(Adapted from a message by Tom Holladay at Saddleback Church)
There’s a story about a wealthy Christian who somehow got obsessed with the idea of taking some of his wealth to heaven. Now he knew the Bible clearly teaches that you can’t take it with you. But so obsessed was he with this desire that he just prayed & prayed & prayed that God would give him permission to take some of his wealth to heaven with him.
Finally, his persistence in prayer paid off. God spoke to him & said, "Okay, enough all ready! You can take one suitcase with you into heaven."
The story continues with the man deep in thought, "What do I take? What are the most valuable things that I can put into my suitcase?"
Well, he finally decided, & filled his suitcase full. Then one day he died, & when next we see him, he is slowly approaching the pearly gates dragging his suitcase behind him.
St. Peter met him there at the gate & said, "Wait a minute. What do you think you’re doing? You’re not allowed to take anything into heaven." The man answered, "You don’t understand. I have special permission from God Himself to take this suitcase into heaven."
Peter rubbed his beard & said, "Well, that’s very unusual. I can’t imagine God letting you do that. Let me look inside your suitcase & see what’s there." So the man dragged the suitcase over, & Peter opened it to see that it was filled with gold bars & gold bricks & gold ingots.
Peter said, "Well, all right. If God said so, I suppose you can take that in if you want. But why in the world did you go to all this trouble just to bring more pavement into heaven?"
Today I’m starting this series of “Frequently Asked Questions” about Biblical topics. You’ve seen the phrase FAQ’s on products or services you may be thinking about purchasing. That’s what I’m doing during Sunday worship the next 4 Sundays—addressing FAQ’s about God. So today I start with heaven. People in today’s culture don’t think much about heaven. But when we lose a loved one we begin to wonder is there more to life tha what we experience here?
When I say the word “heaven” most of us kind of put that in an “I’ll think about that later” category. In our minds we have three boxes of importance of thinking about things. The first box is Urgent. The second box is Not Urgent. The third box is After I’m Dead. And heaven is in that third box. Because of that we just don’t think about it much.
The Apostle Paul had this to say about this place called heaven. Philippians 3:14 “I strain to reach the end of the race and to receive the prize for which God through Christ Jesus is calling us up to heaven.” The Message paraphrase says it this way, “I’ve got my eye on the goal. God is beckoning us onward to Jesus. I am off and running and I’m not turning back. Let’s keep focused on that goal, those of us who want everything that God has for us.” Do you want everything God has for you this next year? The joy that God has for you? All the significance in life that God has for you? Do you want the peace that God has for you? Paul says if you want everything that God has for you, focus on this goal, this place called heaven.
Paul pictures it like a race. The Bible often pictures our life like a race. He says heaven is like the ultimate finish line of life. What if I said, “I want you to run a race. I want you to run it well. I want you to do your best to win that race. I’m not going to tell you where the finish line is.” That would be pretty difficult. Yet that’s the way a lot of us try to run the race of life. We don’t really know where the finish line is. If you don’t know where the finish line is you either run a frantic race or a frustrated race.
If you run a frantic race you get up every morning. You run as hard as you can as fast as you can because maybe the finish line is that day. You just don’t know. Some of you ran your life this way this last year. You’re just worn out. You think, “I don’t know if I can do that again this next year.” You don’t have to. You don’t have to live life that way. That’s what the ultimate finish line of life in heaven does for us. It gives us something to look forward to.
Some of you may have lived a frustrated life this year. You may have run your race like we would if we didn’t know where the finish line was. You just sit down and say, “Since I don’t know where it is, I’ll just wait until somebody shows me.” God shows us. He tells us here’s this ultimate finish line, this hope of heaven that you and I have to look forward to.
