HEAVENLY HOPE II
TITUS 1:2
Throughout our lives we are always beginning told that we just do not how good we have it. When we were kids our parents use to tell us how they would have to walk to school 3 miles, uphill both ways, with no shoes, in the middle of winters. Winters then of course consisted of hundreds of inches of snow, with temperatures so cold that poplar bears would freeze to the death. You know the stories I am referring to.
For my dad who was raised in Boston you had many of the "city" tales. Orange crates for furniture, stealing sheets of cloths lines to make money. Live was terrible back then, and I as kid never knew just how go I had it.
Just like the old saying, "Everyone thinks the grass is greener on the other side".
Today I want to look at the other side of the coin. Because I believe that in regards to our eternal home, that is if you have trusted in Jesus Christ as your Saviour and Lord, you do not realize how bad you really do have it.
I want to use my computer to illustrate my point. My first computer was know as an XT, it was slow as anything. But I did not know that it was slow until I got my 286. Boy was that fast. Well, I failed to realize how slow that was until I got my 386. Now I was cooking. But I’ll tell you what, that 386 was going in slow motion when I upgraded to a 586. I thought I was not going to need another computer for the rest of my life that 586 was so fast.
Well guess what? They come out with a Pentium and it put to shame my 586. Now I have a Pentium II and my daughters have the Pentium on which I use on occasion. I can’t get over how slow the Pentium I is! Now of course this as all taken place over the course of a least ten years.
But my point is that I never knew how slow my computers were until I got the next generation of computers. I never new how bad I had it until I got something faster and more powerful.
Life is like that. When we get to heaven, when we stand before the throne of almighty God, singing with the angels and the millions of other countless saints I believe we are going to realize how bad life on earth really was. We are going to wonder why earthly life held such a grip on us.
Eternal life with the Lord God in heaven is beyond our comprehension, beyond description, beyond what we can imagine. And that is a good thing, because if we did realize and comprehend how much better it really was, we would all commit suicide to get there quicker.
God leave it as it is so that we will continue the work He as for us on the this old earth.
Please turn with me to the passage for this morning. Tutus chapter 1 verse 2, that would be page 1032 in your pew Bibles this morning. I will read both the first and second verses,
"Paul, a bondservant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ, according to the faith of God’s elect and the acknowledgment of the truth which accords with godliness, in hope of eternal life which God, who cannot lie, promised before time began,"
Here is a wonderful promise of God. Last week we took at look at hope and what it means to the Christian. We made not of how our hope in God is a hope of certainty. Hope is that which is desired and expected. We saw some reasons for hope. The Word of God was a reason for our hope. The cross of Christ and the completed work of atonement which was accomplished on the cross was a reason for Christian hope. The resurrection of Christ was reason for hope. By it was know that we can change just as God changed the body of Christ into a glorified body, He can change us into new creations, no longer slaves to sin.
And the resurrection of Jesus Christ give us hope of eternal life, because their was victory over death though the resurrection.
Today I want us to focus on the object and sum of Christian hope as stated in our passage this morning, and this is eternal life. What a great promise that is, what a great hope that is. There are three things I want to point out concerning this promise.
First of all, this promise is priceless in value. I would challenge you to think of one thing that would be greater then eternal life with God in heaven. What could be greater? What could be more valuable.
If you have all the money in the world, how long could you enjoy it? 70-80 years maybe. If you look around to people who have lots of wealth and material possessions most of them are not any happier then you are now.
I do not see how having every desire meant, every lust meant, brings happiness. Look at Bill Gates, one of the world’s richest men. Just the property tax on his home is around $300,000. Bill does not seem to happy these days with the government bring a case against Microsoft which Mr. Gates owns.
Eternal life is worth for more then material possessions. There would probably a lot more self-professed Christians today Paul stated that our hope is to have massive wealth which will be given to us by God who cannot lie. If material wealth were a greater gift then Eternal life, I have no doubt that everyone of God’s Saints would be filthy rich.
