This sermon was preached on Sunday
evening, October 23rd, 1983, at the Trinity Baptist Church
in Montville, New Jersey. Now let us again bow before the
Lord and ask His help as we turn to the ministry of the Word of
God together. Our Father, we read in Your Word
that though we have never beheld your Son with our physical eyes,
whom having not seen, we do love and rejoice with joy unspeakable
and full of glory. We thank you for the sheer joy
of confessing our love of the gospel in the words of this hymn. We thank you for the transforming
power of the gospel which many of us have not only known in
our individual life experience, but have seen in the lives of
multitudes of others. And, O God, tonight, as we turn
our minds to that great and glorious theme of the age to come, and
those things which never would have entered into the heart and
mind of man to conceive, but which have now been revealed
in Christ who has brought life and immortality to light through
the gospel. May the Holy Spirit make us strong
to grasp the wonder and the glory of our final inheritance in Christ. And those who sit amongst us,
strangers to your grace, strangers to the power of the gospel, may
the very glimpses, even an oblique glance, at these glories make
them insatiably thirsty. to know the blessedness of the
hope that is ours because of Christ. Bless us, then, in our
study together, we pray, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. Now, in the middle of June of
this past summer, I began a series of Sunday evening studies with
you on the awesome and yet glorious themes of heaven and of hell. In the seven previous studies,
I attempted to answer, from the Word of God, two very basic but
vital and important questions. Number one, what is hell? And number two, who is going
there? In answer to the first question,
we collated the biblical materials and saw that it is proper to
affirm that hell is, and then we categorized the teaching of
the Bible under five major headings. And then with reference to the
question, who is going there, we again collated many passages
of the Word of God under two major headings, the general description
of those who are going there, and the specific descriptions
of those who are going there. Now, although God has stamped
upon the consciousness of all of his creatures as image-bearers
the fact that this world is not all there is to our existence,
We are absolutely dependent upon special revelation, that is,
the book of God, the embodiment of His mind in the scriptures
of the Old and the New Testaments, if we are to affirm anything
with certainty about these great themes of heaven and of hell. And having spent some weeks on
the questions, what is hell and who is going there, we now move
to address those questions to the subject of heaven. And tonight,
we begin to take up the first of those questions, what is heaven? And then, after spending several
Lord's Day evenings on that subject, we will take up the question,
God willing, who is going there? What is heaven? And as we attempt
to answer the question tonight, just looking at two parts of
the answer, I would remind you of a point made in the introductory
study on this subject, that we are concerned primarily not with
the intermediate state, that is, not that dimension of heaven
that is the portion of every believer the moment his soul
leaves his body. There are three texts in the
New Testament which speak very clearly of the intermediate state
of the believer. Philippians 1.23, I desire to
depart and be with Christ, which is far better. 2 Corinthians
5.8, to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. And Hebrews 12.23, which speaks
of the spirits of just men made perfect. But we are concentrating
our attention upon heaven in terms of the eternal state. the heaven that will exist after
the return of the Lord Jesus, after the resurrection of the
bodies of all men, saint and sinners, and the reuniting of
their souls with those bodies, and their being fixed in their
eternal state with body and soul, joined forever. So we take up
the question then, what is heaven? with our concentration upon heaven
in terms of the eternal state. And the first assertion that
I will make, and then we will look at a number of scriptures
which force this assertion upon us, is this. Heaven is a place
as well as a state or condition of existence. Heaven is a place
as well as a state or condition. When the Bible speaks of heaven,
some passages clearly point to a place outside of this present
world order, particularly the place where our Lord, now in
His glorified body, resides. It is called the right hand of
the Father. Let us look at several passages
which would seem to point to the fact that heaven is a place
as well as a condition outside of this present world as we now
know it and exist within it. John chapter 14 verses 1 through
3. John 14 verses 1 through 3. Our Lord has told His disciples
that He is about to leave them. And this, of course, has caused
great grief to their hearts, and so he's seeking to comfort
them, and he says in John 14.1, Do not let your heart be troubled. You believe, or it may be the
imperative in the original, the actual wording, the actual spelling
for the imperative or the indicative is exactly the same. Believe
in God. Believe also in me. In my Father's
house are many mansions, or many dwelling places. If it were not
so, I would have told you. For I go to prepare a place for
you. And if I go and prepare a place
for you, I will come again and receive you unto Myself, that
where I am, there you may be also. Here our Lord says, I'm
about to leave you. And in leaving you, I am going
