If medical technology came up with a way to determine the day of your death, would you want to know? On the one hand, you could plan out what you’d like to accomplish before that day. On the other hand, could you live normally, counting the days you have left? That day is coming regardless. Life is uncertain. Our date with death may come suddenly at any moment.
Death is everyone’s destiny (Ecc 7:2, 8:7,8). Death is an intruder in this world due to the Curse on human sin (Gen. 2:17, Rom. 6:23). That’s why we dread it. But Jesus removes that fear through His own death & resurrection because he defeated sin, death, & the devil who holds the power of death (Heb. 2:14-15). He gives us new & eternal life, & so removes death’s terror (Rom. 5:10, 21, 1 Cor. 15:56-57, Phil. 1:21-24).
Our future life isn’t entirely disconnected from our present life as Christians. It’s both continuation & contrast. We begin to experience a foretaste of heaven even now through faith. It’s described in terms of all the wondrous things we have now, but multiplied & expanded (Mark 10:29-30). It’s what we’ve already begun to experience in Christ, but we ain’t seen nothing yet (1 Cor. 2:9)!
Heaven is a state of relationship. It won’t be whatever you desire it to be because it’s not man-centered. It’s more about being in the direct presence of God Himself! God lives within us now as we enjoy Christ’s abiding presence through the Holy Spirit. But then we’ll know Him face to face (Rev. 22:4). So, to go to heaven will be a fuller realization of this relationship. That alone will transcend all earthly joys. It’s what we were made for! Heaven’s also about relationships with others. Will we know others there? Oh yeah—better than ever! We won’t really know each other until we get to heaven.
Heaven is also a state of worship. Since our present relationship includes worship, it’s only in heaven that we’ll experience worship fully. There we will witness God’s glory & even share in it. Revelation gives us several previews of worship in glimpses we can understand. But we cannot truly conceive of how wonderful worship, our joy, & fulfillment will be.
Heaven will be more than worship—it will be a state of service. Our service will have a fuller meaning as an outpouring of love & gratitude, without the curse of exhaustion, suffering, or tedious boredom. At the same time, it will be a state of rest. Hebrews 4 likens it to a Sabbath rest for God’s people. Just as God rested after His labors, so shall we rest from our earthly labor. Though it cannot be deserved or earned, Heaven should be viewed as the reward of our work.
I think of the beginning of the movie, “A Christmas Story,” as the children press their faces against the department store window to pine for the toys behind the glass. One day, the glass will be removed for us! So let’s toil now & rest then. I often like to quote C.T. Studd, who said: “Only one life twill soon be past, only what’s done for Christ will last.”
Heaven is a perfect place for prepared people who have been perfected by Christ (Heb. 10:14). But for those who are not in Christ, they absolutely should dread death because it leads to being eternally shut out from God’s presence in hell. Hell isn’t something invented by preachers to keep people in line. The Bible speaks much about it, especially Jesus, describing it as a state of torment, darkness, weeping, & regret (Matt. 8:12, Jude 1:13, Luke 16:23-24). It’s called the 2nd death, not because people cease to exist there, but because it’s an everlasting existence of misery without the quality of life known as “immortality”—without goodness, joy, peace, or rest (2 Tim. 1:10, Rev. 20:14).
Many refuse to believe a loving God would send people to hell forever. Who hasn’t struggled with that thought? But to deny hell is to ignore God’s righteousness & justice. God has the right to judge the people He created who have rejected Him. Hell was originally prepared for the demons, but those who follow in their rebellious way choose to join them. It’s key to understand that no one will be in hell because of what they didn’t know, but because of what they did know & disobeyed (Rom. 1-3). Jesus came to die to rescue people from that destiny (1 Thess. 1:10, Col. 1:13-14). If hell isn’t real, why did Christ endure the suffering He did? What was He saving us from? What was worth leaving heaven for?
Mickey Mantle once said, “If I knew I was going to live this long, I would have taken better care of myself.” Many more will say, “If I knew I was going to live forever, I would have taken better care of my soul” (1 Tim. 4:8). If we could get a real glimpse of hell for just 3 seconds, nothing could stop us from doing everything possible to keep people from going there. Our goal in life is to go to heaven & take as many people with us as we can! We want to make it hard to go to hell from here.