3:1: “If then you’ve been raised with Christ, search the issues which are above, the place Christ is, seated on the proper hand of God.” However God has no physique. He has no bodily fingers, neither a proper nor a left. He’s not materials, not spatial. So, for Christ to be at his proper hand is to be in a relationship to him that’s kingly, authoritative, however not spatial in any abnormal approach that we will match into our classes. That’s first.

“The Bible encourages us to give attention to our being with Christ — with God — as the principle blessing of heaven.”

Second commentary: the resurrection physique that Jesus has is like and but not like our our bodies. His buddies may acknowledge Jesus after he rose from the lifeless. They may contact him. He may eat, however he additionally appeared and disappeared in unusual methods, not like our our bodies. Now, that unusual reality, along with the truth that he’s on the proper hand of God, ought to alert us to the truth that the spatial realm he inhabits, which is suited to his peculiar form of bodily physique, just isn’t like ours. That spatial realm is not any abnormal area as we all know it. That’s the second commentary.

Right here’s a 3rd biblical reality to maintain us from being too simplistic about talking of Christ’s location in primarily spatial phrases. For us to be there, to be in heaven now or after we die or within the coming age — that actuality of being in heaven, the New Testomony describes primarily in relational phrases, not spatial phrases.

• Colossians 3:3: “You will have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.” That’s now.
• Philippians 1:23: “My need is to depart and be with Christ.” That’s dying. That’s much better, he says.
• 2 Corinthians 5:8: “We’d relatively be away from the physique and at dwelling with the Lord.”
• John 17:24: “Father, I need that in addition they, whom you’ve given me, could also be with me the place I’m, to see my glory.”
• Lastly, 1 Thessalonians 4:17, concerning the second coming: “Then we who’re alive, who’re left, will probably be caught up along with them within the clouds to satisfy the Lord within the air, and so we are going to all the time be with the Lord.”

“With Christ,” “with Christ,” “with the Lord,” “with me,” “with the Lord” — that’s the emphasis of the New Testomony. It’s not unsuitable to think about heaven immediately as a spot the place Christ sits in supreme authority over creation, so long as we notice that the spatial actuality of this place defies limitation to the abnormal classes of this current creation. It simply received’t match the world that we now know. Heaven can have acquainted elements however vastly new, mind-blowing elements. And we’d do properly to not give attention to what we don’t know, however to rivet our consideration, our principal consideration, on the One we do know and be so accustomed to him, get to know him so deeply, go down into such depths of affection for him that to be with him after we die — and without end — will make all spatial realities valuable however secondary.

Getting old with Gratitude

That could be a lovely meditation on heaven’s relational give attention to Christ, Pastor John. However earlier than we depart this episode and depart this week, I’ve to say that on Saturday you flip 79 years outdated. Comfortable birthday from all of us. We love and recognize you vastly.

Wow, thanks.

And we thank God for a way you’ve impacted so many lives around the globe.

My pleasure. I’ve been excited about it rather a lot lately. I learn a guide lately by Richard Bauckham referred to as The Blurred Cross. He’s precisely my age. He’s a New Testomony British scholar. And perhaps my largest takeaway was that getting outdated is a wonderful alternative for rising gratitude. That’s the theme of the guide, actually. And I mentioned, “Amen. Amen.” The longer I reside, the extra grateful I really feel towards God and so many different folks.

However the second-biggest impression was his wrestling with why it’s that these of us who’re outdated don’t really feel outdated. He mentioned it’s nearly a common expertise that while you discuss to seventy-somethings and eighty-somethings about how outdated they’re, they are saying, “Yeah, yeah, I’m. I really feel it, however I don’t really feel it the way in which you assume I really feel it.” And I mentioned, “Yeah, yeah.” And he mentioned he found a proof that’s the very best factor he had seen. And I might say now, up to now, it’s the very best factor I’ve seen to present an account for why that’s. He mentioned, “I don’t assume we must always consider our lives as a circle, rising out of nothing and returning to nothing. And I don’t assume we must always consider our growing older lives as a straight line the place you’re constantly simply leaving the previous behind and shifting on to one thing new.”

Right here’s what he mentioned, and it is a quote now. And it is a quote, by the way in which, from Michael Mayne (so I’m getting it third-hand, not simply second-hand).

I can . . . see my life as a slowly ascending spiral [so not a straight line, not a circle, but a spiral]. For a spiral suggests a life the place every new circle — every new 12 months or decade — nonetheless incorporates inside it the make-up of the outdated, the sensation of familiarity, the octogenarian nonetheless conscious of what it felt prefer to be a toddler, the lover, the dad or mum she or he as soon as was, and nonetheless displaying the identical recognizable traits, however wiser now, formed by life’s knocks, in a position to say, “I’ve been right here earlier than and realized a factor or two.” Trying again, we will start to grasp our personal distinctive story and see that we now have been shifting in a spiral round a middle. (10–11)

Now, after I learn that, I assumed, “That helps.” That actually helps. As a result of as I stand right here earlier than this microphone, my 14-year-old expertise of shin splints — it’s identical to yesterday. I really feel these shin splints immediately and what they stored me from doing for just a few weeks. My school pleasure after I headed off to varsity — that’s all proper right here in my coronary heart proper now. My 22-year-old evening earlier than I married Noël, I keep in mind that evening within the motel simply yesterday and the way completely thrilling it was. And my first job at 28, all the joy of strolling into that classroom. And leaving instructing at 34. And I may simply go on and on.

These moments in my life haven’t been left behind. All these emotions are there. So, I feel that’s partly why I don’t really feel outdated. I’ve bought all that stuff, all that superb actuality of expertise with God, with folks nonetheless within me — forming me, spiral-like, who I’m. And I really like that reference to the middle. My life has been spiraling round (since I used to be six years outdated) the middle of God’s grace in Christ. And each new day, the reservoir of previous grace will get larger, and so thanksgiving will get deeper, and each new day the guarantees are extra positive, extra intense, extra valuable to consider. So, I’m excited to get outdated, Tony. It’s an excellent factor to develop towards heaven and develop towards Jesus.