to prepare a place for you in my Father's house. And the contrast
is their present place of dwelling and the Father's house. I'm leaving
you, but I'm leaving you to do a work of construction. I'm leaving
to prepare a place for you in my Father's house. And in my
Father's house, there are many dwelling places, and if I go
to do that work of preparing the dwelling places, I give you
my pledge that I will come back again to take you to myself,
that where I am, there you may be also." And if this were the
only passage in the Bible with some explicit teaching on heaven,
we would be rightly led to think that heaven, whatever it is,
is a place up there, out there, beyond this present state of
affairs, this present place of dwelling as we now know it. The
same pressure is on a text such as Philippians 3 and verse 20. Philippians 3 and verse 20. For our citizenship is in heaven. Whence also we wait for a Savior,
the Lord Jesus, who shall fashion anew the body of our humiliation,
that it may be conformed to the body of His glory. Our citizenship
is in the heavens. From the heavens we wait. We wait for our Lord Jesus to
come and to fashion anew our bodies like unto the body of
His own glory. And the pressure again seems
to be pointing to heaven as a place and a condition out there, up
there, beyond here. Likewise with Colossians 3 verses
1 to 4. If you then were raised together
with Christ, Seek the things that are above, outside of you,
above you, beyond you, where Christ is, seated at the right
hand of God. Set your mind on the things that
are above, that is, the place where Christ is seated on the
right hand of God, not on the things that are upon the earth.
You see the contrast? Where Christ is seated at the
right hand of God is the place above in contrast to the earth. For you died and your life is
hidden with Christ in God. when Christ, who is our life,
shall be manifested, then shall you also with him be manifested
in glory." Now, I say the pressure of these texts, not the clear,
undeniable, explicitly etched-out teaching, but certainly the pressure
of these texts is that heaven is a place out there, up there,
beyond this present earth. However, there are other passages
which clearly point in the direction of this present earth, renewed
and renovated at the coming of Christ as the place called heaven,
that heaven will indeed be found here on this earth. and two such
clear texts are Romans chapter 8, and I begin the reading at verse
18. For I reckon that the suffering
of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the
glory that shall be revealed to usward. For the earnest expectation
of the creation, that is, this created world order, waits for
the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation, this world
and all that pertains to it, was subjected to vanity, not
of its own will, but by reason of him who subjected it in hope
that the creation itself shall be delivered from the bondage
of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children
of God. For we know that the whole creation
groans and travails in pain together until now." And here is the picture
of this world having come under the curse. and longing to be
released and delivered from that curse in conjunction with the
final installment of redemptive privilege with respect to the
children of God. That comes, of course, at the
return of Christ, when at His return He summons dead believers
out of their graves. Living believers are transformed
in a moment, and they come into the full possession of redemptive
privilege in their glorified bodies. And according to this
passage, the whole creation in that same complex of events will
be delivered from the bondage of corruption under which it
is labored from the fall of man. For you remember, when man sinned,
God said, Cursed is the ground for your sake. And so this passage
clearly points in the direction of a heaven that is here. This
very earth on which this building rests, this very earth which
supports the walls and the trusses and the concrete floor on which
you sit, this very creation is given the picture here of one
in travail, its groaning and travailing, longing for its true
birth into the liberty of the sons of God. And then the second
key text is 2 Peter chapter 3. 2 Peter and chapter 3. Now remember our question is,
what is heaven? And I have said that heaven is
a place as well as a state or condition. Well, what is that
place? Where is it to be found? Some
texts point out there, up there, outside of this present order. Now we've looked at a text that
says, down here, in this situation, within this present order. And
now 2 Peter chapter 3, and beginning with verse 10. But the day of
the Lord will come as a thief in which the heavens shall pass
away with a great noise, and the elements shall be dissolved
with fervent heat, and the earth and the works that are therein
shall be burned up, seeing that these things, the heavens and
the earth, are thus all to be dissolved. What manner of persons
ought you to be in all holy living and godliness, looking for and
earnestly desiring the coming of the day of God, by reason
of which the heavens, being on fire, shall be dissolved, and
the elements shall melt with fervent heat? But, according
to His promise, we look for new heavens and A new earth wherein
dwells righteousness. Well, you see, the Bible is all
full of contradictions. Anyone can see it. Jesus said,
I'm going out there to prepare a place. I'm going to come and
take you to myself. Heaven is up there and out there. And now Peter says, we're supposed
to look for a new heavens and a new earth. Heaven's down here.