We need finish lines. And the hope of heaven is the ultimate finish line. Don’t get me wrong. There’s nothing wrong with setting goals. Nothing wrong with having goals about your family, your career, your school – all those kinds of things. Just so those aren’t the ultimate goals. This hope of heaven is our ultimate goal. All other goals are under that. Why? Because even if you reach them – and some of you did. You’ve reached your greatest dream this last year – you realize it’s not enough. Even my greatest dream it’s not enough. You need a goal that is enough. And only this goal is enough to motivate us for a lifetime, to give us hope for a lifetime.
We’re starting this week a four-week series we’re call “FAQ’s About God”. Frequently Asked Questions. What are some frequently asked questions about God and the Bible and good and evil. Today we’re talking about some frequently asked questions about heaven. During these next four weeks as we look at these I would guess that you would have three different reactions as we talk about these different Biblical principles.
Sometimes when we talk about a truth you’ll think, “I like that! I really like that truth. I’ve always believed that. That really resonates with me. I like that.”
Then there will be times you think, “I need to look into that. It’s interesting but I’ve never heard it that way before. That’s something I need to look into a little bit more, study a little bit more.” That’s a good thing. The place we’re looking at obviously is the Bible so look at the Bible more and what it has to say.
But then, I guess, there will be a third reaction sometimes. Sometimes you’ll think, “I don’t agree with that. I do not agree with that at all.”
I want to make you a promise as we begin this series I’m simply going to share with you what the Bible says about these subjects. So when you have those moments of thinking, “I don’t agree with that,” I hope at least once you think that during this series. I don’t agree with that.” Those are the moments when life can really change. You start to dig in.
Those of you who are teachers know that sometimes the truth can be a little irritating if you’re not sure you agree with it yet. The irritation like a grain of sand in an oyster. As you think about it more and more, it becomes a pearl of truth in your life. It becomes something of great value. I hope at least once you think that you don’t agree with what I share with you.
Wouldn’t it be interesting to go out on the street and ask people what is heaven and see how they answer. Well, we’re about to do that—our traveling correspondent is on the streets of LasVegas asking that very question.
[Show video clip “What is Heaven?’ (Visual Edge video series)]
As we start today looking at our questions about heaven, I’m going to start with the first question most of us ask about heaven.
1. Where is heaven?
Some of you may have had your 3 or 4 year old ask you this question. It’s a tough question to answer. Where in the world is heaven? If this world were filled with 1st and 2nd graders, and I asked them “Where is heaven?” what would they do? They’d point up. Heaven is up!
The fact that a four year old points up when we say where is heaven, may sound simple but its one of the most significant things you can say about heaven. The word “heaven” has always had the idea of up. It has that idea in the Bible.
Psalm 123:1 “Lord, I look up to You, up to heaven, where You rule.” Even Jesus looked up to heaven when He prayed. Mark 6:41 “Jesus took the five loaves and two fish and looked up toward heaven and He asked God’s blessing on the food.” Heaven is up.
That doesn’t mean up in the sense that it’s out there somewhere beyond the orbit of Pluto. Up means higher. Higher than anything we experience on this earth. Up means beyond. Beyond anything that I can imagine on this earth. Up means above. Who amongst us does not wish, long sometimes, to live above the pain that is in this world? There’s something in us that realizes this isn’t right. I should be able to live above this. We will one day. We look forward to that day. That’s where we’ll live for eternity.
Who amongst us doesn’t wish they could live above the temptations of this world? Whatever commitments you’d like to change, habits, the truth is everyone of us is going to face temptation this next year. That’s part of living in this world. Don’t you wish sometimes, “I wish I could live above that and not even have to face that?” There will come a day when that’s true. That’s the place called heaven.
Up means where God lives. He is everywhere but there’s a special sense of His presence in heaven. He is there in the most incredible way. When we talk about heaven and what it’s like, where do you think most people today get their ideas of heaven and what it’s like? It’s not from the Bible. It’s not even from great books. Most people get their ideas of heaven from movies.
There’s a particular picture that we usually get from movies of what heaven looks like. Just a cloudy sort of place. Why do movies picture heaven that way? They couldn’t afford to picture what it really looks like! It would be a multi billion dollar set even if they could figure it out. Something we can’t even imagine in our minds the greatness. How do you picture it in a movie? Just go with the clouds! People will go with that!
