Heaven

by Randy Alcorn

  God did not sit idly by or shrug his shoulders at sin, death, and the Curse. He did not relinquish his claim on mankind and the earth. No sooner did ruin descend on humanity and Earth than God revealed his plan to defeat Satan and retake them for his glory.

  TAKING OUR INHERITANCE

  Our interest in the end timesusually extends to the period immediately preced­ing and following the return of Christ. But God's plan culminates after the final judgment, when King Jesus says, "Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world" (Matthew 25:34). Where is this kingdom? Exactly where it has been from the beginning—on Earth.

  What is the inheritance Jesus speaks of? Just as the children of kings inherit kingdoms, and kingdoms consist of land and property, so Earth is humanity's God-given property.

  God hasn't changed his mind; he hasn't fallen back to Plan B or abandoned what he originally intended for us at the creation of the world. When Christ says "take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world," it's as if he's saying, "This is what I wanted for you all along. This is what I went to the cross and defeated death to give you. Take it, rule it, exercise dominion, enjoy it; and in doing so, share my happiness."

  God doesn't throw away his handiwork and start from scratch—instead, he uses the same canvas to repair and make more beautiful the painting marred by the vandal. The vandal doesn't get the satisfaction of destroying his rival's mas­terpiece. On the contrary, God makes an even greater masterpiece out of what his enemy sought to destroy.

  Satan wants us to give up on God, on our purpose and calling, and on our planet. God reminds us, "The one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world" (1 John 4:4). Satan seeks to destroy the earth. God seeks to restore and renew the earth, rule it, and hand it back over to his children. God will win the battle for us and for the earth.

  UNITING HEAVEN AND EARTH

  God's plan of the ages is "to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ" (Ephesians 1:10). "All things" is broad and inclusive—nothing will be left out. This verse corresponds precisely to the culmina­tion of history that we see enacted in Revelation 21, the merging together of the once separate realms of Heaven and Earth, fully under Christ's lordship.

  The hymn "This Is My Father's World" expresses this truth in its final words: "Jesus who died shall be satisfied, and earth and heaven be one."81 Just as God and mankind are reconciled in Christ, so too the dwellings of God and mankind—Heaven and Earth—will be reconciled in Christ. As God and man will be forever united in Jesus, so Heaven and Earth will for­ever be united in the new physical universe where we will live as resurrected beings. To affirm anything less is to understate the redemptive work of Christ. Yet, strangely, in the schools and churches I've been a part of—and in the vast majority of the 150 books about Heaven I've read—this central truth has rarely been affirmed. Many people with whom I've spoken have told of similar experiences.

  Heaven is God's home. Earth is our home. Jesus Christ, as the God-man, forever links God and mankind, and thereby forever links Heaven and Earth. As Ephesians 1:10 demonstrates, this idea of Earth and Heaven becoming one is explicitly biblical. Christ will make Earth into Heaven and Heaven into Earth. Just as the wall that separates God and mankind is torn down in Jesus, so too the wall that separates Heaven and Earth will be forever demolished. There will be one universe, with all things in Heaven and on Earth together under one head, Jesus Christ. "Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them" (Revelation 21:3). God will live with us on the New Earth. That will "bring all things in heaven and on earth together."

  God's plan is that there will be no more gulf between the spiritual and physi­cal worlds. There will be no divided loyalties or divided realms. There will be one cosmos, one universe united under one Lord—forever. This is the unstop­pable plan of God. This is where history is headed.

  When God walked with Adam and Eve in the Garden, Earth was Heaven's backyard. The New Earth will be even more than that—it will be Heaven itself. And those who know Jesus will have the privilege of living there.

  WHO WILL REIGN OVER THE EARTH?

  The Bible's central storyline revolves around a question: Who will reign over the earth? Earth's destiny hangs in the balance. Because it is the realm where God's glory has been most challenged and resisted, it is therefore also the stage on which his glory will be most graphically demonstrated. By reclaiming, re­storing, renewing, and resurrecting Earth—and empowering a regenerated mankind to reign over it—God will accomplish his purpose of bringing glory to himself.