Well, is it out there or down here? Is it up or is it down? Is it out or is it here? Well,
there is no contradiction, but there is a beautiful synthesis,
and it is wonderfully brought together in a passage such as
Revelation 21, verses 1 to 3. There is no contradiction. There
is a beautiful and glorious synthesis of these various strands of biblical
teaching in vision John writes, And I saw a new heaven and a
new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth are passed
away, and the sea is no more. And I saw the holy city, New
Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, made ready as
a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice out
of the throne, saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with
men, and he shall dwell with them, and they shall be his peoples,
and God himself shall be with them, and be their God." And
then, further on in the chapter, The identity of this holy city,
New Jerusalem, is none other than the glorified Church. Verse
9, there came one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls,
laden with the seven last plagues, and he spoke with me, saying,
Come hither, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb. That is the Church. And he carried
me away in the Spirit to a mountain and showed me The holy city,
Jerusalem. You see it? He says, come, I'm
going to show you a beautiful bride. And then he takes John
and carries him away. And what does he see? A gorgeous
woman in a bridal garment? No. He sees a city coming down
out of heaven. And that city is the perfected
church coming down out of heaven to earth. So what is the answer
to the question, where is heaven? The answer is, according to these
scriptures, that heaven is the place and condition that will
involve this present world that now groans and travails under
all of the many effects of sin. purified by the fire of the returning
Lord who renews it in judgment, and new heavens, the heavens
above us, and who knows how far out beyond us to the farthest
galaxies the entire universe of God, with its focal point
being this little speck on the outer edge of this galaxy, will
constitute heaven as to its locality. So we are warranted in asserting,
what is heaven? Heaven is a place as well as
a state and a condition, a place involving this present earth,
but this earth as paradise restored and renewed and made fit for
the new condition of the people of God, along with a renovated
universe. And beyond that, all is speculation. Scripture casts a veil of silence
over those particulars. But did not our Lord say, Blessed
are the meek, for they shall inherit what? The earth, Matthew
5 And think of the many billions of times the prayer has gone
up, not as an empty form and ritual as it is with many, but
as an earnest cry to God from the hearts of obedient disciples,
Thy will be done upon earth, even as it is in heaven. And that longing and holy passion
in the hearts of the people of God will be answered when our
Lord Jesus, at His return, ushers in the full glory of heaven. Think of it. This very globe,
and I love to think of it in these terms, this very earth
that has soaked up the blood of multitudes upon battlefields,
this very earth where the sod is stained with innocent this
very earth that supports the footstep of the tyrant and the
lecher and the murderer and the thief and the tyrant, this very
earth that supports the rebel activity of the multitudes of
the unconverted, this very earth in which Almighty God is denied. this very air that surrounds
us, that men breathe into their lungs, that they might force
some of that air up over the larynx and speak words of blasphemy
and denial of God, that this very world and its total life-support
system will be renovated by the fire of judgment at the return
of Christ. And when He is through, every
particle, every atom of this Earth and its support system
will be permeated with nothing but righteousness. It will be
the new heavens and the new earth wherein righteousness and righteousness
alone has its home. You want to get shouting happy
driving down a busy freeway? thinking of all the cussing that's
going on because people are banging into one another and cutting
one another off. And you go into that office and
your eyes burn with people blowing smoke into them and your ears
are defiled with the cursing. Child of God, do you want something
that will make you shouting happy in the midst of it? Look at every
square inch of the Garden State Parkway, every square inch of
that office room, every square inch of that classroom and say,
one day, nothing but righteousness will occupy you. Nothing but
righteous feet will walk over that square inch of ground. Nothing
but righteous words will send out vibrations to be picked up
by human ears. Nothing but righteous sights
will ever enter these eyes. Oh, child of God, if you want
to get shouting happy, you just fix your mind upon that great
reality. What is heaven? Heaven is a place
as well as a condition. And that place will be this present
world, renovated and renewed, paradise restored, and all of
the heavens above us And I say beyond that, we must speculate.
