Life in the Father's House

So every time we enter the Father's house through one of those pearly gates, we're not going to be assigned one gate. Somebody asked me after the first hour, do we only go through one? No, there are several gates.

Like you could get into this auditorium, you can go through that one and then that one and that one. But every time you enter through one of those gates, you're going to be reminded Jesus Christ was born on earth, but he was born in order to suffer in death, in order to fashion a doorway that will be open to all who enter by faith. What will your experience be like in heaven? What does heaven look like and what will we be doing when we're there?

Today on Wisdom for the Heart, Stephen brings his current series to a close. He opens the book of Revelation to unpack the architectural immensity and infinite glory of the Father's house and our place in it. We will live in the celestial city on the perfected earth within a perfected universe, and we ourselves will be perfected. Heaven is an aspect of God's creation, and we're going to explore that next.

This lesson is called Life in the Father's House. Today we come to the conclusion of our study entitled In Living Color. We're coming to the end of it, not because we've exhausted the subject, but because we've exhausted the speaker.

Not really. In fact, this has been invigorating and intriguing to me. So many subjects have come to our attention, which is why I just couldn't stop. We just had to keep going.

But today will be our last discussion. This is a wonderful study if you're visiting with us on the creative handiwork of God. And I'm grateful, as we have learned, that we're going to have all of eternity with Christ as our guide to explore his new, newly created earth and newly created universe, exploring it forever. I thought it would only be appropriate for us to end this series by going back one more time and looking at this future home and answer perhaps a few more questions about life in the Father's house along the way. So if you've brought a copy of the Bible, turn to Revelation and to that description, and let's go to chapter 21.

We're going to drop in here and there as John describes it. He says in verse 10, if you look there, And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me the holy city, Jerusalem coming down out of heaven, you could think of that as out of the heavens, from God, having the glory of God, her brilliance was like a very costly stone, like crystal clear jasper. He goes on to say that it had a great and high wall, this outer wall, and there will be these gates, these gates with inscribed names upon them. If you look down at verse 17, John doesn't tell us how high this wall is, but he does tell us it happens to be 144 cubits thick.

That's helpful, translated into English, it's probably around 250 feet thick. That's a thick wall. If you look further down at verse 21, we're told there are 12 gates hinged to this wall, three on each side of the four sides of the city. Each gate is made out of a single pearl, matching the thickness of the wall it's hinged to, which then allows us to begin to figure out, to begin to kind of imagine the unimaginable. I mean, we're not even going to get inside yet before we are staggered by the grandeur and the immensity of heaven, the Father's house. Each gate would have a diameter, each pearly gate would have a diameter then of 250 feet. Can you imagine a pearl whose diameter is 250 feet?

You talk about going through the pearly gates, imagine the immensity and the glory, and we're just at the front door. By the way, if you've ever wondered why pearls would be used by the Lord in creating the gates, we're not told. But I think it's interesting that of all the precious gems we're told are built into the architecture of this house, the foundation stones at each of the 12 levels going up Father's house at the very top with its glorious throne.

These foundation stones of jasper and onyx that are going to refract and reflect the light of God through this translucent city of gold, we can't imagine it. But this is the only element, the only gem which is formed by a living creature. When you think about that little oyster that produces that little pearl, it comes from an irritation, it comes from a wound, it comes from a grain of sand that gets inside its shell and that oyster layers over it and over it and over it, over and over again this substance until it forms this pearl. A pearl is something beautiful crafted out of something painful. You might say that a pearl is the answer of the oyster to that which injured it. Think about heaven being the answer of God to that which injured God the Son. Jesus bore the greatest irritation possible of sin and shame and the wrath of God and something beautiful emerges from something so painful. So every time we enter the Father's house through one of those pearly gates, we're not going to be assigned one gate. Somebody asked me after the first hour, do we only go through one?

No. There are several gates like you could get into this auditorium, you can go through that one and then that one and that one, but every time you enter through one of those gates, you're going to be reminded Jesus Christ was born on earth, but he was born in order to suffer in death, in order to fashion a doorway that will be open to all who enter by faith. John gives us measurements.

