Soon ... and Very Soon!

And listen, I say all of this to say, and we're going to say a lot of it in the future, but heaven is a literal place.

It isn't a figment of some imagination. Jesus Christ said, I am going away to prepare a place for you, and if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and take you to myself, that where I am, there you may be also. And soon, and very soon, we are going to that place. Heaven is a real place, and heaven is the destination of all true Christians. But what is heaven like? Where is heaven?

What can we know about this wonderful place? Some people have claimed to have been to heaven, and then returned to write a book about it. But the truth about heaven only comes from the Bible, and it gives us some clues. Today on Wisdom for the Heart, Stephen Davey begins a series called The First Hymns of Heaven. It comes from Revelation 4. The Apostle John records the scene from God's throne room in heaven.

This lesson is called Soon and Very Soon. In September of last year, USA Today ran the results of a survey conducted by the American Association of Retired Persons. The survey revealed that the majority of people 50 years old and older believe in life after death.

The same statistics nearly hold up for the younger people as well. Of the people surveyed, I read, it was interesting, 94% of them claimed to believe in the existence of an eternal God and an eternal heaven. Not quite as many were sure of an eternal hell, but we would expect that. Most believed in an eternal heaven. More than half of them said their belief in heaven had increased as they had gotten older. There is an intuitive sense of something out there beyond, and books and movies that have to do with life after death gain a lot of attention, don't they?

Not to mention books written by people who claim to have had a near-death experience and have returned from either heaven or hell to tell their story. The sense that we live forever has shaped civilizations, all of them throughout human history. Even secular anthropologists have noted this unifying thought. One author catalogued, Australian aborigines believe in a distant island beyond the western horizon.

The early Finns believed it was an island in the far away east. Peruvians and Polynesians believed that they would go to live on the sun or the moon after death. Native Americans believed that their spirits would hunt the spirits of buffalo after death. The pyramids of Egypt filled with treasures and maps and even servants put to death alongside the rich and politically powerful gave testimony to the Egyptian belief that they would need servants and money and maps, direction, in the coming afterlife. Even the first century pagan Roman philosopher named Seneca once said that a person's last day on earth was the birthday of their eternity.

Where do they come up with that? This unifying thought, this unifying testimony of belief in some kind of conscious existence beyond life. Well Solomon tells us why as he wrote in Ecclesiastes 3.11 that God has implanted the truth of eternity in the heart of mankind.

He's built us this way. And anybody who says they don't believe in life after death is doing nothing more than suppressing the truth just as they suppress the existence of a creator God, Romans 1.18. But for the believer and seen in our expressions and felt throughout this auditorium today, one of the great delights of Christianity if not one of the chief distinctives is the revelation of our God regarding life after death. Christ has left nothing to mysticism or guest war. He's left no room for the thought of limbo, some floating endlessly state, some sort of eternal consignment to wander the earth as some disembodied spirit, to come back and haunt your house or your neighborhood as a ghost.

As attractive as that might seem for a day or two before you go on. The apostle Paul wrote to be absent from the body that is through death is to be present with whom? The Lord, 2 Corinthians 5.8. Jesus Christ made the amazing claim as God incarnate when he said, I am the resurrection and the life. He that believes in me, though he dies, yet shall he be alive. John 11.25. This is the distinction of Christianity.

This is the distinctive doctrine of our faith. Many religions and isms in the world believe that when they die, they come back again and again until they get it right, ultimately becoming one with some divine consciousness or one with God. Others believe that you go on to actually become a God. Christianity says now you go to live with God.

That's what happens. You retain your distinctive personality, your unique persona, though given a perfected spirit and glorified body as we enter the new heaven ultimately and the new earth. We don't get absorbed into God. We don't become a God.

We rule and reign with God. This belief is the fabric of the Christian faith. So you discover deep in the catacombs of Rome, the tombs of second century Christians who were martyred for their faith in Christ bearing inscriptions that read with confidence their belief in life with God after death. One inscription reads, He who lives with God. Another reads, He was taken up into his eternal home. Yet another reads, In Christ, Alexander is not dead but lives. They had simply believed the record of the apostles teaching. Like this one from Paul who wrote to the Philippians, For me to live is Christ, and to die even better.