And I don't think God is at all disturbed with holy speculation,
just so long as you don't preach it. And I'll not preach my speculations,
though I have great joy in turning them over in my mind. But in
the second place, and this is all we're going to touch upon
tonight, the second thing that we are warranted to say about
heaven is this. Heaven is a state of the personal
perfection of soul and body. Heaven is a state of the personal
perfection of soul and body. Let us consider, first of all,
the perfection of the soul. When God begins His work of grace,
He begins that work by breaking the dominion of sin over the
soul of an elect sinner. Romans chapter 6 is the watershed
of biblical teaching on this point. Paul says in that chapter,
when you were the slaves of sin, you obeyed from the heart the
form of doctrine unto which you were delivered, verse 17. and
being made free from sin, that is, its dominion, its lordship,
ye became the servants of righteousness. And in verse 22, servants to
righteousness is changed to servants of God. And I love the fact that
both are used. You see, if we became servants
of righteousness in the abstract, that would be mere legalism and
moralism. But if it simply said, servants
to God, it might leave the door open to the mystic flights of
an unethical pietism. And someone says, oh, I'm a servant
of God, who still lives like the devil. But being made servants
to God, we are made servants to righteousness. And one is
never true without the other. The dominion of sin is broken,
and in the deepest recesses of the soul, we are delivered from
the clutches of the devil. and the principle of living for
self and for sin. We are given the gift of the
Holy Spirit, and in these souls of ours God implants what the
Bible calls a down payment of a completed redemption. And within our hearts we have
a longing to be here and now what we one day shall be. By the grace of God, we shall
have souls with all of the faculties of the soul, the intellectual,
the thinking faculties, the affectional, the feeling faculties, the volitional,
the willing faculties, and all the mysterious faculties of the
soul. to think that as surely as sin
has entered and twisted and marred and scarred and warped every
faculty, the God who has broken its dominion will one day scour
every last remnant of sin from every atom of the soul, if I
may materialize the soul into a collection of atoms, until
the very eye of God, with a God-made microscope cannot find one single
remnant of sin left in the human soul, completely and wholly sanctified
by His grace. Now, for those who die before
the return of Christ, that is what the Lord does the moment
the soul leaves the body and before it enters His presence.
That is why Hebrews Chapter 12 and verse 23 says, You are come
unto the spirits of just men made perfect. So the soul is
perfected at the moment of death. To be absent from the body is
to be present with the Lord. That's why John can say in John
14, 13, Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord, and their
works do follow them. They have the perfection of the
soul at the moment of death. But God did not make us to be
disembodied souls, even perfect disembodied souls. And when the
Bible says that in the resurrection they shall be as the angels,
it's only speaking with reference to the institution of marriage.
It doesn't mean we shall be disembodied spirits. May I say it reverently?
Do you know you could never be happy as a human being, existing
for eternity with a perfect soul without your body? Because God
didn't make you to be a disembodied soul. He made you a human being. He made you a body-soul entity. And you can never be totally
happy in God unless you are totally what God made you to be. a holy
man, body soul, a holy woman, body soul. And so heaven will
realize for us not merely, bless God, not merely the perfection
of the soul, but the perfection of the body as well. And according
to 1 Thessalonians 4.14, this will be brought about at the
return of the Lord Jesus. Look at the passage, familiar
to many of you. But we as elders are constantly
reminding ourselves that we have those of you who are very new
to the Christian faith and some of the texts that some of us
received almost as it were at our mother's breasts are as new
as tomorrow morning sunrise to some of you. First Thessalonians
four in verse fourteen. Some silly notions have been
floating around the church at Thessalonica that there was some
kind of special privilege that awaited those who would be alive
when the Lord came, and that those who died before his coming
would be sort of second-class citizens in the kingdom. So Paul
addresses himself to that notion. Verse 13 of chapter 4, We would
not have you ignorant brethren concerning them that fall asleep,
that you sorrow not as the rest who have no hope. For if we believe
that Jesus died and rose again Even so, them also that are fallen
asleep in Jesus will God bring with him. That is, he will bring
their souls with him at his return. For this we say unto you by the
word of the Lord, that we who are alive and are left under
the coming of the Lord shall in no wise precede them that
are fallen asleep. You see his masterful stroke?
