Title: Heaven- According To Genesis
Place: BLCC
Date: 5/7/17
Text: Genesis 1-3, Revelation 19-21
CT: Heaven is revealed in the Book of Genesis.
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FAS: In fall 2014, Rolling Stone magazine interviewed Stephen King, who has spent his career writing about death. When the interviewer asked, "Do you hope to go to heaven?" he responded, "I don't want to go to the heaven that I learned about when I was a kid. To me, it seems boring. The idea that you're going to lounge around on a cloud all day and listen to guys play harps? I don't want to listen to harps. I want to listen to Jerry Lee Lewis!"
Levi Lusko comments: "That's why it's a mistake to allow unbiblical imagery, perpetuated by cartoons, comic books, and well-intentioned but misinformed Sunday school teachers, to color our thinking. I am with Stephen King 100 percent. I don't want to go to such a heaven either! Fortunately no such heaven is actually to be found in the Bible."
Levi Lusko, Through the Eyes of a Lion (Thomas Nelson, 2015), page 73
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This is my second sermon in the series Heaven. In the first sermon we looked at what Jesus revealed to us about heaven in his famous “Don’t let your hearts be troubled scripture”, John 14. We discovered there was a place prepared for us as prepared people.
Today we are going to look at what we can learn about heaven and the afterlife from the first book of the Bible, Genesis.
I have talked about the Sadducees before. They are found in the Bible. Acts 23.8,
(The Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, and that there are neither angels nor spirits, but the Pharisees believe all these things.)
Really sad bunch. The really sad thing is that we know they are wrong because the teaching of Jesus and the rest of the Bible. The Sadducees may not have had access to all we have to go on, but they did have the earliest books of the Bible, which have much that points to a life after death. Especially Genesis. With the advantage of hindsight we can look back from the rest of God’s Word to see many clues of the afterlife the Sadducees would have missed. [Screen 3]
IN THE BEGINNING…GOD
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
In the beginning …God.
All truth is based on that truth.
All reality is based on that reality.
There is a God so there is a place where God exists. In other words there is a heaven because there is God and heaven is His throne.
In the beginning, (the earliest moment that man can comprehend) God was creating the heavens and earth.
God and heaven already existed. This is heaven as the dwelling of God not heaven as sky.
[Screen 4] Genesis 1.2, Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the spirit of God was hovering over the waters.
This is where it started. The spirit of God hovering over total chaos and darkness.
Just envision this in your mind.
Something was about to happen. Something was about to come out of nothing. The Spirit of God hovering like a hen hatching her chicks. So was God about to hatch the universe. And here is how He did it.
Genesis 1.3, [Screen 5] Let there be light. God’s first act of creation was to bring light into darkness. That will be what God and Jesus will be doing from then on. A light in the darkness.
Second day. Genesis 1.6, Let there be a vault between waters to separate water from water. It was called sky.
Third day. Let there be dry land. Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place and let dry ground appear.
Fourth day. Let there be lights to guide the day and night. Sun and moon.
And God saw it was good.
Fifth day. Let the water teem with living creatures and let birds fly above the earth.
And God saw it was good.
Sixth day. Let the land produce living creatures according to their kinds. All kinds of creatures. There was an amazing variety of creatures. There was wildlife and livestock. God saw it all was good.
I’ve got to ask a question here. Will there be animals in heaven?
It says in Isaiah 11.6-8, The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them.
The cow will feed with the bear, their young will lie down together,
and the lion will eat straw like the ox. The infant will play near the cobra’s den,
the young child will put its hand into the viper’s nest.
Why shouldn’t God have animals in heaven? He made them and may even redesign some of them it seems. Heaven would be pretty dull with out them I think. Think of all the beauty there will be in heaven. God created the heavens and earth the way He wanted them. Perfect in every way. With animals? I don’t know. Kind of sounds like it.
When we look back at how it was we are probably seeing the way it will be for us in the afterlife with God. There will be beauty and wonder beyond what we can imagine. Yet we do get a glimpse here as we look back to what God created.
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Next comes man. God had done really good up to now. Everything was perfect. Everything was doing what it was supposed to do. But something seemed to be missing.
Genesis 1.26, Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule.
Before the fall of man this was God’s stated purpose for us. To rule. God created us to rule over creation for eternity.
[Screen 7] We are made in God’s image. This was not said about any of the other animals. It is clear we are to be more than just an animal that chases after its desires. We are to be like God in many ways.
God is the creator. We are to be creative. A mind is a terrible thing to waste because we are made in the image of God. If you are wasting your mind you are wasting God’s mind.
God is love. We know how to love because he loved us first. 1 John 4.19, We love because he first loved us.
God is also holy, generous, wise, existing in eternal fellowship. These are the areas that separate us from other creatures and are where God’s purpose for us derives itself. God created us to be eternal with Him and rule over the creation.
Man’s assignment to rule over other creatures is a stewardship, a given authority we must never abuse.
