A TRAVEL GUIDE TO HEAVEN
2 Samuel 12:16-23
Turn to Luke 24. We're going to look at the body that
Jesus had when he came forth from the grave. We're
continuing our study on QUESTIONS ABOUT HEAVEN YOU
ALWAYS WANTED TO ASK. By the way, these questions,
along with some other really interesting and helpful
material, are in my book entitled, COMFORT, PEACE, AND
HOPE. That is a little book that we often give to
those who have lost loved ones, and it's a book that
talks about near-death experiences. It talks about the
reality of heaven, and it talks about how we cope with
grief and the process of grief as well as some really
comforting information about what the Bible says about
heaven. It's available from our tape ministry for $5,
a little paperback book that, if you buy a sympathy
card, you almost pay that much. So you might think
about sending this book to friends when you want to
send someone a word of encouragement if they've lost a
loved one, because it has the message of salvation, the
message of heaven in there.
In Luke 24, you have the story of the appearance of
Jesus after His resurrection. Jesus appears to the
disciples as they have gathered together. Luke 24:33:
“And they rose up the same hour, and returned to
Jerusalem, and found the eleven gathered together, and
them that were with them.” So here are disciples of
the Lord gathered together in the very room where the
Last Supper was held. Luke 24:34: “The Lord is risen
indeed, and hath appeared to Simon.” They began to
relate their experiences on the road and how He was
recognized by them and the breaking of the bread.
While they were telling these things, He Himself stood
in their midst. They were startled and frightened and
thought that they were seeing a spirit. Naturally you
can understand how startled they were. When God
answers prayer, even though we believe God answers
prayer, we're amazed. We say, "Wow, I can't believe
it! I prayed that prayer, and God answered; I heard
from God!" That's the way Christians have always been.
We're still surprised, because we stand in awe at the
greatness of a God who answers prayer. So although
they had heard Jesus had risen from the dead, these
disciples were very startled by His sudden appearance.
For one thing, He apparently didn't come through the
door; He didn't come through a window: He just
suddenly appeared. One second, He wasn't there; the
next second, there He was standing right before them.
I don't know anybody who wouldn't be startled and
amazed in that circumstance. So notice they thought
this was a spirit because of the fact that He appeared
so suddenly and He appeared so miraculously. So they
thought He was a spirit. But He was far more than a
spirit. Luke 24:38-39: He said to them, "Why are ye
troubled? and why do (doubts) arise in your hearts?
Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I Myself." Of
course, the hands with the nail prints, the feet with
the nail prints. Then He said also, not only do I want
you to look at me, but He said, "I want you to touch
me." “Handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh
and bones, as ye see me have.” So here is Jesus
standing in their midst. In Luke 24:41-43, “While they
yet believed not for joy, and wondered, He said unto
them, ‘Have ye here any meat?’ And they gave Him a
piece of broiled fish... and He took it and did eat
before them.”
This passage of scripture many times is overlooked for
the value it gives us in telling us what our body will
be like in heaven. What kind of body will we have in
heaven? Well, we know that our body will be like that
of Jesus. I John 3:2: “We shall be like Him; for we
shall see Him as He is.” When Christ comes, and when
the dead are raised, and when we are given our immortal
bodies, the Bible says we will be like Him, for we will
see Him as He is. Jesus rose from the dead with an
immortal body. Paul in I Corinthians 15 says that the
Christian's body is sewn in the ground a natural body,
but it's raised an immortal body, a supernatural body.
Jesus says that death is necessary in order that our
bodies can be transformed and the prophecies of God can
be fulfilled. So what kind of body will we have in
heaven? It will be a body that occupies time and space
but is not hindered by it. That is, a body that will
never diminish, a body that will never grow old, a body
that will never grow tired. Secondly, a body that does
not need food but can enjoy food. We're going to see
in a moment that the Bible indicates that everything we
enjoy on earth, we will have in heaven, but we will
enjoy it to a much greater degree because it will have
a much greater quality about it.
