Heaven & Hell – Week 2

What is Heaven?

People don’t look forward to Heaven enough. Therefore, Pastor Mike spoke about what we know about Heaven. A lot of us think it’s a 24/7 church service, so we don’t want to go there, but it’s so much better than that.

Heaven will be a physical place. God is going to recreate the Heaven that exists today, and He’s going to recreate Earth, and those two places will make up the new Heaven and it won’t have a sea. Why? Many ancient cultures correlated the sea with evil spirits. They believed there were portals to hell at the bottom of the sea, and John says in Revelation 21 that in the new Heaven and new Earth, there won’t be anything evil, nothing bad.

Heaven will be a better version of Earth. Sometimes we think we’ll become like God in Heaven, but we won’t. We won’t be omniscient in Heaven. We will still have the joys of discovery, of art, entertainment, etc. That’s really what Heaven is. It’s the presence of God. When we are with God, we are in a form of Heaven, but the Heaven we will experience when Christ returns will be even better than the Heaven that exists today.

There will be no pain of any kind. It’s all gone. The Bible tells us that we’ll have jobs in Heaven, but we’ll enjoy them. We’ll work because we’ll want to work. Some people wonder:

How could I enjoy Heaven if everything is good there?

This thinking happens because we have a bad definition of good. We equate good with boring because we don’t think of work, competition, and achievement as good. Everything you enjoy on Earth will be better in Heaven, but that’s hard to comprehend because sin has clouded our understanding of good. We think our relationships in this world are the pinnacle of good. – Some say:

How could I enjoy heaven if someone I love went to Hell?

That’s a great question. Here are three points to think about it.

1. We don’t know who goes to Heaven.
2. Everything we love about people is a gift from God
3. True joy does not come from experiences.

I hope that you can at least trust God that Heaven will be awesome. Even if we can’t imagine it, we trust Him, and that makes us want it all the more. – So how do we get there?

What will happen when we die?

1. Our bodies die.
2. Our souls are with God.
3. Jesus will return to Earth.
4. We all face judgment

Heaven & Hell Week 2 Teaching Text

Revelation 21:1-5

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the old heaven and the old earth had disappeared. And the sea was also gone. ² And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven like a bride beautifully dressed for her husband.

³ I heard a loud shout from the throne, saying, “Look, God’s home is now among his people! He will live with them, and they will be his people. God himself will be with them.^[a] 4 He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. All these things are gone forever.”

⁵ And the one sitting on the throne said, “Look, I am making everything new!” And then he said to me, “Write this down, for what I tell you is trustworthy and true.”

---

Did you like this message, Heaven & Hell Week 2? Check out more of our Sunday teachings here.