The problem with clouds when you look at that is it looks so boring and dull. Heaven is not some boring place where you sit around on a cloud playing a harp – choice of one of two songs: “Stairway to Heaven” or “Hey you! Get off of my cloud!” That’s not what heaven is like. It is not a boring place.
It is an incredibly vibrant place. The Bible tells us that heaven is a material place. It is a lot more like earth that you and I imagine and a lot less like earth than you and I imagine. It’s a material place the Bible says. The Bible says that there’s going to be a new heaven and a new earth. That everything we’ve experienced here is just multiplied there. It’s perfect there.
Can you imagine, if you’re a surfer, riding a perfect wave every single time? That’s what heaven will be like. If you love nature, can you imagine a perfect sunset, a perfect waterfall? Can you imagine perfect relationships for every single relationship? That is the joy of heaven that we look forward to. Heaven is up! I don’t know how to say it any more profoundly than that. That’s what heaven is.
Not only is it up but heaven is home.
It’s the home that we all long for. We long for a perfect, permanent home. That home is found in heaven. It’s the one that we all long for, the one that some of you never had. The Bible often talks about heaven as being this home that we look forward to. Hebrews 11:16 “They were looking for a better place, a heavenly homeland.” And Philippians 3:20 “But our homeland is in heaven.” That’s our ultimate home.
The question is, what kind of a home is it? What kind of a home do we look forward to?
Psalm 16:11 “You have made known to me the path of life. You will fill me with joy in Your presence, with eternal pleasures at Your right hand.” A place of eternal pleasure, eternal joy. One of the ways that you and I make it through the realities of this life, the suffering and the struggles of this life, even the evil that we have to face in this world is to realize this isn’t all there is. This isn’t the best that it can be. I look forward to something better.
We watch a bunch of middle aged men, smelly from fishing, sitting around a campfire on a commercial on TV clicking their beer glasses together saying, “It doesn’t get any better than this.” I hope it does! I hope it get better than that! It does! It does get better than this.
This is not the end of the story. There is a day that we look forward to, a goal that we look forward to and a place called heaven.
I love what the preacher Vance Haffner said in his old age about longing for heaven. He wrote, “I’m homesick for heaven. It’s the hope of dying that’s kept me alive for this long.”
There’s a lot of questions we have about our home, this place called heaven. I’d like to take a couple minutes to answer some of them. I can’t answer all that you might have but I’d like to answer a few of the top questions about what’s our home going to be like.
The top question that I hear people asking about heaven is Will I know? Will I be able to recognize other people in heaven? Will I recognize my loved ones in heaven? What does the Bible say about this? The answer in the Bible is yes. We will be able to recognize people in heaven. How do we know that? Jesus’ disciples recognized Him when He had His glorified heavenly body. Not immediately but eventually they recognized Him. That’s one indication. The Apostle Paul indicates that he will be able to recognize the people he ministered to on this earth as they will stand beside him in heaven. The indication of the Bible is yes, we will be able to recognize people.
The second top question that people have about our home in heaven is, Will our pets be with us in heaven? Let me tell you what the Bible says exactly. One real animal-lover , “My pets are perfect. They don’t need to be saved.” That’s another way to think about it. But the Bible says very clearly that there will be animals in heaven. Many times it talks about the animals. In heaven, in this new heaven and new earth that God’s going to create. And although the Bible doesn’t say expressly that your pet that’s died will somehow be recreated to be with you in -- it does say extremely clearly, there will be no sorrow and no pain in heaven. We can be assured of the fact that if you were sitting there in heaven and thought, “I have to have my pet here to have joy,” God would provide that pet in an instant. There’s going to be no sorrowing, no pain in heaven.