We're not going to get into the weeds here, but let me just mention a few things. He reveals it's measured, I believe, as a cube. He's given us the sum total of somewhere between 1,300 and 1,500 miles, and the reason it's difficult is because we're not sure today how long a stadia is, but we can be fairly confident that he's given us the sum total of a cube and that would be 11 times 11 times 11, which would give us then the length 11 miles long of each of those city walls and then 11 miles high. If you saw the tallest mountain in the world, Mount Everest, which stretches 29,000 feet into the air, you'd have to stack one Mount Everest on top of another to reach the height of the Father's house. It's 11 miles high. We're told by the Apostle John that the river of life is going to flow from its origin being the Father's throne, which we know is at the top. It's going to cascade down. If you can imagine, this is evenly divided. Each floor would be at least a mile high. Can you imagine a waterfall a mile long? When the Lord promised his disciples in John 14 that they would have a dwelling place in the Father's house, your Bible might render that mansions.

So you get those gospel songs, I'm going to have a mansion, and you wonder how close you're going to get to the Father's house, how good you've been. Maybe you're a block away. Maybe you're a mile away. Maybe you're in another county. I'm just hoping to be in the same state. I don't know about you.

We miss the point. You've got a dwelling place here forever. In the meantime, and even now, believers who die are going to this house.

This is heaven. This is where, having been absent from the body, they are immediately in the presence of the Lord. There's no limbo. There's no purgatory. There's no soul sleep. Your body, as it were, goes to sleep. That's what a deceased body looks like.

It's sleeping, but you've never been more awake. You're in the presence of the Lord, Paul writes. Imagine what life will be like in the Father's house. Here's a question I want to address, again, a little bit more detailed because I've been asked this question. I want to answer a little bit of it with the clues we've been given in Scripture. What is life for them like now? What will life be like for us? For those who've already died, what are they experiencing?

What are the clues? Will we remember who we are after we die and we're there? Are we still us?

The answer is yes, but perfected. Everyone said, Amen, because we don't want to be just like us right now. We're going to be perfected in holiness. Our memories will remain. You won't forget who you are.

You won't forget who you were on earth. In fact, God intends for us to remember the 12 apostles, the 12 sons of Jacob. Their names are written on the gates and the foundations of the gemstones and the gates in that celestial city. Every time you pass through a gate, you're going to see on it and scribe the name of one of the 12 sons of Israel, Jacob. We're going to remember them. Every time you go up, perhaps another level to visit somebody, you're going to be reminded of one of the 12 apostles.

The foundation stones have their names engraved on them. When you see the name Peter, you're going to remember Peter from what you've learned. You're going to remember the sin of Peter. Peter's going to remember his denial. However, our memories are going to be perfected in holiness with a perspective of God.

Peter's not dwelling on his sin, nor will we. We're going to dwell on the grace of Christ in our lives that will make heaven so sweet because we're going to recognize we're there by his grace, by his birth and death on our behalf. We're not going to go, I wonder why I'm here. I wonder how I got here.

What are we going to know? Surely you think nobody in heaven today is talking or thinking about anything unless it's positive, unless it's happy, which is happy, happy stuff. Well, you might think that until you start exploring Scripture. Consider the Mount of Transfiguration. Let me give you a couple of illustrations.

What's your appetite to study it a little more? The Mount of Transfiguration is where the Lord... You remember Peter, James, and John are sleeping through it, and they finally wake up, and it's glorious. And Moses and Elijah have come to talk with Jesus. Now, Moses died 1,500 years before that moment.

He's still Moses. There they are talking to the Lord, and they're robed, as we've seen, in glorious splendor. Matthew describes it as like flashes of lightning. What are they talking about? They're talking to Jesus, Luke tells us, about his coming crucifixion. That didn't ruin paradise for them. They're coming to talk about his death, his sacrifice.