Most people have the idea that heaven is a place of
ghosts and spirits and angels, but it's not like this
world. It's not real. But the concept of scripture is
so fascinating because it's this: that heaven is not
only real, but heaven is of such much greater quality
and such greater significance and fulfillment than
anything we could ever know in this world. If we
understood the concept of heaven as Paul understood it,
then we would think of our loved ones there with great,
great joy because of what they are experiencing right
now. It's going to be a body like the Lord Jesus. We
shall be like Him. It will be a body of glory. In
Philippians 3:20-21, the apostle Paul writing to the
church at Philippi makes a tremendous comparison
between the bodies we have now and the bodies we're
going to have in heaven. “For our citizenship is in
heaven, from which also we eagerly wait a Savior, the
Lord Jesus Christ: who will transform the body of our
humble state into conformity with the body of His
glory, by the exertion of the power that He has, even
to subject all things to Himself.” In other words,
he's saying if God created the world, if God created
mankind to begin with, then God has the ability and the
power and the intent to create for us and transform us
into a heavenly body like the body of His glory.
Here's a body that is totally incorruptible.
Then some believe that we will be the ideal age of 33,
the age of Jesus at His death and resurrection.
There's nothing in scripture to prove that, but
everything in scripture does indicate that the bodies
in heaven will not be bodies of age; they will not be
bodies that have infirmity or weakness or that have any
limitation upon them. Then others believe we'll have
some choice about our age or appearance according to
personal taste. Again, that's not in scripture. But I
just know this: you're going to be happy with the body
you have in heaven. Because if you weren't happy with
your appearance in heaven, you'd be unhappy. And the
Bible says there will be no unhappiness in heaven. So
however your body looks, you're going to be happy with
it, and you're going to say, "That's perfect." When
God made the world, He made it perfectly. When God
completed creation, He stepped back. The Bible says,
“And God saw that it was very good.” You're going to
be able to look at your body and say, "It's very good;
it's just exactly like I want it to be." Won't that be
wonderful? Down here on the earth we can always find
something we don't like about our appearance. Either
we're too short, or we're too tall, or we're too fat,
or we're too thin, or some other aspect of our
appearance makes us unhappy. But in heaven we're going
to have total self-esteem, total self-acceptance,
because we're going to have the body that we want.
We will still have emotions and feelings. How do I
know that? I Corinthians 13 says that “faith, hope,
and love will endure forever.” Now think about that.
Love is an emotion. Love is many things: love is a
commitment to another person; love is total trust in
another person; love is being able to give yourself
totally and completely to another person. But there is
no way that you can separate love from emotion. The
Bible says, “Love will endure forever.” There's
nothing greater in this world than love. Somebody said
the greatest need of a man or a woman is to love and to
be loved, to love someone else and to be loved with a
perfect love. So love will endure forever. Faith,
hope, and love, but the greatest of these is love. I
Corinthians 13 says these three will endure. Faith
will endure in the sense that we'll have a perfect
faith, a faith that is total trust in the heavenly
Father. Hope is one of the strongest emotions you can
have. In the Bible, hope is not just an abstract
feeling of wishing something will come true, to HOPE
for something, like a hope chest. But hope in the
Bible is a strong conviction based on a promise from
God. So these three great emotions will always exist.
So in heaven we're not going to be robots; we're going
to be able to experience faith, we're going to be able
to experience hope, we're going to experience love, and
it will be a perfect kind of love. So that tells us
something about the kind of body we're going to have in
heaven.
Another question that's been asked in these thirty-one
years that I've been a pastor is what happens to babies
and children when they die? The Roman church has
historically baptized babies, and one of the purposes
is babies are baptized for original sin. In other
words, we've inherited the sin nature of Adam, and so
David said, "In sin my mother conceived me." So
Catholic theologians many years ago said, "Well, if
babies are conceived in sin and they are sinners, then
we need to baptize them so that their sin will be
covered." That's where the baptism of infants came in.
