Ten (10) Benefits That Are Kept In Heaven For You.

Ten (10) Benefits That Are Kept In Heaven For You.

A person without Jesus is no more than a walking corpse.

The apostle Paul reminds us that we don’t belong here on earth. This planet is not our home. (It’s not home for the Saint, nor the sinner).

He urges us to be continually aware that our citizenship is in heaven.

DL Moody quoted a humble woman who said that the way to heaven is short, easy, and simple… Out of self, into Christ, and into glory.

Philippians 3.20-21NIV “But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, 21 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.”

Awe, these lowly bodies…Transformed into His glorious body.

In a cemetery in Philadelphia, there’s an epithet that the great American founding father Benjamin Franklin wrote for himself.

The body of Benjamin Franklin, printer, like the cover of an old book, it’s contents, torn out, and Script of its lettering and Gilding, here, food for worms. But the work shall not be lost, for it will, as he believed appear once more in a new more eloquent addition, corrected and improved by the author.

Of course the author Benjamin Franklin refers to, is God.

As born again believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, we have treasure stored up in heaven.

Paul, in Ephesians 2.7, calls these treasures, the incomparable riches of His grace.

I call them the 10 benefits that are kept in Heaven for every believer.

The first benefit of heaven is, Resurrection from sin and death.

The apostle Paul opens Ephesians 2, with these statements.

Ephesians 2.1-2, 4–5NIV “As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, 2 in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient.”

4-5 “But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.”

God, through Jesus Christ, has resurrected us from sin and from death!

This foundational Christian truth is diametrically opposed to the biggest, and worst lie ever spread, namely, “that if you are a good person, you will go to heaven.”

Here’s the truth, straight from God‘s word. There is only one good person in heaven, and that’s Jesus. -Everyone else in heaven is a bad person saved by grace.

If you rely on being a good person to get to heaven, you are going to hell. -Only bad people go to heaven.

Romans 3.12NIV “All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.””

Again, In writing to the church at Ephesus, Paul also said in, Ephesians 2.1NIV You were dead in your transgressions and sins.

Not sick, not weak, not on life-support, but dead!

-In our natural spiritual state, before we are born again, we are spiritually dead.

No one is good enough to satisfy God‘s standard of moral perfection.

-We are so selfish, sinful, and polluted with sin that we don’t even realize how sinful we are.

Incredibly, we are able to look at ourselves in the mirror and think, “Now, there’s a good person! That someone deserves to go to heaven.” -Yet we are spiritually dead.

In, Luke 15.11-32 Explains how even the living can actually be dead.

Jesus tells the story of a father, whose son leaves home, squanders his inheritance on sinful living, and returns home, poor but repentant.

And what does the father say? “This son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and now found!”

Listen, in his rebellion, sinful condition, the son was physically alive, but spiritually dead.

He had no fellowship with his father; he was lost. Only when he came home in repentance was he truly alive.

Ephesians 2.8-9NIV “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God. 9— not by works, so that no one can boast.”

“God‘s not in competition with anybody or anything, he has to be trusted and faithfully loved and served.” PH

Now, the fact that salvation is a free gift is a problem for many people. Tragically, they are too proud to accept Jesus Christ sacrifice on their behalf.

You might say, “I like hard-working people who believe in earning everything they have.”

-That’s an admirable trait for this earthly life.

However, hard work won’t get you into heaven.

You can’t earn it and you don’t deserve it.