He says, we won't be found the first class citizens. He said,
I got news for you. You know who's going to get preferential
treatment? Not living saints, dead saints. Look, we who are
alive will in no wise precede them that are fallen asleep.
The Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with
the voice of the archangel, with the trump of God, and the dead
in Christ shall rise first, then adverb of time, then we that
are alive, that are left, shall be together with them, caught
up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so shall
we ever be with the Lord. The Lord Jesus at his return
is going to show preferential treatment to the dust of his
departed saints, whose bodies have long since been eaten by
the worms. Return to dust, they will have
preferential treatment And when he raises them to life, with
what kind of body will he raise them? Well, Philippians 3.21,
the passage we've already looked at in another connection, now
let's look at one part of the verse. What kind of body will
we have? This is the kind of body the
returning Lord will give us. Verse 21, who shall fashion anew
the body of our humiliation, that it may be conformed to the
body of His glory." Think of it. Try to meditate for a moment
tonight. Bird up the loins of your mind
and think, what is that body like that our Lord now has subsequent
to His resurrection? that body in which he moved freely
in and out amongst his disciples for forty days subsequent to
the resurrection, that body that could pass through walls and
yet had substance and could prepare a lovely fish breakfast by a
seashore. The body that they could see
and discern, and yet it could appear, the doors being shut,
that body that they saw ascending up before their very eyes, Acts
chapter 1, while they were gazing upon Him, He was taken up from
them into heaven with His hands outstretched in the posture of
priestly blessing. The body of His glory, the body
of the outshining of the perfection of His own glorious person, as
the exalted, majestic Son of God, who came obediently through
the course of humiliation, and now is seated at the right hand
of the Father, that body of tireless energy He day and night intercedes
for His own, in that body with which He carries on His high,
priestly, heavenly ministry. This passage says He shall fashion
this body of our humiliation. This body of our present lowly
state, with its aches and its pains and its constant tendency
to press, as it were, its own state and indispositions in upon
the soul and hindering and constantly keeping us from carrying out
the longings of our renewed hearts, it shall be fashioned like unto
the body of His own glory. What is heaven? Heaven is a state
not only of the personal perfection of the soul, but the personal
perfection of the body. And for a more extended treatment,
I commend to you 1 Corinthians 15, the entire chapter. Let's look just at a couple of
verses that capture the essence of the glory of the body that
awaits us. 1 Corinthians 15, 42. to 44, 1 Corinthians 15, 42 to
44, so also is the resurrection of
the dead. It, the body, is sown in corruption. It is raised in incorruption. It is sown in dishonor. It is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness. It is raised in power. It is sown a natural body. It is raised a spiritual body. It is raised a body. Spiritual
does not mean it is raised as a phantom. Whatever the spiritual
body is, it is a spiritual body. Body. There is the resurrection
of the body. Now at this point, when the Lord
returns and brings with Him those perfected spirits and souls that
have been in His presence, to be absent with the body is to
be present with the Lord, which is far better. The souls of all
that is redeemed that have beheld His face with joy, that have
in the disembodied state known blissful communion with Him,
all stain of sin removed from the soul, Those souls brought
with Him joined to these bodies, sown in weakness, now raised
in power, sown in dishonor, raised in honor, sown in corruption,
raised in incorruption. At that point, God's eternal
electing purpose for every one of His people will be realized.
