Heaven

1:14Once he had improved the product enough to where people would actually buy it, his next challenge was getting ski resorts to allow snowboarders to use the lifts so they could actually ski on real runs. And through his relentless effort, And passion and hard work, he succeeded. And today, snowboarding is as popular as skiing. But that wouldn't have happened without Jake Carpenter's vision. By the way, his middle name is Burton, which, of course, is the name of the most beloved snowboards in the world. Jake Burton Carpenter passed away two years ago, but he was a man who was driven by his vision and was blessed to see that vision come to reality in his lifetime.

2:08Let me ask you a question: Do you have a vision of heaven? Do you have a clear biblical picture in your heart and mind of heaven? And if so, does it motivate you? Or, if you're honest, is it pretty uninspiring? I believe that many professing Christians don't have a biblical vision of heaven. If they do, it's not very clear and it's pretty uninspiring. And as a result, it's very difficult to live for on a day-to-day basis.

2:52And if that's you, my hope this morning is that this final sermon in the Back to the Basics series will change that and will transform the way. That you live your life today. Now, before we jump into Revelation 21, it's important to locate ourselves within the context of the book of Revelation. And so, we need to know that at the end of chapter 20, if you look there in that last section, Jesus returns and defeats Satan and all of his supernatural enemies. The righteous and unrighteous are raised to life, and Jesus judges them before his great white throne. The unrighteous are condemned to eternal punishment in the lake of fire, which is the second death.

3:36And then we move into chapter 21, and John sees in his vision, take a look at verse 1, a new heaven and a new earth. For the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. This is precisely what Isaiah foretold in chapter 65, verse 17. Take a look there: For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind.

4:08Now, when Isaiah says that God is creating a new heavens and a new earth, and when John says the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, I don't take that to mean that God is going to completely destroy this present heaven and earth. I believe Romans 8, verses 19 through 21, helps us to understand. What John and what Isaiah are talking about. Take a look on the screen. Paul says, For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God.

4:41For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. So, Paul compares what's going to happen to the world with what's going to happen to us as God's creatures, his people. And we are going to experience as the children of God our physical bodies raised from the dead and restored to new life. We will be made new.

5:20Our bodies are not going to be destroyed and then completely recreated. They're going to be raised and made new. They're going to be set free from their bondage to corruption. So, John Piper says this in his book, Future Grace. When Revelation 21:1 and 2 Peter 3:10 say that the present earth and heavens will pass away, it does not have to mean that they go out of existence, but may mean that there will be such a change in them that their present condition passes away.

5:51We might say the caterpillar passes away and the butterfly emerges. There is a real passing away and there is a real continuity. A real connection. See, if God were to destroy the present heavens and the earth, he would be destroying that which he created and called very good. He would be essentially saying that sin and Satan had so corrupted his creation that it was beyond redemption and that he would have to start over. But as Jesus says in verse 5, if you take a look there, he's not making all new things, he's making all things new.

6:36And that's an important distinction. He is restoring their original beauty and glory and making them even better. And you notice as well that in the new heavens and the new earth, the sea was no more. John doesn't mean that there's no water there. We'll certainly see in a moment here that's not the case. But rather, John is referring to the source of earthly rebellion, the sea out of which the beast of Daniel 7 and Revelation 13 emerged to utter blasphemy against God and to make war against the saints. John is saying that that sea will no longer exist because in Revelation 20, God has already done away with all of the unrighteous and all rebellion against him.

7:21What will exist is a magnificent city, the holy city, New Jerusalem. And verse 2 describes it this way. Take a look there. Coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. Now, many people seem to think that the Bible offers little to nothing in the way of descriptions of heaven, as though we just kind of had to imagine it ourselves and do our best. But in reality, Scripture offers some fairly lengthy, vivid descriptions of what heaven is going to be like, especially in these last two chapters of Revelation.

