What?s Up With Heaven - Part 1

Under non-Christian welcomed the Turning Point. One of the most beautiful and inspiring drovers in Scripture you know from one of the most misunderstood what you know about Jeremiah begins a series revealing the mysteries of heaven share of the myths about the paradox that God created to be out is today's message with no someone once told me that we spend more time planning a two week vacation than we do investigating where were going to spend forever. I think that's probably true. Serena correct that during these next days investigate heaven.

When you look at a lot of the things that people say about heaven that are true like heaven will be boring. How how crazy that is when you understand the implications of it, and so I don't want you to miss any of this woman to try to answer your questions about heaven. No matter who you are, you know somebody who's there. My father once told me as he was getting over. He said they were the hard part about getting older is you have more friends in heaven and you have on earth and all of us. We can go through that cycle. Along the way. So what is what is heaven, and what is it about so let's begin this discussion, let's find out what's up with talking with you about what the Bible says about heaven. Probably the most misunderstood doctrine in the Scripture unfortunately misunderstood by a lot of God's people we get caught up in the myths that surround heaven and so we talk about this and it seems to be very appropriate because the Bible tells us will spend eternity there and it would make sense. Would it not check out the place where you live forever and ever and find out all you can about it. And there's a lot in the Bible about it and talk about all the different aspects of it.

Some of you know that over the years that I've been here, my favorite things is been the collection of epitaphs. I don't know how I got started on that. But somebody got me started. I started collecting course epitaphs are very fitting for a series on heaven because it's written on your tombstone during the series.

I might share some of my favorite ones with you right up front.

Here's my all-time favorite. I love this one goes like this. Here lies the body of old man Pease buried the flowers and trees appeasing here just the pod shelled out what God that's actually on a tombstone someplace up in the Northwest and is very very appropriate epitaph because it's very accurate that's what happens when you guys are Christian shell out you go to God stays here right why sure that back east at a conference and a lady came up to me after she had heard this in a bit later. She had gone home and she told me that this little epitaph got her in a lot of trouble and I could not imagine how this could have gotten her into trouble, but she explained to me that she had not written it down correctly and what you want to share with the ladies missionary group. What came out was here lies the body will man Pease buried beneath the flowers and trees appeasing here just the shell she said immediately. She knew she was in trouble and she couldn't finish it out. I have a lot of these in their very interesting and is amazing what people write or have written on their tombstone.

It was Sunday and in Sunday school. The fifth grade class was convening the teacher was drilling her class about the gospel and salvation and she was quizzing them at this particular moment in the class and she said if I sold everything I owned and I gave the money to the church without get me into heaven, and the whole class responded spontaneously with a big no, well, she said if I clean my house every day mowing the yard planting flowers, make my home beautiful with that get me into heaven, and once again you can just see it. If you wait around.

There is no Wi-Fi was kind animals and polite to my friends and if I love my family would not get into heaven as if programmed. The answer was once again a resounding no. Well, the teacher said, then how can I get to heaven and a little boy who was new to Sunday school that week shouted out the answer from the back.

You have to be dead. In fact is that's true.

Jesus doesn't return to take us to be with him. The only way you can get to heaven is to die. And that means every one of us has a chance to go to heaven because the current death rate is 100% MLS Christ returns soon all going to die worldwide three people die every second hundred and 80 every minute nearly 11,000 every hour and if the Bible is right about what happens to us after that. That means that more than 250,000 people every day go to heaven or to hell here in our country we seem to have lost interest in all of this 2003 Harris poll indicated that 82% of the American people believe in heaven. 63% said they expected to go there after they die can't help thinking of the old spiritualists as lots of folks talking about heaven going if recent trends are any games you may be sitting in the service that's very unusual because you will not hear many sermons preached today about heaven nor about hell, you will not hear about the nature of paradise that is awaiting all of those who put their trust in Christ.