Just as we are delegated responsibility here on earth, we will be given responsibility in heaven. This is our destiny; the purpose of our creation by our creator.
Looking at what God has created we can begin to see what His intention as the designer was. Every creature is designed for its own environment. It will flail and struggle whenever it tries to do other than what God has planned for it to do.
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Man is the same. When we try to do other than what God has planned for us we flail and struggle. God shows us what our purpose is. Furthermore he made us not as temporary beings that are to live and then die, we are eternal beings that will live with our creator and serve him forever in a place beyond our imagination.
Thus by looking back at what God originally wanted and what he “thought was good”, we can get a glimpse of what God will deem good in our “place” in heaven to come. [Screen 9]
So what will we do in heaven? The abundance of the Garden of Eden is a foreshadow of heaven. I’ve got 5 things I believe from reading in our text today we will do in heaven. [Screen 10]
1. Eat- Adam and Eve got in trouble for eating something they shouldn’t have eaten.
Jesus describes a day when, “I say to you that many will come from the east and the west, and will take their places at the feast with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. But the subjects of the kingdom will be thrown outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” Matthew 8.11-12.
In the final Revelation, those who overcome are promised “the right to eat from the tree of life which is in the paradise of God. Revelation 2.7.
Also we read that John is told to write, Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb! Revelation 19.9.
Heaven will be a feast with…food. [Screen 11]
2. Rest-God rested on the seventh day. Genesis 2.2, by the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.
Not because he was tired but because he was finished. God made the seventh day a special day and passes this day of rest to us.
Hebrews 4.9-10, There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God;
for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from their works, just as God did from
his.
We will rest in heaven. [screen 12]
3. New Body- God created man with a physical body. Genesis 2.7, Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.
From the beginning, therefore, man has had a dual nature. The spirit part of man was made in the image of God; the physical part was made from the dust.
You hear me say at funerals: Ashes to ashes and dust to dust, but the imperishable spirit may forever be with the Lord.
Both parts are good because God made both parts. Both are necessary to complete the definition of man. From the beginning God wanted man to have spirit and body.
But there will also be a body in the life to come. This is a factual based doctrine throughout scripture.
Daniel 12.2, Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt.
Job 19.25-27, I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on the earth. And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God;
I myself will see him with my own eyes—I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!
2 Corinthians 5.1-4, For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. Meanwhile we groan, longing to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling, because when we are clothed, we will not be found naked. For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed instead with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life.
Philippians 3.20-21, But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.
That last one seals it for me. I will have a glorious body just like Christ.
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4. Touch-We will be able to touch. The sense of touch is a very important part of being human. Babies thrive on being touched. And I sure like holding my grandbabies. How important are handshakes, hugs, a pat on the back.
Jesus was always touching people. In the Gospel of Matthew alone he touched a leper, a woman with a fever, a dead girl, a drowning disciple, little children, two blind men.
People desired and did touch Him.
Even after he was resurrected, he was touched by people. Thomas touched Him.
When we imagine a heaven filled with bodiless spirits, we create a place devoid of life and vitality. Heaven without touch would be contrary to all we hold dear. Being safe in the arms of Jesus is how I view heaven. I will have a glorified body that can feel the touch of a loved one and be embraced by my Lord.
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5. See-The sense of sight is a wonderful gift from God. Sight is one of the hardest things evolutionists try to explain about how it came about. Our sight is so limited now. Our eyes are incapable of seeing so many things that are out there. Like a color blind man who cannot see certain colors there is a whole range of things we cannot see.
Perhaps this explains how we will one day see God.
Colossians 1.15, The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.
We cannot see God yet.
1 Timothy 1.17, Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory for ever and ever. Amen.
But in Matthew Jesus promises we will see God. Matthew 5.8, Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.
Revelation 22.4 promises, “They will see His face.”
I will see God’s face some day as a follower of His Son.
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Conclusion: If the world had remained the way God wanted it to be, it would have remained a perfect paradise.
The good news for us is that one day the world again will be just the way God wants it. There will be no more pain and suffering, no more disease. And the feller that started all the trouble back there in the Garden of Eden, well he gets his in Revelation 20.10, And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night forever and ever.
The garden of Eden-the original paradise of God-has much to tell us about heaven that God has prepared for us. The parallels between the first two chapters of Genesis and the last two of Revelation are remarkable.
They show that God, who does not change like the shifting of shadows has an intention and goal for us all.
Jas. 1.17, Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.
Although the fall of man has set us back, God ultimate purpose for us will not be stopped. What God started in Genesis will come to completion in Revelation. And all through God’s Word we are guided as to how we should follow.
The freedom God gave man to begin with is what got us in trouble and away from Him. [Screen 16]
But that freedom and forgiveness we now have through Jesus Christ and the cross gives the way to get back to where we should be.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Boles, Kenny. The life to come: what the Bible says about the afterlife. Joplin, MO: College Press, 2010. Print. Part 1 Chapter 2