But eternal life is the greatest gift, and it is the greatest gift which God will give to His children.
Let us get some understanding of what this eternal life is. It is far more then just endless existence. If that all it was I think a lot would rather not have it. Who wants to just sit around forever. Many of us get bored just sitting around for an hour.
But eternal life is existence without end without sin! Without evil, without sorrow, without pain, without misery. In Revelation we are given this description;
"And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away."
Eternal life with Christ comes with all that is good, and nothing that is bad. In heaven we will glory in the fullness of God. We will experience the fullness of joy in heaven, joy that we will never know on earth. There will full and complete happiness in heaven as we dwell with the Triune God enjoying his fullness.
Again in Rev. chapter 21; "And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, "Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God."
If we could only realize the joy there is in dwelling with God. Sin will not be an obstacle in our enjoying His fellowship, for we will be holy as God is Holy. We will be good as He is Good.
Scripture also tell us we will have knowledge with this eternal life. There are so many question we have about God in the world, but when we get to heaven we will have all the answer we want, we will have the knowledge we need.
Paul writes in 1 Cor. 13; For we know in part and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away. When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known."
There will be a fullness in all things when we stand before the throne of God. This verse speaks of that which is perfect coming, which is the return of Jesus Christ when He will gather His Saint unto himself. Then all that which is done in part will be done away.
Eternal life means enjoying the fullness of God.
Eternal life is of great value because we will be like Christ. All our lives that should be our goal, to be like Christ. To think as Christ thought, to speak as Christ spoke, to have the relationship with the Father that Christ had. In heaven those things will be realized.
The apostle John writes, "Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is."
That is what give eternal life its value, we will have as Christ! This not saying we will be God as Christ is God, but we will be holy as He holy, we will be righteous, pure, just and He is righteous and pure. In heaven we will finally meet what should be our earthly goal, to be like Christ.
Let us also realize that there is not time in heaven. Time is a creation of God. Listen to Rev 21 again; "But I saw no temple in it, for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. The city had no need of the sun or of the moon to shine in it, for the glory of God illuminated it. The Lamb is its light. And the nations of those who are saved shall walk in its light, and the kings of the earth bring their glory and honor into it. Its gates shall not be shut at all by day (there shall be no night there).
This no day or night in heaven because there is no time. We thing of eternal life in terms of endless hours, days and years. But there are not hours, days and years. It is simply a wonderful existence enjoying the fullness of the glory of God. Worshipping Him, praise Him, enjoying His presence.
Eternal life is of great value because we will see as He really is. In all His fullness, and all is glory. Even with all we see around us here on earth, with all it’s beauty and wonder, we have not but seen a small fraction of the glory and majesty of God.
The second thing I wish to point out concerning this promise is that it is a promise of absolute certainty. There is no doubt that this promise will not come to pass. Paul writes "in hope of eternal life which God, who cannot lie…"
We are often under the assumption that God can do everything. We hear all the time. God can do anything He wants because He is God. You have even heard me say that on occasion. But we need to qualify that. We should say that God can do anything that accords with His nature. Because here Paul states that CANNOT do something.
God cannot lie, He is unable to lie.
Some may have heard the riddle if God can do anything, can He make a rock so big that He cannot move it. That question begins with a false assumption. God cannot do everything. And no He cannot make a Rock so big that He cannot move it, because God cannot create something greater then himself. Because it would go against what God essentially is, almighty, and all powerful.
God cannot lie for the same reason because it would go against what God essentially is. He is truth, He is light, He is good.
Hebrews 6:18 tells us that "it is impossible for God to lie". God could not do it even if He wanted to.
It does however seem odd that Paul would be telling Timothy this. After all Paul has entrusted Timothy with organizing the Church on Crete. Paul I am sure is confident of the Timothy’s knowledge of the Scripture.