8:03According to Revelation 21, 15 and 16, the holy city, the New Jerusalem, is roughly 1,400 miles long and wide and high. That is a massive city. Take a look at what Randy Alcorn wrote. A metropolis of this size in the middle of the United States would stretch from Canada to Mexico and from the Appalachian Mountains to the California border. You have to leave out California. This is 40 times bigger. If you're from California, I love you. I'm sorry. This is 40 times bigger than England and 15,000 times bigger than London. It's 10 times as big as France or Germany and far larger than India. And remember, that's just the ground level. That is huge. It's huge.

8:58And what he's saying is that. Doesn't take into account all of the stories that you could build upward in a city that size. So, remember, the city is 1,400 miles long and wide and high, 1,400 miles. I've been to several buildings that are around 100 stories tall. So, the World Trade Centers before they were attacked, the Empire State Building, and the Rockefeller Center, and Sears Tower in Chicago. And you have to take two, sometimes three elevators to get from the ground floor to the 100th story. They're that tall.

9:36And in a city that goes 1,400 miles into the air, Randy Alcorn says you could have 600,000 stories. 600,000 stories. You are in outer space at 62 miles. 1,400 miles is way up there. Lots of elevators. So the New Jerusalem is massive. And we learn in the rest of chapter 21 that it's got these four walls surrounding it. Each one of them is 200 feet thick. It's got three gates on each wall that are guarded by angels 24-7, and they're also open 24-7.

10:15And that seems like a little bit of a, what's going on here? Why do you have gates if they're always open? Well, I think the point here is that these unscalable, impenetrable walls that are guarded by the angels remind us that we are perfectly secure, that no one, that nothing. Is ever going to threaten us again. And the fact that the gates are always open remind us that we are going to live in perfect freedom in this new city with the freedom to explore all of the rest of the new heavens and the new earth anytime that we want to.

10:48We learn in the rest of the chapter there's no sun or moon because according to verse 23 and chapter 22, the glory of God gives it light, and the lamb is its lamp. The river of the water of life is flowing from the throne of God right down the center of the street with the tree of life standing on either side of it. And that's just such a beautiful picture because you may remember that after Adam and Eve sinned in the garden by eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, God said this in Genesis chapter 3.

11:24Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand and take also of the tree of life and eat and live forever. Therefore, the Lord God sent him out from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken. He drove out the man, and at the east of the Garden of Eden, he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life.

11:54See, that tree had to be blocked off after Adam and Eve sinned, so that neither they nor their descendants could eat from it. And live forever in their fallen state. But in the New Jerusalem, that tree is perfectly accessible. It's right in the middle of town. But, friends, when we think about this beautiful picture of the New Jerusalem coming down, the most wonderful part of it is that the holy city is coming down out of heaven so that God can dwell with us forever.

12:30And that, of course, is what we would expect from reading the rest of Scripture. We see in the book of Genesis that God came down to walk in the garden with Adam and Eve. That God's glory came down on Mount Sinai when He gave Moses the law. That God's glory came down and filled the temple at Solomon's dedication. And as we celebrate at Christmastime, Jesus came down, he took on flesh and dwelt among us. In Genesis 11, we have this picture of what happens when we try to go up to God in the Tower of Babel. The people in their rebellion against God attempted to build a city with a tower whose height reached to the heavens. It was a unified act of rebellion against God, this attempt to go up instead of going out to fill the earth and subdue it as God had commanded. And what's amazing is as you read the earth. Read that account in Genesis chapter 11 is that they're attempting to build this tower with its top in the heavens, and the text says that God has to come down to see their little tower.

13:41He comes down to see it, he confuses their language, and he disperses them throughout the whole earth. Friends, all of our attempts to go up to God end in failure. We cannot go to him, whether from false motives or true. But the beauty of his love and grace is that he comes down to us, he brings the new Jerusalem down out of heaven to us and his presence with it. God is the initiator, he is the creator, he is the pursuer, he is the one who comes down to meet with us and dwell with us because we cannot go to him.