They're still Moses and Elijah. They don't need an introduction to Jesus when they arrive at that mountaintop. They know what's going to happen next with all its suffering and sorrow. They know what is coming. In fact, I've wondered, we're not told, but of all of the scholars I've read, we're still not sure, but I would perhaps throw my hat in at this thought, that Moses and Elijah were the two sent because they both experienced the rejection of Israel. And they're talking about the crucifixion.

We know that much. They're talking about the rejection of mankind, or by mankind, of Jesus. And we're told later on in Luke that the Lord just seems to be resolute as a man, fully man, fully God, resolute as he heads toward Jerusalem after that conversation. They have buoyed his spirit.

Let me give you another clue. Further along in Revelation, there's an angel who at one point John sees him pointing to the events happening on earth during the tribulation period. And John watches as all of the believers who are already there in heaven begin to rejoice over the judgment of God in Revelation 18 and 20. They're evidently able to observe his judgment to some degree.

In fact, in the next chapter, Revelation 19, as God is judging the enemies of God, the empire of Satan through the antichrist during the tribulation, you read this interesting text. There is this roar of a great multitude. These are the redeemed, by the way. And here's what they're saying. Hallelujah, salvation and glory and power belong to our God.

Why? Because his judgments are true and righteous. The redeemed are thanking God for his judgment over evil.

It didn't ruin heaven for them either. People in heaven are very aware of the wrath of God being poured out on the earth and the judgment of God upon unbelieving human beings. In fact, if you go back earlier to Luke 15, you find the illustration of our Lord during his ministry.

He's promising this. You know this text. You've probably heard it, that there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents, one sinner who is saved. Have you ever thought about the fact that that verse doesn't tell us that the angels are doing the ones rejoicing, but that the rejoicing is taking place in the presence of the angels? But believers living in the Father's house who've gone on ahead along with the Lord certainly would break out in celebration at the conversion of another lost sinner. In fact, a sinner they evidently knew needed saving. A sinner they evidently knew hadn't gotten saved yet. A sinner they evidently knew just got saved. And so the celebration begins as they celebrate the fact that that sinner joins the family of God. Imagine the implications of that. We've reached the wrong conclusion that for heaven to be heaven, we can't know anything about what's happening on earth.

Millions of people. There's another clue who've come to faith during the tribulation period and are martyred. They're going to be beheaded as quickly as the Antichrist can catch them. And then they go to be in the presence of the Lord in the Father's house. Here's the Apostle John who hears these martyred tribulation believers praying. Here's what they're saying to God.

Revelation 6, verse 10. How long, O Lord, will you refrain from judging and avenging our blood on those who dwell on the earth? It is inevitably ruining heaven for them to know they were martyred and to know their blood needs avenging.

In fact, think of it. They're in heaven and they know the judgment of God is not yet completed on earth. How long, O Lord, are you going to wait before you avenge our blood and your glory is established on earth?

Think about that. They're in heaven but they're still praying to God to act. They're in heaven but they're still waiting for an answer to a very fresh prayer. They're in heaven.

They're aware of earth. They're aware of its violence and the reign of evil and it evidently isn't ruining heaven for them. But it sure reshapes your thinking of heaven, doesn't it? See, future happiness in heaven is not based on our failure to know what's happening on earth. It's based on our being able to see what's happening on earth with a new perspective and a holy perspective of our Lord's doings. With perfected hearts, with perfected and glorified minds, we're going to see everything in light of the glory of God. We're going to glory in the grace of God for the redeemed and we're going to glory in the holy justice of God over the unredeemed and we're going to glory in that of God with equal admiration.

So what we can gather, there is an awareness of major issues and major events. The believers are not omnipresent. They can't see everything and we're not told they're looking at everything. But evidently, they're involved in the timeline and the progression as the future unfolds, which gives you a different thinking of time in heaven. Now don't get the idea that people in heaven are watching your every move or watching you sleep this morning in church.

You're going to be afraid to watch that football game this afternoon or take a nap. Man, I'm going to do both to the glory of God. I want you to know that. Listen, we don't know all the facets of what our beloved in heaven see and know, but we do need to rethink the idea that they don't care.

