The Glory of Heaven

Now I don't know what's making you cry today or be in pain, whether physical, emotional, circumstantial. Dr. Tony Evans says everything's going to change the moment you make it to heaven.

All that disappears forever. Celebrating 40 years of faithfulness, this is The Alternative with Dr. Tony Evans, author, speaker, senior pastor of Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship in Dallas, Texas, and president of The Urban Alternative. Storytellers, movie makers, and even theologians have their ideas about what heaven might be like. But today, Dr. Evans describes it from a purely biblical perspective that beats anything the human imagination could ever dream up.

Let's join him. One day, for all of those who belong to Jesus Christ, the Son of the King, Jesus Christ is going to locate you. And he is going to rapture you or receive you through death, where you will enter the end of the story and live happily ever after. The home that the Son of the King is going to take all of his believers to is called heaven.

The first thing I want you to know that Jesus makes it clear is heaven is a promised place. He says, believe in God, believe also in me. If heaven is not real, Jesus is a liar and so is his daddy.

Believe in God, believe also in me. To deny heaven is to call Jesus the liar and challenge his integrity. And if he is a liar and he has no integrity, why should I believe him for anything? He says, no, you believe in God, you believe also in me.

I'm not just talking, I'm telling you about a reality. So what you read in the Bible about heaven, the little that's given to us there, is tied to Christ's integrity. So he says, if you believe that there's a God up there, then you better buy what I'm saying about your future.

Don't call me a liar. It is not only a promised place, it is a paternal place. Notice what he calls it in my father's house. He calls heaven my father's house, where my daddy lives. I'm gonna take a day or two and go up to Baltimore to see my father and I will go to my father's house.

I'm not gonna go to the neighbors. I'm not gonna go to the folks in the community because when I go back to Baltimore, I'm going to my father's house. He'll be expecting me. And the reason why he's expecting me is I'm his son. I was born into his family. And what makes him my father is I'm running all up and down my skin and all over my body is daddy's DNA. I got my daddy's DNA. And so because I possess his DNA, I get to go to his house. The only folks who go into the father's house in heaven are folks who have the divine DNA.

Because you got to be a child in order for him to be a daddy. It says, I go to my father's house. Heaven will be also a populated place. Hebrews 12, 22, and 23 talks about all the folk who gonna be there.

Let's talk about a few of them. It says the Old Testament saints are gonna be in heaven. All them questions you had? You get to have lunch with Abraham and have Starbucks with Jacob. Walk in the malls of heaven with Esther and Ruth.

The things that you do not understand about what happened in the Bible and questions, you can find out the size of the stone that David used to down Goliath. Because the Old Testament saints, he says, are gonna be there. The New Testament saints, it says the church will be there.

Paul and Silas and Barnabas and Peter and the disciples and the saints of the church age will be there. Notice, he says, it is also a prepared place. I go to prepare a place for you. So there is preparation involved in your new location, just as people prepare for new people who move in to their house.

So you'll have a body prepared for heaven. You'll have a location prepared in the Father's house, heaven. The highlight that the Bible gives us is the capital of heaven, only the capital building or the capital city. It's called a city, but it's the city of heaven. John says in Revelation 21, he describes it all the way through Revelation 22 verse 5, this city coming down from heaven called the New Jerusalem. So the city is coming down from heaven. The city is not the total definition of heaven.

It's just the capital of heaven. Like in the millennium when Jesus rules from Jerusalem and Jerusalem will be the capital of earth, the now existing Jerusalem, in eternity, God is going to have the New Jerusalem coming out of the new heavens and earth. Revelation chapter 21 verse 1 says the old heaven and earth are going to pass away.

I call that the uncreation. Genesis 1, 1, you have the creation. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. But in Genesis 21, it says this heaven and this earth disintegrate.

Every proton, neutron, atom will disintegrate. All the energy that makes up the current heaven and current earth will be destroyed so that all remnants of sin are removed. Now, if God is going to destroy all the heavens and the earth, that can only mean that he lives outside of it.

Because there is another realm for which we are not acquainted that is outside of the created realm by the Creator because the Creator is not limited to his creation. So he says, I will show you your capital city. I will show you the Father's house.

Because guess what? The one in charge lives in the capital city. The governor lives in the capital city.

The president lives in the city of Washington. His abode is there. This is my Father's house. So this capital is where you're going when you're raptured or when you die, whichever comes first. I wish I had a better word, but there's no other word, is that it is an environment of perfection. It is a perfect place. First of all, let me talk about the size of your new home.

It's told us in verse 16 of Revelation chapter 21. It says, the city is laid out as a square, and its length is as great as its width. And he measured the city with the rod, 1,500 miles in length, width, height are equal. So the capital of heaven that's now coming down from heaven to earth, that capital is 1,500 in a square.