  In Scripture, those said to have thrones include God the Father (Hebrews 12:2; Revelation 22:1), Christ the Son (Luke 1:32; Hebrews 1:8), God's human children (Revelation 4:4; 11:16), and Satan (Revelation 2:13). God's claim to his throne is absolute. The claim of human beings to their thrones is valid, but only if they remain in submission to God, who delegated dominion to them as his heirs and subrulers. Satan's claim to the throne is false.

  Ultimately, Satan will be eternally dethroned. People who reject God will be eternally dethroned. God will be permanently enthroned. Righteous human beings, first enthroned by God to reign over the earth from Eden, then de­throned by their own sin and Satan, will be reenthroned forever with God. "And they will reign for ever and ever" (Revelation 22:5).

  Christ will become the unchallenged, absolute ruler of the universe and then will turn over to his Father the Kingdom he has won (1 Corinthians 15:28). Redeemed humans will be God's unchallenged, delegated rulers of the New Earth. God and humanity will live together in eternal happiness, forever deepening their relationships, as the glory of God permeates every aspect of the new creation.

  THE LAST ADAM DEFEATS SATAN

  Satan successfully tempted thefirst Adam in Eden. The theological conse­quences of Adam's sin (and the redeeming work of the last Adam, Jesus Christ, the new head of the human race) are laid out in Romans 5:12-19. When Satan tempted the last Adam in the wilderness (which is what Eden's garden had be­come), Christ resisted him. But the evil one was desperate to defeat Christ, to kill him as he had the first Adam (Matthew 4:1-11; Luke 4:1-13).

  Satan appeared to succeed when the last Adam died. But Jesus didn't die because he had sinned. He died because, as God's Son, he chose to pay the price for mankind's sins, tracing all the way back to the first Adam and for­ward to the final generation of the fallen Earth. Satan's apparent victory in Christ's death was what assured the devil's final defeat. When Christ rose from the dead, he dealt Satan a fatal blow, crushing his head, assuring both his destruction and the resurrection of mankind and the earth. Satan's grip on this world was loosened. It's still strong, but once he is cast into the lake of fire and God refashions the old Earth into the New Earth, mankind and Earth will slip forever from Satan's grasping hands, never again to be touched by him (Revelation 20:10).

  Christ has already defeated Satan, but the full scope of his victory has not yet been manifested on Earth. At Christ's ascension, God "seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything" (Ephesians 1:20-22).

  These words are all-inclusive, and they are past tense, not future. Christ rules the universe. And yet it is only upon Christ's physical return to the earth that Satan will be bound.

  This is the "already and not yet" paradox that characterizes life on the pres­ent Earth. Heaven's king is even now "ruler of the kings of the earth" (Revela­tion 1:5). "On his robe and on his thigh this name is written: King of kings and Lord of lords" (Revelation 19:16).

  Through Christ's redemptive work, he "disarmed the powers and authorities" and "made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them" (Colossians 2:15). His death stripped Satan of ultimate po
wer (Hebrews 2:14). "The Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil" (1 John 3:8, NASB).

  Note that it says Christ came not to destroy the world he created, but to de­stroy the works of the devil, which were to twist and pervert and ruin what God had made. Redemption will forever destroy the devil's work by removing its hold on creation, and reversing its consequences. It is Satan's desire to destroy the world. God's intent is not to destroy the world but to deliver it from destruction. His plan is to redeem this fallen world, which he designed for greatness.

  Redeemed mankind will reign with Christ over the earth. The gates of Sa­tan's false kingdom will not prevail against Christ's church (Matthew 16:18).

  The outcome of the great war is not in question. It is certain. Christ will reign victoriously forever. The only question we must answer is this: Will we fight on his side or against him? We answer this question not just once, with our words, but daily, with our choices.

  REMOVING THE CURSE

  "No longer will there be anycurse" (Revelation 22:3). If the Bible said nothing else about life in the eternal Heaven, the New Earth, these words would tell us a vast amount.

  No more Curse.