But the scripture teaches this is not necessary
because although a baby is a sinner technically, he's
inherited a sin nature. You don't have to teach a
child to do wrong; you have to teach a child to do
right. A child is born and immediately has a selfish,
sinful nature. But the difference is God doesn't hold
that sin against them; God does not hold them
accountable for that sin. God is a just God; He's a
fair God; He's a loving God; He's a forgiving God. So
God is not going to hold the sin of a baby against it
or the sin of a young child against it. The scripture
teaches that salvation is necessary whenever a person
comes to an accountable age, whenever they realize that
they have sinned against God and that Jesus Christ is
the answer to sin and that they need to be saved from
that sin. When they come to the age of moral
accountability. Of course, a little baby is not
accountable for the choices they make. So they are
under the blood of Christ.
When Jesus died, He died for the sins of the whole
world. That would include babies, wouldn't it? Jesus
died for the sins of the whole world, and the Bible
says that as in Adam all died, in Christ all are made
alive. So that baby is under the blood of Calvary;
he's under the blood of Christ. The death of Jesus
covered the sin of Adam. If that's true, then we don't
go to hell because of the sin of Adam; we don't go to
hell because we have a sin nature. We go to hell
because we're sinners by choice. Not only are we
sinners by nature, but when we come to the age when we
can choose to sin, we choose to sin. It's that choice
to sin that makes us lost, not because we're sons of
Adam. So a baby is not lost; therefore, a baby doesn't
need to be saved. So when we dedicate babies to the
Lord in our church, we're not doing that so that they
will be saved; we're doing that as mainly a prayer for
that child that when they come to that age of
accountability, they'll come to know Christ, and we're
doing it to dedicate that parent to the Lord and to
recognize that God is the giver of this new life and
that this child belongs to God. So it's far different
than baptizing a baby so his sins will be covered.
Way back in the Old Testament, David committed adultery
with Bathsheba. Out of that adultery, a child was
conceived. As a part of the judgement of God, God had
told David, "You're going to pay for this sin in
several ways. The first way you're going to pay for
this sin is this child is not going to live." So the
child is born.
“David therefore inquired of God for the child, and
David fasted and went and laid all night on the ground.
And the elders of his household stood beside him in
order to raise him up from the ground, but he was
unwilling, would not eat food with them. Then it
happened on the seventh day that the child died, and
the servants of David were afraid to tell him that the
child was dead, so they said, ‘Behold, while the child
was still alive, we spoke to him and he did not listen
to our voice. How then can we tell him that the child
is dead since he might do himself harm?’ But when
David saw that his servants were whispering together,
David perceived that the child was dead. So David said
to his servant, ‘Is the child dead?’ And they said,
‘He's dead.’ So David arose from the ground, washed
and anointed himself, and changed his clothes, and came
into the house of the Lord and worshipped. Then he
came to his own house. And when he requested, they set
food before him, and he ate. Then his servants said to
him, ‘What is this thing that you've done? While the
child was alive, you fasted and wept. But when the
child died, you arose and ate food. And he said,
‘While the child was still alive, I fasted and wept for
I said, 'Who knows? The Lord may be gracious to me
that the child may live.' But now he has died. Why
should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I shall go
to him, but he will not return to me.’” (2 Samuel
12:16-23)
If David believed that his child was going to the grave
and he would never see his child again, would David
have been able to handle his grief? No, the thing that
made him handle his grief when he realized the child
was dead, the thing that made him get up and eat and go
to the house of God and worship and put on his clothes
was this: he knew that the child was with the Lord.
So he said, "I cannot bring him back to me, but one day
I will go to where he is." Ladies and gentlemen, I
believe with all my heart that passage is in the Bible
to tell us that when you lose a little child, and that
little child has not come to the age of accountability,
that that little child is covered by the blood of Jesus
Christ, and that little child is in heaven, and that
little child one day you will see once again.