Why? Because dying means I get to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far. Philippians 1 21 and 23. Paul wrote to the church in Corinth. So we are always of good courage. We know that while we are at home in the body, we are away from the Lord. For we walk by faith, not by sight. But we would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord. Second Corinthians five six and eight. See for the believer, death is simply the hand that opens the doorway into heaven.

So this isn't morbid thinking. This is faith rooted in the certainty of the apostles doctrine. This is the expression of faith in what God has told us about life after death. No wonder the apostle Paul, who had already himself been given a personal tour of heaven in the spirit.

No wonder he said, I would rather be there than here. 50 years after John recorded the book of what we call Revelation, a Greek man named Aristides wrote a letter to his friend, and he talked with some amazement to his friend about Christians living around him. He wrote, If a Christian passes from the world, they all rejoice and offer thanks to God, and they escort his body to the grave with songs and thanksgiving as if he were merely setting out from one place to another place.

What an interesting testimony of our faith. Ladies and gentlemen, perhaps our courage about the future is not as strong as it ought to be, because our view of heaven is weaker than it should be. Maybe your faith and facing the future is not deeper, because your understanding of heaven is superficial. The apostle Paul comforted the church by telling it about heaven, 1 Thessalonians 4. The apostle Peter strengthened the resolve of the suffering believer by reminding him of heaven, 1 Peter 1. In fact, our Lord himself comforted his disciples by telling them about heaven, John chapter 14. Could it be that we don't think about and talk about enough and study enough about heaven, nearly enough?

Do we really believe that soon, and very soon, we are going to see the king? For that reason and many more, I'm thrilled to begin with you a series of studies on the vision of John, which now sweeps us into the throne room of heaven, and his eyewitness account found in Revelation chapters 4 and 5. We've arrived at Revelation chapter 4, verse 1. After this, I looked, and behold, a door, standing open in heaven. And the first voice, which I had heard speaking to me, he goes back to chapter 1 like a trumpet, said, come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this. Now, you might notice that the verse begins and ends with the phrase, perhaps you could circle them and draw a line connecting them.

This phrase, after this, metatelta, after these things. It's a phrase that will appear often through this revelation, and it transitions the reader to a new facet, a new vision of John the apostle, a new vision indicating a new series of events. So you could do, perhaps, in your own study, as I have done, I have gone and circled every time it appears in the book of Revelation, after this, after this, after this. Now, earlier in chapters 2 and 3, John had focused our attention on God the Son speaking to the church on earth. Now the scene shifts, and the church is singing to God in heaven.

So it shifts from earth to heaven, along with some rather strange creatures that we will study later on. This, by the way, explains the absence of the church from Revelation chapter 4 all the way to the marriage supper of the Lamb in chapter 19. The church is missing. It's absent.

It's silent. By the way, this fits perfectly with the promise of Christ given to the church earlier in chapters 2 and 3, right? Where he said that the faithful church in Philadelphia, he said, I will keep you from the hour of testing that will come upon the whole world, Revelation chapter 3 verse 10, tero ek.

I will take you away out of, from the presence of, the testing that will cover the earth. By the way, this is the same promise delivered by the apostle Paul to the Thessalonians in 1 Thessalonians chapter 5 verse 9 where he writes, for God has not appointed us, the church, to wrath. Even more specifically, Paul refers to the wrath of God in chapter 1 of Thessalonians, 1 Thessalonians, where he writes, you wait for his Son from heaven, Jesus, who delivers us from the wrath to come, chapter 1 verse 10.

This is the promise to the church age from first century Thessalonica and Philadelphia to the 21st century. We live under the promise that God's wrath will never be poured out upon the church, not ever. Now, this can't be a reference to the judgment of God at the great white throne and the sentence of eternal wrath from God, which is described in Revelation chapter 20. The church has never feared that wrath. We are not afraid of that wrath and never have been. In fact, the church will not even be standing before the great white throne in fear of God's wrath. We will actually be there judging the unbelievers who stand before the great white throne as they are given the verdict of eternal punishment, 1 Corinthians chapter 6 verse 2. So what wrath from God would the church be troubled about? Would the church fear? What would God desire to encourage the church in Thessalonica and Philadelphia and us by promising to take us away from, literally, you could render it, to remove us altogether out of the reach of?