  What would our lives be like if the Curse were lifted? One day we will know firsthand—but even now there's much to anticipate.

  After Adam sinned, God said, "Cursed is the ground [earth] because of you" (Genesis 3:17). When the Curse is reversed, we will no longer engage in "painful toil" (v. 17) but will enjoy satisfying care taking. No longer will the earth yield "thorns and thistles" (v. 18), defying our dominion and repaying us for cor­rupting it. No longer will we "return to the ground . . . [from which we] were taken" (v. 19), swallowed up in death as unrighteous stewards who ruined our­selves and the earth.

  Our welfare is inseparable from Earth's welfare. Our destiny is inseparable from Earth's destiny. That's why the curse on mankind required that the earth be cursed and why the earth will also be resurrected when we are resurrected.

  The Curse will be reversed.

  As a result of the Curse, the first Adam could no longer eat from the tree of life, which pre­sumably would have made him live forever in his sinful state (Genesis 3:22). Death, though a curse in itself, was also the only way out from under the Curse—and that only because God had come up with a way to defeat death and restore mankind's rela­tionship with him.

  Because of man's fall into sin, a curse was pronounced over this creation. God now sent his son into this world to redeem that creation from the results of sin. The work of Christ, therefore, is not just to save certain individuals, not even to save an innumerable throng of blood-bought people. The total work of Christ is nothing less than to redeem this entire creation from the effects of sin. That purpose will not be accomplished until God has ushered in the new earth, until Paradise Lost has become Paradise Regained.

  ANTHONY HOEKEMA

  Christ came to remove the curse of sin and death (Romans 8:2). He is the second Adam, who will undo the damage wrought by the first Adam (1 Corinthians 15:22, 45; Romans 5:15-19). In the Cross and the Resurrection, God made a way not only to restore his original design for mankind but also to expand it. In our resurrection bodies, we will again dwell on Earth—a New Earth—completely free of the Curse. Unencumbered by sin, human activity will lead naturally to a prosperous and magnificent culture.

  Under the Curse, human culture has not been eliminated, but it has been se­verely hampered by sin, death, and decay. Before the Fall, food was readily avail­able with minimal labor. Time was available to pursue thoughtful aesthetic ideas, to work for the sheer pleasure of it, to please and glorify God by develop­ing skills and abilities. Since the Fall, generations have lived and died after spending most of their productive years eking out an existence in the pursuit of food, shelter, and protection against theft and war. Mankind has been distracted and debilitated by sickness and sin. Our cultural development has like­wise been stunted and twisted, and sometimes misdirected—though not always. Even though our depravity means we have no virtue that makes us wor­thy of our standing before God, we are nevertheless "made in God's likeness" (James 3:9). Consequently, some things we do, even in our fallenness, such as painting, building, performing beautiful music, finding cures for diseases, and other cultural, scientific, commercial, and aesthetic pursuits, are good.

  The removal of the Curse means that people, culture, the earth, and the uni­verse will again be as God intended. The lifting of the Curse comes at a terrible price: "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us" (Galatians 3:13, ESV). God's law shows us how far short we fall. But Jesus took on himself the curse of sin, satisfying God's wrath. By taking the Curse upon himself and defeating it through his resurrection, Jesus guaranteed the lifting of the Curse from mankind and from the earth.

  The removal of the Curse will be as thorough and sweeping as the redemp­tive work of Christ. In bringing us salvation, Christ has already undone some of the damage in our hearts, but in the end he will finally and completely restore his entire creation to what God originally intended (Romans 8:19-21). Christ will turn back the Curse and restore to humanity all that we lost in Eden, and he will give us much more besides.

  FAR AS THE CURSE IS FOUND

  Jesus came not only to save spirits from damnation. That would have been, at most, a partial victory. No, he came to save his whole creation from death. That means our bodies too, not just our spirits. It means the earth, not just humanity. And it means the universe, not just the earth.