What about babies who are born before they come to
term? That is, what about babies that are miscarried
or babies that are a result of abortion? The only
comforting fact that we have is that God considers them
to be persons from the time of their conception. John
the Baptist, although not virgin-born (he had an
earthly father as well as an earthly mother), fulfilled
a special purpose for God.
“It came about that when Elizabeth heard Mary's
greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth
was filled with the Holy Spirit. And she cried out
with a loud voice, and said, ‘Blessed among women are
you, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. For behold
and how has this happened to me that the mother of my
Lord should come to me? For behold when the sound of
your greeting reached my ears, the baby leaped in my
womb for joy.’” (Luke 1:41-44)
The scripture goes on to talk about John the Baptist
and to say to us that John the Baptist was to be filled
with the Holy Spirit from his mother's womb. They did
not consider the fetus growing inside of them as a
nonperson. They considered the fetus growing inside of
them to be a person. So from the time of conception,
that fetus is a person; that fetus is a living soul;
that fetus has had God breathe into it the breath of
life. So the only comfort you have when babies are
prematurely born and die or a mother miscarries or even
an abortion occurs is that that is a person who one day
will be in heaven. So I believe the Bible is very
clear about this.
What do our loved ones in heaven know about our
activities on the earth? In Revelation 21:4, we've
read many times, it teaches us that they can know
nothing that will bring them pain. Because it says
“God will wipe away all tears from their eyes.” There
will be no more sorrow. God is able to shield our
loved ones from pain. Also our loved ones in heaven,
if they knew every detail of our life on earth,
wouldn't have sorrow about the bad things in our life
because they now see life from God's perspective. They
see where it's all heading; they see from the beginning
to the end.
Somebody asked the question, "Well, what about a person
in heaven who has an unsaved loved one, and that loved
one dies and goes to hell? How could they not have
tears for their loved one who has died and gone to
hell?" Someone has suggested that heaven is a place
where the unsaved are like the unborn: they've never
been born again. Now a person in God's family, and
because that person was never born again, they'll have
no memory of that person at all. People in heaven long
for Satan to come to an end; they long for God's
kingdom to come and for all of God's family to be
together. Their memory is limited to those who are
born again. The Bible says, “The former things will
not be brought to mind.”
So we don't need to wonder or we don't need to be
concerned about what our loved ones in heaven know
about what's going on on the earth in respect to it
bringing them pain, because God allows them to know
things that bring rejoicing. As a matter of fact, you
remember Jesus said that there is rejoicing in the
presence of the angels over one sinner that repents.
If that's true, every time a person gets saved, whether
our loved ones in heaven knew about that person or
didn't know about that person, that's a cause for
heaven to rejoice. So there's great rejoicing in
heaven, just as there's rejoicing on earth whenever a
baby is born into your family, there's great rejoicing
in heaven over a person who's born again. In fact,
that's the thing heaven rejoices about more than
anything is people being born into the family of God.
Here are some other interesting but not vital things
about heaven. People have asked about animals in
heaven. There are some indications that there are
animals in heaven. In Revelation 19:14, the Bible says
Jesus comes out of heaven, and He's riding on a white
horse. So perhaps that's a reference to animals in
heaven. Vegetables and fruit in heaven, Revelation 22,
alludes to this. Revelation 22:2 talks about the Tree
of Life bearing twelve kinds of fruit. The leaves of
the tree could be construed as vegetables for the
healing of the nations. Eating and drinking in heaven,
Matthew 26, Jesus talks about eating and drinking with
Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and all the saints of God.
Revelation 19 describes the marriage supper of the
Lamb. If you have supper, then you are going to have
food. Revelation 21:1 indicates that just as God
created animals and waterfalls and forests and
mountains and all the beauty of nature for Adam, heaven
will be the creation of a new heaven and a new earth
for God's people to enjoy for all of eternity. So all
of the beautiful things that we see on this earth will
be magnified in heaven. The most important thing is
how can I know that I'm going to heaven? The Bible
gives us great and clear evidence about the way to
heaven.