14:26This is the biblical message of grace: a God who comes down and pursues, not a God who waits for us to come to him. Take a look at verse 3. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more. Neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.

15:10Friends, these verses highlight the real beauty of heaven. As wonderful as the new heavens and the new earth will be, as glorious as the new Jerusalem will be, the most amazing part of this new world is that God Himself will be with them and be their God. He will be our God. We will be His people forever. Emmanuel, God with us, except not just for a time in the person of Jesus Christ, as when He dwelt on this earth, not just as the deposit guaranteeing our inheritance in the form of the Holy Spirit residing in us now, but with us in the most complete and perfect way, Father, Son, and Spirit with us, dwelling with us for eternity. This is the beauty of heaven, because heaven without God isn't heaven at all.

16:07We look forward to reuniting with friends and loved ones, family members, children who have died and gone before us. We look forward to being united with people like Abraham and Moses and David and the apostles and the saints throughout the ages. But the greatest blessing will not be a reunion with other people. The greatest blessing is going to be our perfect union with God, finally made complete forever by his presence among us. Verse 4 is, I think, one of the most comforting, reassuring verses in all of Scripture.

16:51It should bring great comfort to anyone who has experienced loss, disappointment, injustice, hurt, which is every one of us to greater and lesser degrees. This verse is so profound because it suggests that when we arrive in heaven, there is joy mixed with sadness. Perhaps the sadness of sins that we've committed, or maybe that others have committed against us, the sadness of opportunities lost, maybe even the sadness of knowing who's not there with us. It's not as though in heaven we simply pretend that all of those hurts and losses and disappointments and injustices simply didn't happen.

17:38But what does God do? He wipes away all of those tears, every tear from their eyes. There won't be any more death or mourning or crying or pain. All of that has been dealt with on the cross and at the great white throne judgment. Justice has been served. It's either been served on The cross, where Christ paid for the sins that we committed and that others committed against us, or justice is served in hell, where the unrepentant pay for their sins for eternity.

18:12And so, what this means, friends, is that we cannot allow ourselves to become bitter and jaded over what has happened to us, what others have done to us, what we have done even to ourselves. We cannot allow a root of bitterness to spring up. We can be sad today, and apparently, even when we arrive in heaven, it is entirely appropriate to be sad over things that have happened to us, given that God Himself is grieved over our sin and what it's done to this world.

18:46But we, as believers, grieve with hope because we understand that justice was served on the cross, that justice will be served in hell, and that God is going to wipe away every tear from our eyes until there are no more tears, until there is no more mourning, because all of that has passed away finally. So, friends, if you are grieving without hope, if you have allowed yourself to grow bitter over things that have happened to you or dreams that haven't been realized, this verse is for you.

19:23God will set all things right, your tears will be wiped away. Justice will be done. But you must believe that in faith and walk with your eyes fixed on eternity, fixed on the truth of this verse to avoid becoming bitter and jaded now. Verse 5. And he who is seated on the throne said, Behold, I am making all things new. Also, he said, Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true. And he said to me, It is done. I am the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty, I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment. The one who conquers will have this heritage, and I will be his God, and he will be my son.

20:22God is making all things new. And we can count on him to keep his word, because God always keeps every one of his promises. His words are trustworthy and true. John could write them down with full confidence that they would come to pass because he's all-powerful. He is the alpha and the omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end. He stands before and after and outside of every created thing. And friends, he is the very definition of grace.

21:01Look again at the end of verse 6. To the thirsty, I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment. In John chapter 4, Jesus goes to Jacob's well and he meets a Samaritan woman there. And I want you to look at what he says to this woman in verses 13 and 14. Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again. But whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.