  Christ's victory over the Curse will not be partial. Death will not just limp away wounded. It will be annihilated, utterly destroyed: "[God] will destroy the shroud that enfolds all peoples, the sheet that covers all nations; he will swallow up death forever. The Sovereign Lord will wipe away the tears from all faces; he will remove the disgrace of his people from all the earth" (Isaiah 25:7-8).

  Isaac Watts's magnificent hymn "Joy to the World" is theologically on target:

  No more let sins and sorrows grow

  Nor thorns infest the ground;

  He comes to make His blessingsflow

  Far as the curse is found.

  God will lift the Curse, not only morally (in terms of sins) and psychologically (in terms of sorrows), but also physically (in terms of thorns in the ground). How far does Christ's redemptive work extend? Far as the curse is found. If re­demption failed to reach the farthest boundaries of the Curse, it would be in­complete. The God who rules the world with truth and grace won't be satisfied until every sin, every sorrow, every thorn is reckoned with.

  In the Reformed tradition, Albert Wolters embraces an expansive redemp­tive worldview: "Biblical religion . . . views the whole course of history as a movement from a garden to a city, and it fundamentally affirms that move­ment. . . . Redemption in Jesus Christ reaches just as far as the fall. The horizon of creation is at the same time the horizon of sin and of salvation. To conceive of either the fall or Christ's deliverance as encompassing less than the whole of creation is to compromise the biblical teaching of the radical nature of the fall and the cosmic scope of redemption."82

  Jesus came not only to rescue people from ultimate destruction. He came also to rescue the entire universe from ultimate destruction. He will transform our dying Earth into a vital New Earth, fresh and uncontaminated, no longer subject to death and destruction.

  The Curse is real, but it is temporary. Jesus is the cure for the Curse. He came to set derailed human history back on its tracks. Earth won't be put out of its misery; it will be infused with a greater life than it has ever known, at last be­coming all that God meant for it to be.

  We have never seen the earth as God made it. Our planet as we know it is a shadowy, halftone image of the original. But it does whet our appetites for the New Earth, doesn't it? If the present Earth, so diminished by the Curse, is at times so beautiful and wonderful; if our bodies, so diminished by the Curse, are at times overcome with a sense of the
earth's beauty and wonder; then how mag­nificent will the New Earth be? And what will it be like to experience the New Earth in something else we've never known: perfect bodies?

  A mature Christian Bible student wrote me a note after reading a draft of this book: "I realize now that I have always thought that when we die we go im­mediately to our eternal home. After I was there, that would be the end of the story. I wouldn't care about what happened to Earth and everything on it. Why should I care about a doomed planet?"

  Without Christ, both the earth and mankind would be doomed. But Christ came, died, and rose from the grave. He brought deliverance, not destruction. Because of Christ, we are not doomed, and neither is the earth.

  Earth cannot be delivered from the Curse by being destroyed. It can only be delivered by being resurrected. As we'll see in the next section, Christ's resurrec­tion is the forerunner of our own, and our resurrection is the forerunner of the earth's.

  SECTION FOUR

  ANTICIPATING RESURRECTION

  CHAPTER 11

  WHY IS RESURRECTION SO IMPORTANT?

  Make no mistake: if He rose at all it was as His body; if the cells' dissolution did not reverse, the molecules reknit, the amino acids rekindle, the Church •willfall.. . . Let us not mock God with metaphor, analogy, sidestepping transcendence; making of the event a parable, a sign painted in the faded credulity of earlier ages: let us walk through the door.

  John Updike

  In the late 1990s, a group of scholars assembled to evaluate whether Jesus ac­tually said the things attributed to him by the Gospel writers. Although they employed remarkably subjective criteria in their evaluation of Scripture, mem­bers of the self-appointed "Jesus Seminar" were widely quoted by the media as authorities on the Christian faith.

  Marcus Borg, a Jesus Seminar leader, said this of Christ's resurrection: "As a child, I took it for granted that Easter meant that Jesus literally rose from the dead. I now see Easter very differently. For me, it is irrelevant whether or not the tomb was empty. Whether Easter involved something remarkable happening to the physical body of Jesus is irrelevant."83