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The Afterlife, #2: "New Heaven and New Earth" Colossians 3:1 Revelation 21:1-8

by Clancy Nixon

April 6, 2008

Church of the Holy Spirit

Ashburn, Virginia

www.HolySpiritAnglican.org

The title of the message today is "New Heaven and New Earth." It's the second

message in our series called "The Afterlife." I've been studying Scriptures on Heaven all

week again. The older I get, more I long for the New Heaven and New Earth. God

knows, I love the beauty of the Earth as it now is.

The most beautiful sunset I've ever seen was when we lived at a farm on Church

Creek, just off the Chesapeake Bay about 12 years ago. That summer, Sam learned how

to swim; and little Will saved his life when he fell from the dock into the water. During

Seminary, we lived as caretakers for a whole summer in an Antebellum farm home on the

Eastern Shore called Liberty Hall, in Dorchester County, near Cambridge in Maryland.

Before the Civil War, Liberty Hall was a stop on the underground railroad, where slaves

who'd escaped from their masters were traveling to their freedom to the north. The farm

house sat on 200 acres on a peninsula surrounded by water. I remember one amazing

evening: the sun was an enormous orange ball over gently rippling water and marsh; the

clouds filled the sky with pink and purple and green and more; and a lone waterman

quietly plied his crab traps in his little skiff. Not another soul was visible or audible on

the horizon. It is a precious memory to me of God's glory revealed in nature. Yet even

that memory; even that amazing beauty in unspoiled nature is still fallen, still broken by

the curse on all Creation flowing from Adam's sin.

One of my fondest longings is to see a sunset at Liberty Hall that is unfallen,

uncursed, unsullied by sin. I believe that God put that longing in my heart. C.S. Lewis

wrote, "If I find in myself a desire which no experience in the world can satisfy, the most

probably explanation is that I was made for another world." (Mere Christianity, p. 120)

Have you ever been away from home for a long while, on business or travel or college?

Do you remember how your heart ached for home? That's how we can feel about

Heaven, even how we should feel about Heaven. G.K. Chesterton wrote, "The modern

philosopher has told me again and again that I was in the right place, but I felt depressed

even in acquiescence.... When I heard that I was in the wrong place [because this Earth

was not my home], my soul sang for joy, like a bird in spring. I knew now why I could

feel homesick at home." (Orthodoxy, p. 99-100)

The early Christians longed for Heaven. The Apostle Paul said in Philippians 1:23

that "...to depart and be with Christ is better by far." Paul also gave us this command at

Colossians 3:1 "Set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right

hand of God." Let's say this together: "Set your heart on Heaven." "Set your heart on

Heaven." We are commanded to set our hearts on heaven. Last week we learned that

many Christians aren't particularly looking forward to their own resurrection and

afterlife, often because they have the mistaken notion that they will float around as

disembodied spirits on clouds in some kind of unending church service in the sky. We

considered how cool and beautiful our new bodies will be after God has gathered the

molecules up from the four winds and renewed our bodies into their permanent, glorified

state. This week we're looking at the New Heaven and the New Earth, to stir up in us a

longing for Heaven. Many of us don't long for Heaven, even though it is way cool, and

we will be spending the overwhelming part of our eternal existence there. Let's say your

work was calling you to move with your family to Ireland next month, like the Pinkmans

did a few years ago. You would naturally be interested in learning about your future

home about its climate, its people, its customs. It would be strange if you didn't seek to

learn about Ireland if you were about to move there. How much more should we be

stirred to learn about Heaven? There is much to long for.

Why do we talk about heaven so little? Why is what we do have to say about it

often so vague and lifeless? The Bible says that this is the work of the devil. Revelation

13:6 says the satanic beast "opened his mouth to blaspheme God, and to slander his name

and his dwelling place and those who live in heaven." The "rat" slanders three things:

God's person, God's people, and God's place namely, heaven. Isaiah 14:12-15 tells us

that the devil, the son of the morning star, was forcibly evicted from Heaven. So the

devil became bitter toward God and toward the place that was not longer his. Randy

Alcorn (in his book Heaven) says that it must be maddening for the Accuser that you and

I are now entitled to inherit the place where he has been kicked out of! He attacks us by

whispering lies to us about the very place that God tells us to set our hearts on!