For whom He did foreknow, He did predestinate to be conformed
to the image of His Son. And at that point in time, the
humblest believer, someone like that thief on the cross who got
sanctification begun and continued in a matter of a few moments
to the one who has served Christ for decades. In the language
of John, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. And then the purpose for which
Jesus died will be realized. He died that he might perfect
the church, taking out all of its wrinkles and its spots and
present the church to himself, a glorious church without spot
or wrinkle or any such thing. Heaven is not only a place and
a condition. Heaven is a state of the personal
perfection of the body. and of the soul. Now, as I close,
let me try to bring this home by way of application. Can you
begin to think what this will mean? Now, in this present state,
there are times when the dynamics of grace so work in our souls
that we feel we could pray for hours on end. We could go out
and witness to everything with legs upon it and ears to listen. There are times when the soul
is so suffused with the influences of grace that we can really feel
that if we had a thousand tongues, they would be too few to sing
the praises of our God. Do you know what it is, Christian,
to have the dynamics of grace so pulsing within your breast
at times? that you do feel if you had a
thousand legs, you couldn't travel enough places to speak of your
Savior. If you had a thousand voices,
you couldn't say enough of His praise. And yet when you begin
to attempt to carry out the impulses of that renewed soul, throbbing
under the impulses of grace, it isn't long before you're very
conscious you don't serve Christ as the angels do. disembodied
spirits, you try to pray for an hour, and what happens? Weariness
comes over your body. And when you would do good, and
when that heart and soul throbbing with longing for communion with
Christ sets itself to engage Christ in earnest, fervent prayer,
it isn't long before you are utterly exhausted in the very
effort to pray. And before long, the soul that
was ambulant and bubbling and bursting with the pressure of
the dynamics of grace, now is a soul that groans being burdened. It is exactly what Paul meant
when he said, We that are in this tabernacle groan. being
burdened, longing to be clothed upon with our habitation from
heaven. When, O God, when will I have
a body that can serve the soul that has known the touch of your
grace? You come sometimes into a gathering
like this And God, by the gracious operations of the Spirit, gives
you such a felt taste of the reality of Christ. You say as
you sit there, O Lord Jesus, sin will never be attractive
to me again. With such a sight of your glory,
sin will be seen in all of its sordid and ugly reality, and
I will be nerved in every fiber of my being to resist it. Ten
minutes later, some appetite ultimately rooted in the soul,
but finding a powerful channel through a physical passion begins
to appeal. And within an hour, you've succumbed
and bloodied your conscience. And all of that blissful communion
with Christ is but a memory. How I was reminded of it this
past week. when in the very act of preaching
there were times when I felt my soul would burst under the
pressure of truth. And I felt that this mortal frame,
the lungs and the larynx and the diaphragm and the hands and
feet, were not enough to even give a tithe of the expression
of which God's truth was worthy. That is why a man whose heart
is impregnated with truth is not fooling around with the tricks
and the arts of the stage and of the history on. When he preaches
with his hands and his feet and all of his being, he is trying
to find some outlet for what he knows and feels in his soul,
as his soul is quickened by grace and the operations of God's Spirit. I tell you to think of a heaven
where the soul in its perfected state will have a vehicle that's
up to all of its demands. That makes the thought of heaven
glorious to me. Does it make it glorious to you?