So to give you a picture of the capital of heaven as your new home, it is the size of half of the United States of America. United States of America is approximately 3,000 miles. Half of that is 1,500 miles. It is 1,500 miles going this way, this way, this way, and this way, but he throws in something that you wouldn't expect.

He says, it's 1,500 miles going up. And we're just talking about the capital now. It's not all of heaven.

It's not all of earth. It's just one city that's half the size. So you've never seen a city this size, because this is half of the country of America, one city. During a little math, a city that's 1,500 miles up would allow you to build 393 stories of building. So you think of a high rise. This is 393,000 at 24 feet per story.

So just looking at the height, and then you add to it the expanse. This thing is huge, but it's only one city. You'll find out in Scripture there will be many cities.

In fact, it talks about, in chapter 22, nations are existing. So I'm not giving you the whole ball of whack. I'm just giving you what the capital looks like.

The capital, this one city, it's staggering in its size. Its beauty will be perfect. Verse 11, having the glory of God, her brilliance was like a very costly stone, as a stone of crystal and clear jasper. Verse 18, the material of the wall was jasper, and the city was pure gold, like clear glass.

You've never seen this before. Now, I know we talk about, I'm gonna walk on the streets paved with gold. Okay, but so far so good, but that's not what that says. It says the whole city is built on gold. So everything in the city has been crafted with pure gold. When you look at how much man has been able to dig gold out of the earth for all the things that we use gold for, then we shouldn't be surprised that the Creator can create a gold city. Everything in the city is made of gold, and it is made of transparent gold.

Gold you can see through, as clear as crystal. When you look at what man has been able to do with the hotels in Las Vegas, and with the huge hotels in the Emirates, and all of the fancy things that man in his brilliance and in his sinfulness can produce, it shouldn't shock you that the Creator of the world can create such a city that will be spectacular in its brilliance. And all you will be able to say is, what? And the news just keeps on getting better, as we'll see when Dr. Evans comes back in a moment with more about what heaven is like. First though, I want to tell you how you can receive the current double resource offer while it's still available. Tony's book, Prayers for Victory in Spiritual Warfare, will teach you how to reach out to God to get the help you're needing, whether you're dealing with everyday issues or some serious spiritual strongholds. This is a proven resource that's already being used by over a hundred thousand readers.

And as a part of this package, we're offering the luxury edition, with a cover that looks and feels like leather. Along with the book, we'll also send you a copy of Tony's current two-volume series, Prophecy and Our World. These twelve full-length messages on both downloadable MP3s and CDs dig deep into what the Bible says about the rapture, the tribulation, the second coming, the judgment seat of Christ, and many more. To get your copy, just visit tonyevans.org, make a contribution, and we'll say thanks by sending these two powerful resources your way. Again, that's the twelve-part teaching series, Prophecy and Our World, and Tony's popular book, Prayers for Victory in Spiritual Warfare. Just visit tonyevans.org to make the arrangements, or call 1-800-800-3222, and let one of our resource team members help you. I'll have our contact information for you again after part two of today's lesson.

Here's Dr. Evans. Verse four of Revelation 21. And he will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and there will be no longer any death, there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain. The first things have passed away. Now I don't know what's making you cry today, or be in pain, whether physical, emotional, circumstantial. All that disappears.

And it disappears forever. The psalmist says in Psalm 1611, he says, In thy presence is joy forevermore. So here's what I want you to do. I want you, if you can, to think of the best day of your life. Whatever that day was— I know some of you are saying, I don't have one, but try. Whatever the best day, whether you were a child, a teenager, or an adult, what is that one day that you said, I wish every day could be like today? That's the best day of your life. Now multiply that by a million. One hundred quad zillion years from now, there will have not been one decrease in the joy that you had upon your arrival.

Why? Because everything—watch this, this is a small thing I'm going to say, but its profundity is great— because everything, all the time, will be new. We are all excited when something is new. New clothes, new car, new house, new friends, new mate.

Everybody's excited when something is new. The problem with new is it gets old. The car smell goes, the new house you get used to, the maid you don't want to live with no more. It's just you get tired because new doesn't stay new, which is why we're in debt, because we're always trying to buy something to feel new. That's why Madison Avenue and the advertisements get our attention, because we want the feeling of something new, because the new becomes old.

If we get something new, it makes us feel better about ourselves. But in heaven, nothing ever deteriorates. The second law of thermodynamics is inoperable, and so everything is new all the time. So one minute from now is newer than now. I know that's hard to grasp, but one minute from now is newer than now. And throughout eternity, everything is new.

Why? Because the book of James chapter 1 says, in Him there is no shifting shadow. What's a shifting shadow?

Nighttime. See, the earth rotates around the sun. The earth spins, and it rotates around the sun, and it spins, and it rotates around the sun, and as it spins, it rotates around, it casts a shadow called nighttime on half the earth.