21:46You see, sin had left this Samaritan woman spiritually parched, and it's done the same to every one of us. We are like those who are lost at sea that out of desperation start drinking salt water, hoping that it will quench our thirst. But not only does it not quench our thirst, it makes us thirstier than we were before. That's what sin does. That's what religion does. It will leave you even thirstier than before. Both sin and religion promise to satisfy our thirst, but they can't do it. Like salt water.

22:32Only Jesus and His gospel of grace can satisfy our spiritual thirst. That when we drink it, we finally won't be parched anymore. The water that He offers wells up to eternal life, it actually quenches our spiritual thirst, and it does so permanently. As Jesus says, whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. And friends, the best part is that he gives it to us completely free of charge. He says, To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment.

23:12So many things in this world promise to satisfy us, and they don't. And the saddest part of all is that you have to pay for most of them. But the grace of God actually satisfies us, and it's completely free. God pours out his grace upon us not because we deserve it, but because he's so merciful, he's so gracious, he's so kind. Verse 7 tells us who can look forward to this heritage. Take a look there. The one who conquers will have this heritage, and I will be his God, and he will be my son.

23:53In Mark 13, Jesus says this, and you will be hated by all for my name. Sake, but the one who endures to the end will be saved. In order to be saved, we must endure to the end. We must conquer. We must overcome. Jesus commands us to pick up our cross and follow Him. Not for a little bit, not for most of our lives, not once we're too old and too tired to sin in the same ways anymore.

24:26He doesn't call us to just start the race, He calls us to finish it. The one who runs the race according to the rules all the way to the end wins the prize. The Christian life is a marathon, not a sprint. A major theme in the book of Revelation is this idea of conquering or overcoming. The idea appears over and over again, and it appears a lot in the rest of the New Testament as well. Take a look at 1 John chapter 5.

25:00For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world, our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? Faith, namely the belief that Jesus is the Son of God, is the victory that overcomes the world. That's the faith that we have to maintain to the end to conquer and receive the heritage that God promised. Promises.

25:32Friends, do you have faith? If so, is it a faith that is durable and overcoming because it's rooted in Jesus, the Son of God? You cannot have faith in your faith. That is a foundation of sand that will not support you or save you. You must have faith in Jesus Christ, the Son of God. He alone can help you overcome and conquer so that you can look forward with confidence to the inheritance that He has promised here.

26:12Verse 8. But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death. I want you to remember what Jesus said in Mark chapter 13. You will be persecuted, hated by all for his name's sake. But the one who stands firm to the end will be saved. The cowardly, that is, those who turn back from following Jesus. Along with the unbelieving and all others who go on living a life of unrepentant sin, they also have an inheritance. It's just not one that you can look forward to.

27:12Their portion, John says, is in the fiery lake of burning sulfur, which Jesus calls the second death. Unbelievers die twice, and then they experience everlasting punishment. Believers only die once, and then we are raised to eternal life. This wonderful, beautiful eternal life that we've seen partially described here in Revelation 21. Friends, it is difficult, if not impossible, to live for and long for and sacrifice for something that really hasn't captured your heart and your mind. The reason that athletes and musicians and students and entrepreneurs push themselves to train and to practice and to study and to work, the reason that they're willing to deny themselves pleasure and opportunities in the short run is because they have a clear and compelling vision of the future.

28:22It's what keeps them going when the last thing that they feel like doing is spending one more hour in the gym, one more hour studying, one more hour. More hour doing anything other than what they want to do in that moment. But they make all of the sacrifices that they make because they are captivated by that vision of the future. It's what keeps them going. If you've got no vision of heaven, or if your vision of heaven is sitting on a cloud playing a harp in a weird bathrobe, that is just not going to motivate you to live for eternity.

29:05That's why so many Christians are just living for their next high, whatever that thing is. They have no vision for eternity. I want something better for you. The Apostle John wants something better for you. God Himself wants something better for you. He wants to give you a vision that's not only worth dying for, it's worth living for today. Jesus is coming back, and He promises that He's coming back soon. When He comes, He's coming to judge the living and the dead with perfect justice. He will condemn all who refuse to repent and believe in Him for eternal life. He'll condemn them to suffering in the lake of fire, and He's going to reward all who believe in Him with eternal joy and eternal life. In the new heavens and the new earth.