It is this wrath of God, this coming terror of God, which will cover the whole earth, this period of universal tribulation on earth. After this, I looked and behold, a door standing open in heaven. Now this door will provide access for John to be transported in spirit into the third heaven. He hears the voice saying, notice your text, come up here and I will show you what must take place after this, after this being after the church age. And at once, verse 2, I was in the spirit. It is John's body is on earth, he is in his spirit, taken up to heaven, which begs another introductory question. Where's heaven?

Well, the voice says what? Come up, so heaven is obviously up. We're starting easy here, okay?

See, this is the easy part. Well, the Hebrew word translated heaven, shamayim, means literally up or height. It's a plural word which could be rendered great heights or at the greatest height. The Greek word for heaven, uranus, gives us the name of our planet Uranus, which means an elevated place, a place that is highly lifted up. So heaven is a place that is raised up, elevated, I believe, far above the planets, far above our solar system. In fact, I believe with one author who said it this way, it is at the apex, the greatest height of God's created universe. Remember, at his incarnation, Jesus Christ came down to the earth and when he left at his ascension, he went up. And listen, I say all of this to say, and we're gonna say a lot of it in the future, but heaven is a literal place.

It isn't a figment of some imagination. Jesus Christ said, I am going away to prepare a place for you, and if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and take you to myself that where I am, there you may be also. And soon, and very soon, we are going to that place. The average Christian has come to view heaven as some sort of nebulous, wispy, cloudy thing where we're gonna strum our harps, or some palace courtyard where we're just gonna stand around forever and wonder how we will not be bored to death and we're afraid to say it. We're afraid to say it. We don't look forward to heaven because we really don't know much about it.

And yet the record of scripture is filled with so much of it and we're only gonna touch on it in chapters 4 and 5 and then the remainder of it when we get to chapters 21 and 22 in the next millennium, I'm sure. Well, this is a real place with real gates, real streets. We're even told the pavement is translucent gold, which means we're gonna be walking. We're gonna feel it.

We're gonna touch it. This is the place where Christ ascended. This is the place he has prepared for his bride.

This is for real. And so Christ says, come up, John. Come up here to heaven. Verse 2, at once I was in the Spirit and behold, a throne. Look, I saw a throne standing in heaven with one seated on the throne.

Mark this. This is obviously as we will see God the Father, he is seated, distinguished from the Lamb of God, the Son of God in chapter 5, which we'll see later. Being seated is a posture describing the position of an emperor who is currently reigning. So this is a reference to the sovereign ruling directing power of God.

Listen, ladies and gentlemen, he is not resting. He is reigning and his throne is going to appear over and over and over again throughout this revelation. In fact, you can circle the word throne as I have done 12 times in chapter 4 alone.

13 when you include the thrones of the elders, specifically referencing then these 12, the throne of God. So John sees God the Father seated on the throne, but the figure of God the Father is lost in this dazzling display of light that surrounds the throne. See, one of the troubles, and I'm going to deal with this probably later, that I have with people who talk about heaven saying they've gone there and they've come back is they use words that we can easily understand.

They talk about everything but what John saw. In fact, he has difficulty describing it. He has no vocabulary to describe the brilliant light surrounding the throne of God. And so he will use words like the appearance of or like.

He stumbles over the inadequacy of language. It's kind of like asking a young man who is head over heels in love with a young lady to describe her. Well, you know, really, totally amazing. It's incredible.

She's better than, you know, it's just like the beginning. Wow, it's, you know. You think, thanks, that's great.

I got a picture now in my head. John says, this is like, you know, as close as I can get to describing what I saw. Now notice in your text there are two precious gems referenced. I think the first is more than likely the diamond this crystal clear description that will appear again in Revelation 21. He says around the throne here I saw one whose appearance, verse three, the appearance of Jasper, probably more than likely this translucent gem different to John in the first century than what we commonly understand today.

In other words, you have the shining flashing facets of the glory of God compared to the brilliance of light reflecting off a diamond, reflecting all the colors of the spectrum. The next stone, Carnelian, I think it ought to be translated as Sardius. It's the fiery deep red stone.

In fact, the Greek word gives us the name of the city Sardis. What's interesting, by the way, is that these two stones were the first and last gemstones on the breast piece of the high priest. They represented the firstborn and the lastborn sons of Jacob, as if to symbolize that even though the wrath of God is about to be unleashed on planet Earth, primarily upon Israel, God's covenant with the sons of Israel will not be destroyed.