Heaven remains a very popular subject in the imaginations of novelists and filmmakers but it is become a seldom discussed topic among Christian teachers and preachers of all stripes Catholic mainline Protestant evangelical nobody talks about heaven anymore among the mainline Protestants. It's thought that speculation about the nature of a personal afterlife is anti-intellectual belongs to the realm of the sawdust floor evangelist. Some say that too much talk of the next world might distract us from the efforts to relieve suffering in this world and because the church does not have heaven on its mind. Sometimes the church becomes indulgent and self-centered and weak. Sometimes it's present. Comfort consumes its thoughts and heaven is just an afterthought. In one of the reasons why the statistics from the Barna research company and even from the Gallup poll. Tell us this is hardly any difference in the stands of morals and living styles between Christians and non-Christians I believe can be laid at the feet of this great omission in much of the preaching and teaching today. You see what happens when you forget that God has prepared a place for you in heaven, where you will spend eternity and that is a glorious wonderful place and it's real and it's not imaginary when you began to doubt that when you begin to push it off your radar screen.

The next thing that happens because you have a hunger for that in your heart you start to try to create it here on this earth and you will spend every dime and go to every extreme to try to figure out how you can make your situation on this earth is much like the things you heard about heaven as you can get rid of the pain get all the toys live in a beautiful place and all of it sometimes is the result of not understanding that while those things are okay. You could never approximate that which God has in mind for you in the place we call heaven. You can try for the rest of your life.

You can get consultants to help you. You can do anything you can imagine to try to create heaven on earth. And it's impossible. You know, the richest man to ever live Trident, the wisest man who ever live Trident.

He discovered that it was all just vanity God has placed within your heart and within my hunger for eternity, a hunger for heaven and if we do not understand that if we do not need that hunger with the spiritual truth of the word of God. We will end up suppressing that need and replacing it with cheap and tawdry things that will leave us empty and without satisfaction.

So what's up with heaven when we need to know about it more than I can ever tell you say that for sure. But today I want to just examine some certain things that I think might be sort of foundational for us as we move forward. I like to talk with you for a moment about the prominence of heaven. As I've said not being mentioned in churches much anymore but is it surprising how much it seems to be popping up in an irreverent manner. At least, popular culture which albums the five people you meet in heaven, has been on the New York Times bestsellers list.

Interestingly enough, the book has nothing to do with heaven sought motivational book about how you're supposed to live down here and how you evaluate that when you meet these people up there are other books that have come out with the same sort of a twist. Most of you know that that the best-selling series in the history of book writing is the left behind series written by Dr. Tim like a friend of mine, Randy Alcorn released a 500 page book called heaven. Published by Tyndale House and in just a few short months it so the hundred thousand copies heaven is of interest to some people, it just seems so strange that we don't seem to care much about it but you know that heaven is mentioned over 500 times in the Bible in the Old Testament the word is sure my it's a plural word. It means the heights in the New Testament, the Greek word is Alanis Bennett inspires the name of the planet Uranus, which is the same name. The word refers to that which is raised up lofty so the two words from the Old Testament Hebrew from the New Testament Greek speaking heaven is a place that is high and lofty and lifted up and that word is found all over and over and over in the Bible you could not have a Bible. If you took the word heaven out.

It would just be a mishmash.

Heaven is prominent in the teaching of the Scripture is prominent in a strange way in our postmodern culture just not prominent in our hearts, and prominent in our thoughts to talk with you sexually about the plurality of heaven.

Did you know the three heavens sake now try to figure out one you tell me their story.

In fact, when Paul was writing his letter to the Corinthians is second letter he mentions an occasion in the 12th chapter.

When he was caught up. He says into the third heaven then later on he refers to that is being caught up in the paradise.

So Paul apparently had a premature opportunity to see the third heaven office such a place as the third heaven. There must be more than one.

There has to be at least three cemetery with the three heavens are first of all, the first heaven is what we might call the atmospheric heaven.