The Book of Revelation tells us that God is going to make a New Heaven and a

New Earth! Open your Bibles to Revelation chapter 21, verses 1 and 2, on page 1230 at

the end of your blue pew Bibles. "Then I saw a new Heaven and new Earth, for the first

heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the

holy city, the new Jerusalem, come down out of Heaven from God, prepared as a bride

beautifully dressed for her husband." Friends, these verses describe the grand climax of

all history. All the themes of the Bibles come together in these last two chapters of

Revelation, which is why I asked you to read them as homework this week. Please read

them again this coming week, and talk about them with your children. The earth as we

know it is going to pass away; but the best parts of earth as we know it are not going to

pass away; the best of earth as we know it will be saved and retained, and only the

pollution, the degradation, only the fallen parts will be gone. Heaven and Earth are going

to be made new. Not destroyed completely, but renewed. In a similar way that God is

going to resurrect our bodies, God will resurrect the earth. Perhaps the earth will be

devastated like a forest fire consumes a forest but new growth will spring up soon after.

Heaven and Earth will come together. Remember that Jesus told his disciples at

the last supper that he was going to heaven to prepare a place for us? Jesus has been

preparing the New Jerusalem for us for 2,000 years, and it is going got be perfect! The

Holy City will descend out of Heaven and touch down on the earth, or meet it. I believe

that the New Heaven and New Earth will be a physical place in space and time, since our

resurrected bodies are physical in space and time. Heaven is a place right now, but it is

not a place that we can normally apprehend with our senses. You can't take a rocket ship

and go there death is the normal door to Heaven, and glimpses of heaven are given us

in visions. Even so, Heaven is among us. Jesus told us that the Kingdom of Heaven was

breaking in to our realm. I believe that Heaven, and angels and spiritual realms are part of

our reality, of our world, but that we can't usually see them. Theoretical physicists from

the best universities in the world now discuss "string theory." As I understand it, string

theory says that in addition to the four dimensions that we now experience: height,

length, depth, and time - that there are likely more then ten additional dimensions that we

can't now apprehend. It is no stretch for me to say that the present Heaven is in one or

more of those dimensions. The good news is that soon and very soon, Heaven is going to

break into our dimension in fullness. "Soon and very soon, we are going to see the King."

The New Jerusalem will be shaped like a cube, reflecting the perfection of the

Tabernacle and the Temple, which were shaped the same way. Look at Revelation

21:15-17. It says the holy city will be 12,000 stadia in length, height and depth by man's

measurement. That is fourteen hundred miles on an edge. The capital city of the new

Earth would reach from the Appalachian mountains to the California border if it were

placed on this continent.

Some people don't like the idea of heaven as New Jerusalem, since they don't like

cities! It's important to remember that this city will be quite different. It will have all the

advantages we associate with cities, but none of the disadvantages. I believe that it will

have art museums, beautiful architecture, amazing parks and gardens, and six star

restaurants. The food there will be so good, five stars won't be enough! My own vision

of Heaven will have no fast food restaurants, because we won't be in a hurry. Okay, you

can have McDonalds, but it won't be fast food! This city won't have any pollution,

noise, crime, sirens, garbage, crowding, or poverty. It will truly be Heaven on Earth.

The gates of Jerusalem in Bible times would be closed at night to guard against

armies and bandits. The gates of the New Jerusalem will always be open, showing that

the city will be secure and safe. Next week we'll look at what our relationships will be

like in a world without sin, so that we need no protection. Some people worry, verse 2,

that there will be no sea, because they love the sea! I'm one of those who love the sea,

but for the first century people, the Mediterranean Sea was monstrous and frightful, a

watery grave for their family members, a place of danger. We know that a river will flow

from the Throne of God, chapter 22, verse 1, and that water will need to flow somewhere.

So I think we will have lakes, even seas, though maybe not the Mediterranean Sea.

Let your imagination soar with thoughts of the New Heaven and the new earth.

Set your minds on things above, and so obey God's command. Soon and very soon,

we're going to see the king! Amen.