So half the earth is dark while half the earth is lit, because this thing keeps spinning. He says, James says, every good and perfect gift comes from above. So everything in your life that's good comes from God. Everything that's bad does not come from God.

The reason why only good comes from God is because in God, there is no shifting shadow. In other words, there's no turning. There's no night. And because there is no turning, and the reason why there's no turning is we're told in chapter 21, there will be no sun. Because there will be no 24-hour period as you know it now.

Because it says there will be no nighttime. So God is gonna give you a body that can receive everything new, never get bored, never get tired, so every time you do something, you're gonna go, whoa, whoo, wow, good googa mooga, Lord have mercy, that it will dominate the environment all the time. No boredom, no loss of energy, no need to sleep, because you will never get tired.

You will have a glorified body. Some of you, some of us are already maybe planning vacations. Sometimes those vacations include things you've never done before.

Maybe you've never been on a cruise or never went to Italy or never done this or never done that. It can get a little exciting, planning to go a special place that you've never been before. It can get exciting.

I'm looking forward to it. I can't wait to vacation. But to live in anticipation of what is to come, even though it's not vacation time yet, the more you think about it, the more you're excited.

What God wants you to do with it, He wants you to think about heaven so you stay excited, even though you haven't gotten there yet. So that when vacation time comes, you're ready to go, your knowledge will be perfect. You will never stop learning because God is inexhaustible. So since God is inexhaustible, you'll never stop learning. You'll just have the capacity to understand.

You will be given the brain power, the mind power, to make Google look stupid. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go to prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself, that where I am, you will be also. Guess what God calls us? The bride of Christ. So the husband is coming for his girl, the church, in order to take us to his paradise.

Because it won't be the same if he wasn't there. It will be the Savior's presence that will turn heaven from just being a beautiful place to hang out to a great experience to have as the bride of the bridegroom when the bride comes for his bride to take us home. However, whenever you travel to a foreign country, you need a passport. The only way to legitimately get in to a foreign country, you must have a passport that grants you access. God will only let you into heaven if you have the right credentials.

If you do not have the right credentials, you don't get to enter there. And many people are wanting to go to heaven without a passport. Or with a passport that no longer works. If you go to God and show him your passport of good works, he's gonna say, unacceptable, you can't come here. If you show him a passport of your church membership, he's gonna say, unacceptable, you can't come here. If you show him a passport of your keeping the Ten Commandments, he'll say, unacceptable, you can't come in here.

If you show him a passport that you're just a nice person, he will say, unacceptable, you can't come in here. Because the only passport he accepts is the blood of Jesus Christ, who was wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities. Only through receiving Jesus Christ as your personal Savior will your passport be stamped and entrance be granted. There will be many people think that they're going to heaven, hope that they're going to heaven, wanting to go to heaven, desiring to go to heaven, who will be denied interest because their names will not be written in the Lamb's Book of Life because they did not come by means of the blood. You must come by the cross of Jesus Christ in order to have access to the pristine beauty of eternity. And if you have not accepted Jesus Christ, you cannot enter into God's holy heaven.

But God says, at the end of chapter 22 of Revelation, come all who are thirsty, come all who are hungry, and I will quench your thirst and give you eternal life. If you're ready to say yes to Jesus' invitation, stay with us, because Dr. Evans will come back in a moment to tell you how to do that. In the meantime, there's more to this lesson than we had time to bring you on the air today, but the complete full-length version is available as a part of our current two-volume 12-message series, Prophecy and Our World. Don't forget, you'll get both volumes of this collection on CD and digital download as our thank-you gift when you make a contribution to help us keep Tony's teaching on this station. And if you make a contribution by tomorrow night, we'll also include a special bonus, the high-quality keepsake edition of Tony's book, Prayers for Victory in Spiritual Warfare.

This is a special limited-time offer, so don't wait. Visit tonyevans.org or reach out to our resource center at 1-800-800-3222, where team members are always on hand to help you. That's tonyevans.org or by phone at 1-800-800-3222. Well, right now, here's a final word from Dr. Evans. If you have yet to accept Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, we can resolve that right now. I'm going to say a little prayer. I want you to pray it after me, but you've got to mean it for yourself. Lord Jesus, I'm a sinner, and I know I need a Savior because I can't save myself. So right now, I trust You alone because You died for me and arose for me to be my sin-bearer. You are now my substitute, and I'm believing You to forgive my sin and to give me eternal life. Thank You for the free gift of salvation that You have given to me. Help me to live a life to please You. In Jesus' name, amen. Welcome to the family, and we'll keep ministering to you for your spiritual growth through our broadcast. God bless you. The Alternative with Dr. Tony Evans is brought to you by the Urban Alternative and is celebrating 40 years of faithfulness thanks to the generous contributions of listeners like you.