Heaven
- Jake Chambers
- Feb 28, 2010
- Series: Ephesians
In all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.
Gospel. What we have been talking about the last few weeks as we study the first chapter of Ephesians is the gospel. My prayer is that as we have been exploring the gospel you are starting to see the depth, riches and overwhelming magnitude of the gospel. Today we are looking at one of the keys to understanding the entire book of Ephesians. Ephesians 1:3-10 can be broken down to represent three aspects of the gospel- gospel past, gospel present and gospel future. I want to encourage you to imagine, dream and long for gospel future. My hope is that after today we will all have a stronger understanding and longing to be with our King for all eternity.
Making known to us the mystery of his will. Ephesus was a city shrouded in mystery, cults and the worship of capricious, unpredictable, and angry gods. The Ephesians did not know how to please their gods or spirits or earn their gods' or spirits' favor. How to relate to their gods was a mystery to them. Paul speaks to the Ephesians of our God, The God, the God of the Bible, and tells them of how he reveals himself, not as a capricious or unpredictable god amongst many gods, but as a loving Father above all other gods.
The Bible and the book of Ephesians is a book of Revelation, not speculation. Our God reveals himself and his plan for the fullness of time. We are in a time, much like the Ephesians, with tons of religions, speculations and mysteries shrouding gods, time, all things, heaven and earth. But our God has revealed to us the mystery of his will - that everything is going to be summed up in Christ. All things to the glory of Christ, all things summed up in Christ, and all things to Christ! This is the mystery of his will. We do not have to wonder how everything will turn out or who will ultimately rule, we know all things will be summed up in Christ.
So, there is a lot to unpack in these verses, and often I think we can read them, admit we are confused and then move on. But I want us to spend some time here because these verses are important. I want us to understand the parts of the mystery of his will that have been revealed to us, so that we can joyfully praise Jesus like Paul does.
The Bible reveals to us a lot that will help us shape our identity and story. We must confess, we all wonder, what we are doing here? Why the world is the way it is? And we wrestle with deep philosophical questions, like the meaning of life and junk like that. Fortunately God is at work revealing his plan, purpose, story. He is also revealing our story, plan, purpose and story within his story. We see this happening in the Bible.
Genesis 1 + 2. In the beginning. God creates a world and everything in it and everything is good. God visits humans on earth and there is no sin, death, pain, sorrow or hunger on the planet. We see that man had dominion over the earth and enjoyed his work all his days. Man knew who he was and what his purpose was on the planet. Man got along with animals, had tons of fruit to eat and had a naked wife. The garden was a very good place.
Genesis 3 – Revelation 20. The Fall: Man sins and the earth is now cursed. Sin and death enter the world. Work now curses man and childbirth curses woman. Man’s relationship with God is severed. Man’s relationship with each other is severed. Man’s relationship with the land is severed and man's relationship with himself is severed. Man is not in perfect communion with God or people, he hates work and doesn’t know who he is or what he is here for. There is identity confusion on earth. Satan and his demons have real power to lie, accuse, and rule on earth.
The world knows this is our situation. Look at our separation from God. The world is trying to fix this. Think of our relationship with God. Man tries to repair this by creating religions. We live in a very spiritual and religious world. The problem is that man caused the problem with God and tries to repair it but the answer is not in man to repair it.
Take the severing of our relationships with one another. We are a lonely people. We have tried to replace real community with internet-communities. Online social networking is absolutely booming. Even while I was preparing this sermon, a pastor friend of mine received a text from AT+T selling “extra piece of mind” with the “family map by AT+T.” Not even starbucks could fix this. We go there alone to do facebook and put on our I-pod, to feel like we are with people, but are even isolated in public. But we all know that after hours on facebook, twitter, etc, we all feel much lonelier and isolated. Again, the answer to our separation in community is not in man or technology, now is it?
Man is also trying to fix our problem with creation and the earth. This is why we have green peace, tree huggers, etc. Now we should care for our planet but the planet is cursed and again the answer is not in us. And animals can not be tamed either. This week in Orlando a killer whale killed its trainer. We live in a world where animals and men are not perfectly friended. And no amount of training can change that. No amount of training can stop the fact that this week I had a dog crap in my front yard. I don’t have a dog. And how is man trying to fix this problem? With little signs of a dog squatting with an 'x' through his body. I wondered why it would be a picture of a dog and not a sign saying no dog poop. But then I remembered that dogs can’t read.
And what about our loss of identity? Our country is on more anti-depressants that any other nation. We have more self-help books, psychologists and more self-medications than at any time in history. And it is not helping. We are putting our hope in man. But man cannot fix what he has broken. We need something outside of ourselves to repair what we messed up. Otherwise we will struggle in vain, placing our false hope in religion, technology, medicine or environmentalism.