30:03And we know this because his words are trustworthy and true. We have spent the past four months trying to get back to the basics of the Christian life, which begins with Christian doctrine from God's word. I hope this series has been helpful. I hope it's challenged you to think biblically about God's word and his world, about the church, about our calling as followers of Christ. But we must remember that Christianity is not merely an intellectual discipline. No, Christianity is truth that must be applied to our daily lives.

30:48For some of you, it is time for you to start following Jesus. God is calling you to repent and believe, and you know it. It is not complicated. You must confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord. You must believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead. He promises that any who call to him will be saved. And so I urge you this morning to not put that off any longer, to turn from your sin and to receive Christ by faith. Become a part of this family that has this inheritance waiting for us. There's a card on the Back of the seat in front of you. If you want to know more about Jesus, if you want to talk to somebody about Jesus, fill that card out and let us know. We will meet with you right away.

31:41For some of you, you've already started following Christ, but you need to be baptized, like our brother William is going to be later this morning. And if that's you, I just want to challenge you to come and talk to one of the pastors, talk to a member of our church, talk to your parents today about being baptized. Some of you guys need to join the church. You've been playing games for a long time. You've been attending church for months or maybe years, but you've never committed.

32:17And what that means is that your spiritual growth has been stunted. And the rest of us have to work harder to be spiritual providers so that you can be a spiritual consumer. It's time for you to step up and become a spiritual provider. And so, same thing. If you know that you need to commit to a local body of believers, grab that card again. Say that you want some more information about membership, and we will talk with you about that.

32:52For the rest of us, friends, we just need to keep on keeping on. We refer to the Christian life as a walk with Christ for a reason. Day after day, week after week, we put one foot in front of the other until Jesus returns. We fix our eyes on Christ and learn how to apply the beautiful truths of the gospel to new areas of our lives and to the same areas of our lives over and over again.

33:24We rest in the grace of God and then we work with the strength that God supplies. I want to challenge you this morning to set your eyes on the beautiful vision of heaven that's laid out for us right here in Scripture. To have that beautiful vision fixed in your heart so that it's not just something that you will die for one day, but it's something that you're willing to live for every single day of your life.

33:53Friends, God's Word is trustworthy and true, and He promises this inheritance to all who overcome. And we will overcome by God's grace. We believe that God will dwell with us forever in the new heavens and the new earth, that we will be His people, and that He will be our God for eternity. Amen. Let's pray. God, we pray that you would fill us, our hearts and minds, with a biblical, clear, compelling vision of heaven so that we don't fall into the trap of believing that this life is all that there is, or believing that this life is as good as it gets.

35:14I pray particularly for those who have experienced loss and disappointment and hurt and injustice, dreams that have not been fulfilled. I pray that for them, instead of becoming jaded and bitter, that they would look with hope and anticipation and eager expectation to this beautiful new reality of living in the new heavens and the new earth forever, where all of our hopes are met in you coming to dwell with us. And be our God forever. I pray for those who right now either know that they're not going to be in the new heavens and the new earth or who aren't sure.

36:13I pray, God, that you would meet them here this morning through your word and your spirit. I pray that you would bring them to repentance and faith, and they would confess with their mouth and believe in their hearts that Jesus has been raised from the dead and that salvation is found in him alone. God, we thank you for this unusual series for us where we've explored all these different topics. And I pray that we would be known to each other, to our community, as basic Christians, people who are simply following Jesus and seeking to honor him in every way, and that you would bless us as we become that kind of a church.

37:01In Christ's name we pray. Amen. Thank you for listening to the sermon audio from New Life Baptist Church in College Station, Texas. For more information or to support our ministry, visit us online at newlifecs.net.