He will keep his promise to ethnic Israel, to the nation. No matter what you read in the newspapers or watch on television, no matter how sad or glad or fearful or troubling, everything takes place under the shadow of this great sovereign God. That's been 60 years since Pentecost when John seized his vision. One could easily wonder, along with his last living apostle, hey, I thought that the gates of Hades would not prevail against the church.

I thought we were on the winning side. I thought we would be a worldwide movement by now. I thought we would influence Caesar and shape culture. Instead, we're being persecuted and Caesar is silencing our witness. It seems his Roman culture is more corrupt than when we first delivered the gospel to it. And the last living apostle who sees the vision is exiled on an island, expecting to die, his voice all but snuffed out. Here's the message to the church. Don't mistake what you see with what is. Don't evaluate the power of the church by CNN.

Don't determine the advancement of the church and the power of God on the basis of a corrupting culture. God is not idle. He is active. He is not unseated. In fact, he's not even up for reelection.

Right? He is not absent. He is not distant. He is not forgetful. He is not uncaring. He is unveiling.

He is orchestrating the events of human history. Pastor and freelance writer Mark Buchanan tells about a conversation he had with a young philosophy student in his early 20s. Mark had officiated a wedding on a beautiful day in the Sunshine Coast of British Columbia and at the reception the student stayed behind and asked if he really believed all that religious stuff he just spouted in the service. Mark writes, I said I did. He smirked. I asked him what he believed. He said, well, I tried your religion for a while and I found it just a burden to carry.

You know what I figured out? He said, life justifies living. Life is its own reward and explanation. I don't need some pie in the sky mirage to keep me going. This life has enough pressure and mystery and adventure in it to not need anything else to account for it.

Life justifies living. Good, Mark said. He responded. I believe you today here and now. Feel the warmth of the breeze. Listen to the laughter of these people. Smell the shrimp cooking.

Look at the blueness of the sky. Yes, today I believe you. What a superb philosophy.

Life justifies living. Only, he went on, I'm thinking about someone I met last February. Richard. Richard was 44. He looked 60. He'd been living on the street since he was 12.

A junkie. Now dying of AIDS. Last time I saw Richard was on a gray rainy day in winter. I bought him a bus ticket and put him on the bus. He was going to his mother's home in Calgary. He hadn't spoken with her in almost 15 years but he was hoping he could go home to die.

Almost incoherent, he sputtered. I wish I'd never been born. My whole life has been a mistake.

My whole life has been misery. I'm thinking about Richard. He went on. And I'm also thinking about Ernie. Ernie was a man on the rise while he was in his 20s. He was already vice president of a thriving national business. Tough minded, hard driving, prodigiously skilled, hugely ambitious. He was a superb athlete, a natural at any sport. He had a beautiful wife. They were unable to have children of their own so they adopted four.

Three from Africa and one from Mexico. On the day the fourth adoption became final, Ernie got the results back from some medical tests he had undergone to account for some dizziness, blurring of eyesight, tingling in his hands. The tests came back with stunning news. Ernie had multiple sclerosis. Yes, I am thinking about Richard and Ernie and I have a question about your philosophy.

How exactly do I explain to them that life justifies living? The young philosophy student had no response. He said he'd have to think about it and get back to me.

I gave him my address and asked him to write it down and then write me when he came up with something. I've never heard from him and never will because life does not justify living. Eternity does. Eternity justifies living. And because we know the God of eternity who even today sits upon his sovereign throne and we await his summons. He didn't come before I preach, maybe before I end.

I don't know. Come on up here. He summons us up so we can sing with confidence. In fact, even more so than the early church that would breathe the truth of these kinds of lyrics, we too can sing today soon and now it's even sooner.

We're going to see the king. I hope you know with confidence that what Stephen just said is true. Many people are uncertain about their eternal destiny.

They face death with fear and dread instead of hope and joy. But for those of us who know Christ, we have complete confidence and assurance that heaven is our home. If you'd like to hear this lesson again or share it with a friend, you'll find it on our smartphone app or at our website, wisdomonline.org. Stephen will continue through this series entitled, The First Hymns of Heaven, next time. So join us here on Wisdom for the Heart.