Redemption: We talked of this mystery being unveiled last week. Mankind’s freedom is ransomed by Christ blood. Mankind is being redeemed for his glory. Because of the cross we are in an already/not yet relationship. We already have communion with God and the Holy Spirit is with us but we are not yet ready to see his face in all his glory, we are already able to mend relationships with each other but we are not yet sinless against each other, we are already redeeming our work and labor for God’s glory but labor will still produce thorns, we are already raising families for God’s glory but our families are not yet perfect, and we already have a new identity in Christ but we are not yet fully living out of that identity. This is our present gospel story. We already belong to Christ and are to live lives that shine forth his Kingdom, yet we will still have to battle sin, temptation, worldly and fleshly desires. We still have to battle with idolatry and battle living out of our old aimless identities. Satan and demons have been judged and conquered by the cross and believers have real strength to battle the lies of the powers of the air but can still fall victim to lies, accusations and attacks of the enemy.
Revelation 21+22 Restoration: This is our verse today. This is gospel future. This is the story of all things restored. God’s dwelling heaven is now on a new, perfectly restored earth. Man now sees God face-to-face and is able to live. There is sinless, perfect unity amongst mankind, on an earth that no longer has any death, decay, pollution, or night. All of mankind will serve the Lord and be perfect stewards over the earth. Taking care of the planet and eating from the tree of life and drinking from the river of life for all eternity. Man and animals will once again be friends and not poop in each other’s yards. Work will no longer be a curse, but only a joy. Our identities will be perfectly formed and we will worship Jesus and know in full whom we are in Christ. Satan and his demons will be thrown into the pits of hell and tormented day and night for all of eternity. They will never attack Christ’s church again.
I must confess that redemption is my primary motivation. I love redemption. But think of the joy in seeing sin confessed and redeemed, of seeing marriages, work and families being redeemed from sin and the curse, and realize that this is nothing compared to what God has planned for the fullness of time. Redemption is just a glimpse of what will be full restoration. This is crazy. This should consume our minds.
We must confess that we do not often long for, dream of, or look forward to restoration and to heaven. I want us to explore why this is.
Christoplatonism: I want to briefly tell you what this is and why it is messed up. The short version is that the Greek philosophy that “spiritual is inherently always better than the physical” crept into Christianity over time. It is a teaching that says everything spiritual is good and everything physical is bad. This is not a biblical teaching. God made everything that is physical, and before the Fall he said everything he made is good. Once this Greek teaching took hold in Christianity, it started to really distort how we viewed heaven. We now viewed heaven not as a physical place, where we in our physical bodies would enjoy real physical, tangible pleasures, adventures and experiences. Instead heaven became known as a mysterious place where we are spiritual creatures floating around on a cloud playing a harp. This is not the biblical view of heaven that we see throughout scripture, and it makes sense that this non-biblical view would leave us less than excited for heaven.
There is a Gary Larson Far Side comic that captures our view of heaven. It has a dude sitting alone on a cloud and his caption says “wish I brought a magazine.” I think many of us think heaven will be boring. It will be one long church service for eternity. No wonder we are not excited for heaven. Who can relate to or look forward to this type of place.
But this is not the heaven we see in the bible. We see in scripture that we will have new bodies, and that we will not be lonely but actually have the most fulfilling relationships and community for all of eternity. It is not an ethereal and unreal place, but a real physical place. In fact it will be earth, but it will be earth how it was meant to be. It will be an earth with no death, decay or destruction. It is the garden restored but Christ will now dwell with his people, and heaven will be on this new earth. Heaven and earth united. God and his church united for all of eternity. There are trees, rivers, people, plants and animals. There will be mountains, canyons and cliffs to climb. We will have bodies, but bodies that are not aching, ill or falling part. We will have perfect taste, touch, smell, vision and hearing. It is not a stretch to think that our senses will be super human. We will have jobs, hobbies and interests but none of them will curse us, but only be used to glorify God and bring us joy.
The second major problem our society has with heaven is what I call boring adult syndrome. Basically a lot of old, fundamentalist and legalistic religious people have taken verses out of context and told us that “we can’t even imagine what heaven will be like so don’t even try!” We need to squash this because it is not biblical. Some of you are even still thinking of what we just talked about and are thinking where is he getting this? I want to show you some scripture that will fuel your imagination and appetite for heaven.