The first heaven is mentioned in Scripture a number of times Winston's in Isaiah 55 verse nine.

For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain comes down from heaven.

The atmospheric heaven refers to that blanket of air immediately surrounding our in which birds and clouds move Genesis 120 says it this way then God said, let the waters abound with an abundance of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the face of the firmament of the heavens. The first heaven is the heaven.

You see when you walk out into your yard at night and you look up into the sky and you see the envelope sort of that surrounds our earth, but then the second heaven is mentioned in the Bible as well, and that is referred to in Genesis chapter 1 verses 13 through 17. Listen to what it says. Then God said, let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to divide the day from the night. Let them be for signs and seasons and for days and years before the lights in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth and it was so. And God made two great lights, the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night he made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth. The seller heavens. The second heaven refers to the outer space that contains the sun, the moon, the stars, and all of the galaxies asked the second heaven. Remember, Paul said he was caught up to the third heaven and this is where we read that in second Corinthians 12 two through four. This is what Paul writes uses I know a man in Christ who 14 years ago is referring to himself. Here 14 years ago, whether in the body I do not know whether out of the body I do not know God knows such a one was caught up to 1/3 heaven and I know such a man, whether in the body or out of the body I do not know God knows what he was caught up in the paradise and heard inexpressible words which it is not lawful for a man to putter Paul is saying there is something beyond the atmospheric heaven there something beyond the stellar heavens there is 1/3 heaven and it isn't that heaven that God resides. In fact, in the Bible we are told over and over again that God is in heaven.

We are taught to pray our father who art in heaven, in the book of Matthew chapter 5 verse 16 we are told that were the letter light so shine that man might see our good works and glorify our father who is in heaven. Some 11 forces the Lord is in his holy temple. The Lord's throne is in heaven. Whenever you see that referred to as the place where God is.

He's not in the atmospheric heaven is not in the stellar heavens and essence of his residence. He is in the third heaven that heaven which is the heaven of heavens where God resides and it is not heaven, to which we aspire. It is that third heaven, where we are going someday to be with God and to be with Jesus Christ you say that's good we have three heavens, and now I know that the third heaven is where I'm going.

Someday if I'm a Christian. So let's talk. Thirdly, not only about the prominence of heaven and the plurality of it. Let's talk about the place of heaven. John chapter 14, would you just turn there, that's a central passage on the subject of heaven's attorney John 14 let not your heart be troubled you believe in God believe also in me. In my father's house are many mansions if it were not so I would've told you. I go to prepare a place for you and if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to myself, that where I am, there you may be also. Let me put this Scripture in its context. Jesus had announced to his disciples that he was going to the cross and he was going to die was going to be buried and he was going to be resurrected and then ultimately he was going back to heaven. His disciples were filled with sorrow and their hearts were troubled.

They didn't understand this. Put yourself in their place. We have a challenge to understand it.

Sometimes, looking back on it as history. They were experiencing. As it happened, and Jesus said I'm going to go away and his disciples were filled with anxiety and they wanted to know where I how and Jesus gave them this truth in John 14 nieces. I want your hearts to be troubled will be filled with anxiety about this. I want to tell you something in my father's house there are many mansions and I'm going up there prepare a place for you and if I go and prepare this place. I want to come again to get you and take you where I am. But where I am, you may be also.

And Thomas the doubter didn't understand this is the Lord, we do not know what you're going how can we know how to get there they didn't understand, but we understand it now. Don't we. We know that Jesus was promising something not just his disciples but to all of us and I want you to notice what he says he went to heaven to prepare a place, a place for us. He did not go to change our state of modeling we did not go to place us in a sort of a spiritual bunk so that we would think about good things and that would be our heaven heaven is referred to in the Bible over and over is a place and there are many metaphors for heaven in the Bible.

For instance, on some occasions.

Heaven is referred to as a country and when we hear that were reminded of the vastness of its territory. Sometimes it's referred to as the celestial city.