The third top question that people ask about our home is what will we look like? I hope a lot better than here, don’t you? A lot better. The Bible answers this. The Heaven is a material place and we get new bodies. New material bodies. It’s not like we float around. This idea that people become angels after they die? Not true! There are angels in heaven and there are people in heaven but they’re not the same. Angels are spiritual beings but you and I are people. When we go to heaven we get a material, new perfect body. A perfect glorified body. Another way to say that is there will be no health clubs in heaven because we won’t need them. We’ve already got a perfect body. Perfectly able to enjoy all that God has made. Also perfectly able to enjoy all that God is in a way that you’ve never imagined. That’s what heaven is going to be like.
What does your perfect body going to look like? I don’t know. The Bible doesn’t tell us. Just that it’s perfect in some way. Although Jesus, when He got a perfect body, His disciples recognized Him and were able to walk with Him. So it’s much like our body here but perfect in some way. That’s the little bit that God has shown us about that. Somehow to give us hope of what’s going to come.
Probably the most serious question that people ask about this home in heaven is “What about babies who die? What about children who die young? Are they going to be in heaven? They never even had a chance to look to Jesus Christ as their way to heaven. Will they be there?” The answer in the Bible is yes. Of course. Based on what? Based first just on the character of God. The character of God is the character of grace. Throughout the Bible God never holds someone accountable for something they don’t know or don’t understand. So a baby or a child who’s never even had the chance to have faith in God, God’s not going to hold them accountable for that opportunity. They just go straight to heaven to be with Him for eternity. To enjoy Him for eternity.
There’s also a place in the Old Testament where King David looses a baby, the baby dies very young. He talks about going to join and be with that baby in heaven for eternity. So the answerI get from the Bible is yes.
I wish I had a lot more time to talk about this. I don’t. Some of you have more questions about this that we can talk about in 25-30 minutes.
How does this information make a difference in our lives now? Is it just some kind of fire insurance, life insurance? I buy it now and then I forget about it until I die? How does it make a difference in my life in an everyday way?
Philip Yancey writes, “A strange fact about modern American life is that although 81% of us believe in the afterlife according to George Gallup, no one talks much about it. Christians believe that we will spend eternity in a splendid place called heaven. Isn’t it a little bizarre to simply ignore that acing as if it doesn’t matter
It caused C. S. Lewis to write “If you read history, you’ll find that the Christians who did most for the present world were those who thought the most of the next world.”
How can it make a difference? Should it make a difference? How does it make a difference in our everyday life? How do I bring this truth that seems so far away from my life now into my everyday life?
Three things you can do.
1. Remove your doubt about going to heaven.
There’s a couple of good reasons that we feel unsettled about the afterlife.
Sometimes we feel unsettled because to us it seems so unclear. How do you know who gets in? How do you I know how you get in? Don’t you have to wait until you die and get all the books settled and figure it all out?
God sent Jesus Christ to this earth to give us the message. He sent Him to give us the message that it does not have to be unclear. We don’t have to be unsure about the hope of heaven. 1 John 5:11-12 “This is what God told us. God has given us eternal life and this life is in His Son. Whoever has the Son has life. But whoever does not have the Son of God, does not have life.” Jesus came to say, “I want to show you the way to heaven, to eternal life. I’m the way to eternal life.” God knows that some of us don’t like to ask for directions. So He came to us. Before we even asked He said, “Here is the way to get to heaven. It’s through Me. It’s through Jesus Christ.”
There’s a second reason we feel unsettled. We’re depending on what we can do to get into heaven. We look around and think, “If I’m doing better than most people I’ll probably make it in.” I’m doing probably as good as Pat Lamb. I’m certainly doing as good as Pastor Don. I’ll probably make it into heaven. It’s a matter of comparison in getting in.
We all have this picture in our mind of waiting in this long line that snakes up to the pearly gate and we just step one step at a time up to Saint Peter who has this book. In this book is all the good things we’ve done, all the bad things we’ve done. If we’ve done more good than bad, if it balances out right he’s going to say, Come on in. Each step we take we’re sweating more and more, hoping that somehow we make it in.