Verses encouraging a desire for heaven: Luke 10:20, Romans 8:18-25 hope and bodily redemption, Phillipians 3:13:14, Colossians 3:1-2, Hebrews 11:16
Verses envisioning a new body. Phillipians 3:20-21, Christ is physically resurrected. He has a physical body and the disciples touch him, see him, eat with him. Jesus stands, walks, talks and has a physical body. 1 Corinthians 15:42-44 – a body … not just a spirit, but a spiritual body. We are free to imagine and look forward to a renewed spiritual body. Our body may have new abilities. It is physical but a renewed spiritual body. Our body will definitely have some new wicked cool abilities.
Verses envisioning a new creation. Revelation 19:7-9 a marriage supper. Isaiah 25:6-8 filled with marrow – meat baby! Choice fruit and meat. I like food. If you are new here, we at Kaleo like food. We eat food at everything. We love food. Welcome to Kaleo! This is taking place on earth. We see in Revelation a new heaven and a new earth. Why does God give us these previews? So we will think upon heaven, march toward heaven, dream on a new earth and keep our eyes on The Promised Land. God gives us great imaginations so we can go to the most majestic places on our planet and eat the best meals and best wines on our planet and imagine that when the new heaven and the new earth meet, all of this will pale in comparison to the greatness of heaven. Let your imagination run wild.
Verses envisioning being with Christ. Revelation 22:4-5. The best part is we will see Christ face to face. God in all his glory will reveal himself and we will not burn up and melt away at the sight but will be able to gaze and worship him face to face. We get to meet and be with the one who has created everything for our enjoyment and his glory. We get to meet face to face our great rescuer and redeemer. Think of your favorite celebrity or hero on this planet. Imagine how excited you would be to meet that person and get their autograph. Or imagine how you would feel about being one of their friends. Now realize how disappointed you would be to realize that celebrity is selfish, greedy, egotistical or a bad friend. The thing about Christ is we will see him face to face. He is the greatest King, Hero, Ruler and Rescuer of all time. And we will not only get to see him but his name will be on our foreheads. We will belong to him for eternity. And he will never disappoint us, but will love us perfectly. I hope we all would have a great anticipation to see the God face to face that Moses and Isaiah got a glimpse of and barely survived. The best part about our new earth, our new bodies, our new heaven, is Christ. A heaven and earth without Christ is a hell. We should never be ok with dreaming of a heaven without Christ. Repent if you do not long to be with Christ. He is the one who makes all things glorious because they are glorious and enjoyable in the very fact that they point us to him. All things are brought to fruition in him! We will see perfectly how all things are to the glory and for the worship of him. It is all about Jesus and we will get to see him, be known by him and be with him for eternity.
It is like a trailer to a movie. It is meant to get you excited and thinking about the movie. And don’t you see that by focusing on heaven and Christ we get to take part in being a trailer for this movie? We get to live this way now. Loving God, each other, earth, and having an identity in Christ now. We get to be a community longing for heaven and previewing heaven to the world now. So they see the trailer and want the movie. We get to be a preview, a foretaste, and God gives us previews and a foretaste of heaven.
It is like the aroma of a rich garden. You can smell it and start picturing the flowers, colors and beauty of the garden, or the aroma of a feast. You start to salivate and imagine the taste and wonder of a feast. The pictures of a new heaven and new earth are to fuel our desires for heaven. We are to imagine and salivate for heaven. And we are to be a people that live in such a way that we become the aroma of Christ. We get to be in relationship with our God and remind each other and be a preview to the world of what it is like to have peace with your Creator God. We get to love and serve each other and preview to the world what it is like to have relationships with one another restored. We get to care for the planet and not shoot the neighbors' dog, but to show the people what it will look like to be good stewards over a new earth. Christ is calling us his church to be the preview of heaven. We are to pray the Lord’s prayer asking for it to be on earth as it is in heaven, and live in a way that responds to our own prayers! We are preview and trailer people!
But how is this all possible? This is all possible because we have an eternal hope. And if we look at our verse today we see that our eternal hope is in Christ. Jesus Christ is not just the location of this cosmic restoration, he is the agent of this restoration. In Christ, is our fallen-ness as he who knew no sin became sin. In Christ, is our separation from God as he separated himself from the Father on the cross. In Christ, is our separation from each other as the ones he created whipped, beat and hung him on the cross. In Christ, is our loss of identity as he gave up his identity as God’s accepted Son as the Father turned his face away on the cross. In Christ, is our curse with the earth as he was swallowed by earth in the tomb for three days. Jesus Christ takes our curse away. Our hope for restoration is in Christ. Do not place your hope in religions, technologies, Sea World, or a psychologist. Place your hope in Christ! The answer to our problems has been revealed to us and it is that all things will be united and restored in Jesus Christ! Amen.
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