When we think of heaven as a city we see in our mind's eye the inhabitants in the marketplace and the commerce sometimes heaven is referred to as a kingdom and when we refer to it as a kingdom. We think will be organization and the government in the process, but the best deposition of heaven. In my estimation is right here in John chapter 14, where Jesus said, it's my father's house my father's house. Most of us here who grew up in warm and loving families have great memories of the father's house. Something about it. It's like a magnet that draws you back when you move across the country. Your even around the world or something about the father's house that you want to come back to my wife and I used to drive on the weekend over a thousand miles one way to come back to the father's house just to spend the two or three hours there and then turn around and go back and I've always told my father before he died that I never would forgive them for selling that place because that was the father's house. He said he downsized you know what I mean, like so many people do and I understand that but for me that was a bummer because my father's house was gone. Never was the same scene is something very intimate and sweet and personal about heaven when you talk about it being father's house is no longer an empty space in your minds eye. You see furniture don't you see decorations on his see the warmth that's a part of a home and Jesus has promised us that if we put our trust in him. He has prepared a place for us in heaven. That is, in his father's house, and we are privileged to be a part of living there in that place forever and ever. Please hear me heaven is not as some people say an imaginary place.

Some people say heaven is a benevolent state of mind a reward for being good.

Some say heaven or hell is whatever you make of it in this life. A projection of the best in yourself. Listen to me.

Men and women. Heaven is not a figment of imagination is not a feeling or emotion.

Heaven is not beautiful island somewhere heaven is not merely a thought form.

It is not a projection of the best in you. It is not a vision along for utopia is not pleasing hold for the invention of man, our thoughts do not make heaven heaven is a prepared place for a prepared people. It is a place in the word in the New Testament languages the word to your POS top boss which is a very strict wording concerning a place that you can locate Jesus that I go to prepare a place for you, and I believe that there is a literal place called heaven if you ask me exactly where it is. I don't know that I can answer that totally with authority, but let me tell you what I believe the Bible teaches most of the time when we talk about it when we say it's up going heaven is up. Ephesians 410 says that he who descended is also the one who ascended far above the heavens, that he might fill all things.

And when Jesus was ready to go back to heaven. In his ascension in acts chapter 1 verses 10 and 11 we read while they looked steadfastly toward heaven, he went up below. Two men stood by them in white apparel will also submit a gallery while you stand gazing into heaven. This same Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven, will so come in like manner as you so I'm going to heaven so we would have to assume that heaven is but which way is up. If we say it is in the direction at right angles with the Earth's surface.

Whatever we may happen to me, then it would be in a different direction from every point, your source heaven and wait until tomorrow for us to solve this riddle that we created. I'm sure you know the answer. You know this is a great time for you to take a moment and get back to us and betray what I'm talking about. This is letter month that Turning Point. July has been dubbed letter month and I want to encourage you to take advantage of this time to let us know what God is doing in your life to Turning Point how God has blessed you through this teaching, or what your favorite teaching series is or may be a favorite issue of our magazine. Whatever you give us by way of feedback helps us plan for the future and we listen carefully. We have opportunities to read many of your letters personally, but once we can get to their all red and we take note of what you say when you cooperate with us during this month just take a little extra time during the month of July and send a letter to Turning Point will see you tomorrow. More information on the picture of Martha series revealing the mysteries of heaven. Visit our website where we offer two free ways to help you stay connected monthly magazine Turning Point in their daily email devotional sign-up today Jeremiah.org/ready that Jeremiah got old/ready to ask your copy of revealing the mysteries of pavement city better informed about your truth. If there's any amount you can also purchase Jeremiah study Bible standard and new international divisions as well as in standard arrangement new King James helpfulness and articles. Jeremiah visited David Jeremiah.org/ready for data on very join us tomorrow as we continue the series revealing the mysteries of heaven here on Turning Point with the taking time to listen to the Friendly's and Christian