But we’ve got the wrong picture. Because heaven is a perfect place. Because it’s perfect even one imperfection will keep you out. If you have even one bad thought, one wrong action, one sin in your life your entire life that’s enough to keep you out of heaven. It’s not a matter of balancing the books. Someone needed to wipe the slate clean for you to let us in.
You don’t have to stand in that line. Jesus gives you a fast pass out of that line. A different way in. You can know for sure, based on what He’s done. Heaven is a gift of God’s grace.
Ephesians 2:8-9 “I mean that you have been saved by grace through believing. You did not save yourselves, it is a gift from God. It is not the result of your own efforts, so you cannot brag about it.” It’s not based on what I’ve done. The more we base our thoughts on whether we’ll get into heaven or on what we’ve done the less sure we’ll be. The more we recognize it’s what Jesus did, the more security we’ll have.
Would you like to know for sure that you’re going to heaven, have no doubt about it? You can. Based on God’s promises.
That’s the first thing you and I need to do to bring thoughts of heaven, the reality of heaven into our everyday lives.
2. Replace our anxieties (the worries that you have as a part of life everyday) with thoughts of heaven.
Do you think you might have some troubles this year? Of course you will. That’s what life is like. Do you think you might have a thing or two to worry about this next year? We’re going to face some anxieties this next year. 2 Corinthians 4:16 “We have small troubles in comparison to heaven for a while now, but they are helping us to gain an eternal glory that is much greater than the troubles. So we set our eyes not on what we see but on what we cannot see.” Circle the phrase “set our eyes”. That is our choice.
Colossians 3:1-2 is “Let heaven fill your thoughts [circle “fill your thoughts” that also is our choice] Don’t spend your time worrying about things down here.” How do you do that? How do you set your eyes on what you don’t see? How do you let heaven fill your thoughts? That’s a tough one. Do you just look up all day long? Just trying to think heavenly visions all day long?
Let me give you a picture. If you were going on the vacation of a lifetime next July what would you do right now? You’d be making preparations now and you’d be looking forward to it until the time you went. The same thing with heaven. You make preparations now. You make sure by faith that you’re going there. You trust in God’s promise and then you look forward to what it’s going to be like. That’s what we’re doing today. And any time you have an anxiety in life, any time you have a worry in life, this scripture tells us that is God’s invitation for you to look forward to a day when those won’t be there any more. Our worries can become so overwhelming in this world. We wonder how we’re ever going to escape them. But every time you have a worry, if you look forward to the day when you’ll never have a worry again, that let’s your thoughts drift towards heaven.
There is a huge misconception, just looking forward to heaven that I want to deal with. There’s a misconception that being heavenly-minded means you can’t enjoy anything now. Who gives us the good things that we enjoy on this earth? God. And who will give us the good things that we will enjoy for an eternity in heaven? God. Same God. So if I enjoy it here what He’s given me, I’m practicing. I’m getting ready to enjoy for eternity what He has given me. We should enjoy the things that God has given us now. To be heavenly minded doesn’t mean you can’t go to movies and concerts. It might change the movies and concerts you go to but you can go but it doesn’t mean you can’t go. It means you enjoy them in a whole new way.
Ever had one of those experiences of life where it’s just perfect, just everything goes right about it. When it’s over your thought is, “That’s over. I’ll never have that again.” Looking forward to the joys of heaven means you enjoy that at a different way. When it’s over you realize, “That was just a taste. That was just aforetaste of what I’m going to enjoy forever in eternity.”
I don’t know how to picture this any better than this. A miniature Hershey bar is a picture of the joys God gives us on this earth. A king size Hershey bar is a picture of the joys God gives us in heaven. One is just a taste of the other. The taste makes me look forward to the great joys I’m going to enjoy for eternity.
The joys in heaven are multiplied. Incredibly more than you and I could ever imagine from what we experience on this earth.