I think they deeply care. And maybe someone in this auditorium this hour is an unbeliever and they long to receive the news that you've repented and come to faith in Christ and that celebration today could begin. Let me add another thought. Our happiness in heaven is not going to depend on a memory swipe so that we don't remember anything we did or said on earth.

Your memories are what makes you who you are, good and bad. In fact, we're going to stand before the Lord and what is he going to do? Remind us of everything we did for his glory's sake. We're not going to stand there and go, I didn't know I did that. I didn't know I said that.

Well, no. In fact, our memories are going to be perfected. But our happiness in heaven is not going to be based on the fact that we can't remember. It's going to be based on the fact that Jesus has forgiven us and there in heaven we are going to be able to grasp that thought and our perfected holiness which will be liberating and freeing for we will see him and we will embrace him and we will no longer doubt that we will be with him and we will glory in our worship of him.

We will be secured in him forever. Jesus, by the way, has kept his wounds to remind us of how we got in. We'll know like never before, it was my sin that did that. Is that going to ruin heaven? It will explode it with glory and meaning and grace.

Lord, I did that. This is what's going to make heaven, heaven. So the joy of heaven isn't based on our ignorance. It's based on new understanding.

Let me point out one more thing. John writes in verse 14 of Revelation 21, the wall of the city had 12 foundation stones and on them were the 12 names of the 12 apostles of the Lamb. Now don't get all hung up with who's the 12th. We're all theologians. We just missed the whole point because we're wondering is it Matthias who was elected by Lot and Acts 1? Or is it Paul, the apostle? I don't know.

I do know it's not me and it's not you. Don't sweat it. But what I think is fascinating that the gates and the foundations as you study it, you notice it doesn't have verses engraved on it. The only thing engraved into the architecture of heaven are names, personal names of real people. It's as if God is saying I'm going to remind you the redeemed of all of the Old Testament and the redeemed of all of the New Testament, that we're all there as family members. We're going to remember we're there because of the grace of Christ. So we're going to remember our lives together like Peter and James and John are going to get around to each other and talk about what it was like when they were walking. We're going to remember this church. We're going to remember our worship together. We're going to remember our service together.

We're going to remember our family. But it's all going to be perfected. By the way, there will be plenty of time for apologies, plenty of time for forgiveness. As God cleans us all up, we will then learn and develop the never again stained with sin, experiencing a deeper awareness of God and His forgiveness.

We're going to rejoice in what we've come through and where we are now. But unlike the first creation, this new creation will not have the potential of another Lucifer rebelling. One of those angels isn't going to decide one day, you know, I'd really like to be at the top of the Father's house. They're confirmed in holiness. There's never a threat of another Adam and Eve among us.

Adam and Eve, by the way, were created innocent, not perfect, innocent with the ability to sin. Your nature will be gone and you will be as unable to sin as Jesus, in whose likeness you've been glorified. Our perfection and glorification is guaranteed forever here in this city of God, city of gold, heaven on a new earth, surrounded by a new universe. The Father's house of glory will be without any iniquity. Our hearts and our lives will be without any impurity. Our service for Him, imagine this, will be without any inconsistency.

We're not going to be hot and cold, up and down. And our worship of Him will go on and on and on without any stopping. It will go on unceasingly, forever and ever and ever, living color like we've never seen. That was Steven Davey and he called this lesson Life in the Father's House. This lesson brings to a close Steven's series on creation called In Living Color. If this series was a blessing to you, there are three ways that you can access it again. First of all, we've posted this series to our website. You can listen to each message or read Steven's manuscript, free and on demand.

You'll find that at wisdomonline.org. We've made the series into a set of CDs. If you'd like to have that set in your library of biblical resources, we can make it available to you. And finally, this series has been turned into a book. The book is also called In Living Color. It actually includes illustrations at each chapter. It's a beautifully bound, hardback book that's been available during this series at a special rate. And that continues today.

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