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Sermon on Heaven (page three)

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When Jesus speaks

 about Heaven,

He speaks about

His native land. 

  That’s the way you speak when you are trying to convince someone from personal experience that what you’re telling them is true. “If it were not so, Pastor, I would have told you. Go to Florida. They have air conditioning.”

  I don’t know if there is air-conditioning in Florida, because I’ve never been there. But George knows because he has been there.

  It all gets down to this. Does Heaven exist? It’s your word against Christ’s word. You have never been to Heaven. So how do you know it’s not real? Jesus knows. He came from there!

  What does He say in John 17, when He prays to the Father? He uses the same kind of language about where He has come from. “Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began.” (John 17:5)

  Then at the end of the same prayer, in verse 24 of John 17, He prays: “Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am and to see my glory.” He came from Heaven. He is going back to Heaven. Jesus knows all about Heaven. It is His native land.

  So when we take our stand upon the words of Jesus, really what we are saying is this: I believe that what Jesus says is true. I take His word over the word of any human who wants to debunk Heaven and pretend it isn’t so.

  There’s an expression we often use: “If it’s too good to be true, it isn’t.”(True, that is). But not here! Here it doesn’t apply. Heaven is real! There is a land of glory where Emmanuel dwells. It’s not just some hymn writer’s fancy. It means that all our tears and our grief will come to an end. It means that all of our limitations will come to an end. It means that our struggle with sin will come to an end.

  One day Jesus will open the doorway of death for us, and usher us into glory with Him forevermore. Jesus will open the door and say, “Welcome home!”

  Heaven is real! God has not designed our salvation just for this life only. Suppose I decide to thank George for his advice about Florida and I invite him over for dinner. I do what people commonly do. I say, “George, would you like an appetizer?” “Sure,” says George. So he digs into the crackers and cheese and juice. Then we sit down to the table, but it’s bare! Nothing there! Just completely bare! No china, no cutlery, no food. George says, “What’s going on? I thought you invited me to dinner!”

  Would I do that to George? Never! Of course I wouldn’t treat a friend that way.

  Let me ask you this. Is your present experience as a Christian just for this life and then death ends it all? That’s it! Nothing further! Is that the way God works? He who “loved us and gave up his Son for us, how will He not along with Him, freely give us all things?” And that includes Heaven!

  You know something? I think there’s been a deadly disease at work in the Christian church for the last two hundred years or so. As conditions materially and physically have improved, there’s been a corresponding decline in belief in Heaven. Things have been getting better and better on earth, so the idea of a future life, a land of glory “where Emmanuel dwells,” has taken a nose dive. You can graph it almost exactly.

  People are embarrassed to talk about Heaven. Why? Because we’re so focused on this life.

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