So every time you have a worry, an anxiety, if you could let your mind drift just a bit to that day when we’ll have no more worries and anxieties, that focuses your thoughts on heaven. If you don’t have any worries, you need to be preaching this next week because you’re far ahead of the rest of us.
3. Refocus your energies on treasures in heaven.
Matthew 6:19-21, Jesus said, “Store your treasures in heaven where they cannot be destroyed by moths or rust and where thieves cannot break in and steal them. Your heart will be where your treasure is.”
Store your treasures in heaven, Jesus said, for two reasons. First of all it’s the only place those treasures will last. If they’re on this earth, moths and rust destroy them. Thieves break in and steal them. Things just don’t last on this earth.
But the second reason He says to store our treasures in heaven is your heart’s going to be where your treasure is. Wherever you put what you value the most, wherever you put the valuable things in your life, your heart’s going to inevitably be drawn towards that. So if you put your treasure in heaven, your heart is drawn toward the hope of heaven.
What does that mean – treasure in heaven? Things that we treasure in heaven are the things that will last. What is it in this world that lasts?
When you boil it all down there’s two things that last, that are going to last into eternity.
One is your character – the relationship that you’re building with God, how you’re developing that relationship. Your character lasts. You’ll take that with you in some way into eternity and then it’s magnified.
The second thing that lasts is people. Look around you. All the people in this room – every one of them – every one that you meet, we will last.
Many of you remember the moving final scene of the Steven Spielberg’s movie Schindler’s List where Oscar Schindler, the Polish businessman who used a portion of his fortune to put the names of Jews on a work list that would keep them from going to concentration camps. Faces, - those who escaped certain death because of his action – as he looks into their faces he has a moment of clarity. He sees things as he’s never seen them before and he’s talking to his friend, and says, “If only there could have been more. If only I could have done more.”
His friend says, “There are 1100 people here. There are generations here because of what you have done.” But Schindler says, “It could have been more. That car – I could have sold it and it would have meant ten more people. Ten more people on that list. Ten more lives saved.” He ripped the swastika pin from his lapel and says, “This pin! It’s gold! That’s two people. At least one person this pin could have been.” He had a moment of clarity when he realized the difference between what we value on this earth and what is valuable in eternity.
When I act in a Christlike way, that has eternal impact. When I think in a Christlike way that has eternal impact. When I speak in a Christlike way, that has eternal impact. There will come a day when for every act, for every thought, for every word Jesus Christ will look you and me in the eye and say, “Well done, good and faithful servant!” That’s the day that we look forward to.
Revelation 21:4-5 – what are we looking forward to? “He will wipe every tear from their eyes [that’s what heaven is like] there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away. He who is seated on the throne said, ‘I am making everything new!’”
I’d like us to close in prayer but in a different way. Instead of bowing our heads like we usually do, I’d like for you to look up with me instead. I’m going to put a prayer of commitment on the screen to letting the truth of heaven impact our lives in a motivating, peace giving, strengthening way this morning. If that is your commitment, I invite you to pray this prayer with me. Let’s pray it together as our prayer of commitment for today and the days ahead.
Prayer:
Lord, I don’t want to live one moment longer with doubt about whether or not I’ll be in heaven. Thank You for sending Jesus to tell me the good news that You love me and You want to welcome me into Your eternal home. Instead of trusting in what I can do to get me into heaven, I trust in the way that You have provided through Jesus’ death and resurrection. I trust You to forgive me and to lead me. I ask today that You would help me to see the problems and worries of this life in light of the hope of heaven. I trust that there will come a day when You will remove our suffering and when You will right every injustice and when You will multiply every joy. As I look forward to the promise of heaven, I’m deciding today to invest my life in eternity. I want to use the gifts and abilities that You have given me to do more than build a good life for myself and family in this world. I want to live for that which lasts. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
If this has been a new commitment for you—complete response tab. If you want to explore becoming a part of this church family and the basics of the Christian faith—plan to attend Class 101—complete response tab.