No more weariness in communion. No more weariness in service. No more distractedness. And then
let's reverse it. There are times When the body
is healthy and strong and there are no or few aches and pains,
no headaches, you've had plenty of sleep and good food, and the
body is healthy and vigorous, and you ought to be the epitome
of someone rendering active, joyful service. But what's the
problem? You've got a dull soul. It is
a stranger to communion with Christ. A soul that is entertained
sin that's been unconfessed and unrepented of. A soul that is
shriveled and sick. A soul that is poisoned. And
though you have a body which should be able to render so much
more service, the problem is not your body and its limitations. It's the imperfections that still
cling to the soul. What is heaven? Heaven is the
perfection of both departments of our humanity, so that joined
to that perfected soul will be not a body that can perform what
only God can do. It will still be a human body,
but a body capable of all the wonderful and glorious tasks
that will be assigned by God Himself in a state and a condition
that defies present description, what would it be to have a mind
full of clear light, no longer to be chasing the shadows of
indistinct views of God and of His truth and who I am and what
my duty is, a mind that will be full of the pure light of
God's truth, a heart that is pure, undiluted love to God,
zeal that will be constant and always wise, a conscience never
stained but ever full of light, emotions all in constant, full-blown
engagement with God in truth but never out of balance, the
thought of a perfected soul and then to join to it a body that
will be its perfect vehicle. to serve and glorify God. No wonder the Bible closes with
the prayer, even so come Lord Jesus. A man would be a fool
to know that that's what he's destined for and not be sick
unto death longing for it. My unconverted friend, do you
pity us poor Christians? who've spoiled all our fun in
life because we've turned our back upon the trinkets and toys
that you cling to and it will take you to hell. My unconverted
young man, young woman, boy or girl, adult, don't pity us. You're to be pitied. All you're
doing now is through those sensory abilities of your body, your
nerve endings, your capacity to enjoy things with your case
buds, the nerve endings of your sexual capacities, in your auditory
nerves that can enjoy pleasant sounds, in your nose that can
enjoy pleasant smells. All you are doing is sucking
a little sweetness here and there, only to have that body sent into
hell, where all of its capacities of sight and sound and feeling
will be tracks upon which the wrath of Almighty God will run
into the very citadel of your soul forever. and you will weep
and wail and gnash your teeth. Oh, my unconverted friend, pity
yourself that you would trifle away your never-dying soul and
make that body fodder for the anger of God in hell forever. Oh, I appeal to you by the loveliness
of heaven to turn from your sins, turn from your pride, turn from
your self-righteousness, I appeal to you on the basis of all that
is noble and glorious in the capacity of that soul that God
has made in His own image, marred by sin, but a soul that can be
renewed in Christ. I appeal to you in Christ's name. Turn from your sin. Run to the
Lord Jesus, who, as we heard this morning by His work on behalf
of sinners received by faith, is able to bring you amongst
the number of those who are marked for heaven. People say derisively
of us, ha, you Christians, with your pie-in-the-sky, by-and-by
religion. My friend, that's some wonderful
pie that's waiting out there. You can call it pie-in-the-sky,
by-and-by. But if having a perfected soul
joined to a perfected body In a perfected heavens and earth,
if that's pie, give it to me, Lord, and give it soon. It costs
the Son of God His blood to provide such rich fare for needy sinners. Don't despise that blood, but
flee to Christ. And child of God, remember Bunyan's
perceptive comment. In the dialogue that's going
on between the two pilgrims on the way to the Celestial City,
When the question is asked, when do you find yourself in your
most wholesome and most vigorous spiritual state? Do you remember
what the answer was? When I think of the place to
which I am going, that will do it. Think of the place to which
you are going if you are in Christ. That will give vigor and renewed
energy. in the pursuit of holiness and
obedience and consistency and living to the praise of Jesus. Heaven's a wonderful place, children.
When the world comes and tells you what it has is wonderful,
you ask the world, what can you give me to compare to heaven? When the devil comes and beckons
to you and says, be my servant a little more, give yourself
to me a little more, If you ask the devil, what can you give
me compared to what Jesus gives those who trust him and love
him? Let us pray. Our Father, as we have sought
to bring our minds to your word and your word to our minds, We
have become convinced again that this side of the perfection of
our bodies and our souls, we can only see through a glass
darkly. But we thank you that we can
see. What we see through a glass, albeit darkly, we praise you,
has whetted our appetites and made us to long for the day when
we shall see face to face. Seal your word preached tonight
to the encouragement of every weary, battle-scarred Christian. Seal your word to the encouragement
of the weakest amongst us. And Lord, for those who are not
in Christ, may your word be sealed to their salvation. May they
see the emptiness and the hollowness of this life apart from Christ
and the horror of facing eternity without him. May the great day
of his return reveal that this night some boy, girl, man or
woman turned from sin and laid hold of Christ and his salvation. Hear our cry, O God our Father,
hear our cry and receive our thanks for your gracious presence
with us. May the blessings of that grace
that we have known today rest upon us throughout this week
that we may so live with our affections in heaven, with our
longings in heaven, that our patterns of life upon earth may
help us to be a good witness, and that many will ask a reason
of the hope that is in us. And may we be bold and winsome
to tell them of Christ, who is our hope. Hear our cry, receive
our thanks, and may the blessings of your grace rest upon us. through
Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.