Paul kind of answers that question a little later on in chapter 1 when he states, "One of them, a prophet of their own, said, "Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons."
You see lies was the way of life for the Cretens. They had a reputations as the world’s best story tellers. They were habitual liars, so much that there is a Greek word that is literally translated "to Cretanize" which means to "lie like a Cretan".
So you can imagine what it was like to teach the Bible to a Cretan. These people because they lied all the time didn’t believe anything. They would have figured that Timothy was just lying to them. So Paul emphasis that fact that God not only does not lie, He CANNOT lie!
God had proven himself that he does not lie. You look to the OT, and time and time again God promises things to His saints he fulfills those promises.
He promised Abraham that He would father a child with His wife Sarah. He promised Abraham that he would have descendants like the stars in the sky. Yet both he and Sarah were long past child bearing age. Yet God fulfilled that promise. All the Christian church in the world are filled with millions of Christians, all spiritual descendents of Abraham.
Realize that God does not always fulfill his promise in ways that we want He to, or in ways that we think He should. God fulfills His promises in His time and in His way.
God promised to sent a Messiah to the Jewish people. They thought that that would meant freedom from a ruling power, a political messiah. God fulfilled His promise, but not in the way they expected or wanted. God sent His messiah to free men from the bondage of sin. Jesus ministry was not understood by the very people to whom God had made the promise.
So when we stand on the promises of God, let us realize that they may not always come according to the time we would like them, or how we think they ought to be fulfilled.
But God will fulfill every promise in His time, and by His means. There will be eternal life for the Saints of God, that is certain.
The third thing I want to point out concerning this promise is that it transcends time. Look what Paul writes;
"in hope of eternal life which God, who cannot lie, promised before time began,"
God has promised eternal life to those who place there trust in Jesus Christ His Son, before time began. Let that sink in a little bit.
Before there was even a thing known as time, eternal was a promise of God. Eternal life in Jesus Christ was promised before God had even created time.
Before there were stars in the sky, before this earth was make, before there was any matter at all, there was the promise of eternal life.
This is a theme mentioned over and over again in Scriptures in 2 Tim. Chapter 1 we are told;
"Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me His prisoner, but share with me in the sufferings for the gospel according to the power of God, who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus before time began, but has now been revealed by the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ, who has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel,"
Again in Eph. 1:4: "just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love,"
You see God as worked out our salvation before were even born, before the world even existed. When God was alone in the eons of eternity He promised us eternal life. That is amazing.
We often think of the gospel, in terms of being a couple thousands years old. We think of it all beginning with the coming of Christ to this earth. But the scriptures reveals to that it is older them time itself. It has been revealed to us with the last couple thousand years, through the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ, but it as always been there.
Let us find comfort in that. Because the promise of eternal transcends time we know that it is applied to us. We can know that we are secure in that promise of eternal life.
So we have seen the sum of this promise of the hope of eternal life. It is a priceless promise, it is a certain promise, it as an ageless promise.
As I have presented this message I hope it has made you aware of how bad we do have it a certain sense. This world full of evil and corruption, with it’s pain and sorrow. Even so we all kind of like here, we have perhaps gotten a little to comfortable here. But I know when we pass from this life unto the next to be present with the Lord, we are going to look back on our lives and think, what was I thinking? What was so great about that?
I know most of you have a personal relationship with the Lord. My prayer is that this message will encourage you to live your like more like Christ. Practice as it were. Practice being like Jesus, because you are going to be like Him for a very long time.
To those hear today who have never placed their trust in Christ this promise of hope means nothing to you. If you have never gone to the Lord, acknowledging that you are a sinner in need to salvation, never trusted in the cleansing power of the blood of Christ, not only is this promise not apply to you, you there is no hope for you.
I pray that you would place your faith in Christ today. Enter into the kingdom of God, enter into the hope of this promise, the joy of this promise. The certainty of this promise. Surrender yourself to Christ.
PRAY SINNER’S PRAYER
