David Jeremiah - The Promise of Heaven
Way back In 1962, Brendon Grimshaw accomplished something most people only dream about. He purchased his own private island in paradise. He bought a tiny spit of the Seychelles Island in the Indian Ocean just above Madagascar. The island called Moyenne cost him $10,000. Once the deal was done, the real work began. The island had become overgrown with weeds and choked with invasive fauna, and most days, rats were the only animals that he ever encountered. But Grimshaw was diligent, and for decades, he worked his way across the 120,000 square meters of his island, clearing trails, planting more than 1600 trees, bringing birds and tortoises back to the land.
Having never married, he developed a strong friendship with a local man who helped with the restoration projects for decades, and when Grimshaw’s mother passed away in 1981, he invited his father to join him on the island, and they spent 5 wonderful years together before his father passed away and was buried there. Brendon Grimshaw died in 2012, which means he spent 50 years in dedicated service to his personal slice of paradise. And in the years before his death, he received numerous offers to buy the island for staggering amounts of money. There were even rumors that a Saudi prince offered him $50 million for the deed to his island. But Grimshaw refused these proposals, and he reached an agreement with the government to turn the island into the world’s smallest national park.
When his life came to a close, Grimshaw was buried in a small cave within his beloved island, and a small tombstone reads, «Moyenne taught him to open his eyes to the beauty around him and to say thank you to God». So take a good look around you, even here in this busy city. What a beautiful world. Sometimes the wonders of nature can lift your spirits when little else can. You may be weary or discouraged right now, but God has designed his world to help you. When we pause to feel the sunshine on our faces, when we listen to the singing of the crickets at night, or smell the fragrance of blooming lilacs, it lifts our spirits like a tonic.
Ecclesiastes 3:11 says: «God has made everything beautiful in its time». And if that’s all the verse said, it would be pretty great, but it goes on to say: «He has put eternity in our hearts». Did you know that God has built our world with his artistry, and he’s placed inside of us a desire to enjoy his creation forever? Despite its beauty, our present world is marred with problems, almost all of them caused by us. But even so, God’s craftsmanship shines through humanity’s haze. Beauty and eternity, it’s built into each of our hearts. And that’s the promise of heaven, and that’s why the Lord has filled the Bible with information about our everlasting home. Whether we know it or not, there is a heaven-shaped vacuum in our heart that we long to have filled.
This was clearly on the mind of our Lord Jesus Christ on the final night of his earthly life. In the Upper Room with his disciples around him, here’s what he said: «Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go to prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto Myself; that where I am, there you may be also». That was the promise that God gave. The Savior of the world wanted to teach his friends about heaven, and so we’re gonna listen to what he said and take it apart today and put it back together.
The first thing we know about heaven from the words of Jesus in John 14 is that heaven means believing in a person. If you believe in heaven, you have to believe in a person. Jesus began his words on a note of assurance. He said, «Don’t let your heart be troubled». And the Good News Translation says: «'Don’t be worried and upset.' Jesus said, 'Believe in God and believe in me also.'» These words are for you. Imagine the Lord Jesus Christ standing here in all of his strength and splendor, looking at you in this beautiful theater and saying to you, «Don’t be worried and upset; don’t be troubled». On that long-ago night, amid the flickering torches of the Upper Room, the Lord Jesus had only one recommendation. You know what it was? Himself. He said, «You believe in God, believe in Me».
So our discussion of heaven and the mental peace it brings to us always starts with a person, and the person of Jesus Christ. Our relationship with him begins when we acknowledge our failures, when we say that we need him, and we open our hearts to him and trust him as Savior and Lord. But that’s only the beginning. That’s the beginning of our journey in believing in him, trusting him, and leaning on him during the frightening times. Jesus’s words would be hollow without what happened to him three days later. He arose physically and literally from the grave following his crucifixion. His body was the same, but it was different. He was recognizable, but he was now physically equipped to live endlessly without aging and without deteriorating.
This is our single greatest biblical clue about heaven. The risen Jesus will be there personally, and here’s something most Christians don’t know. He will be there in his humanity. He will be there in his body, letting us know that heaven is a real place. We will reside there with him in our physical, resurrected bodies. And here’s what the Bible says. Jesus wants you there. Here’s the proof. Pick up a Bible or a New Testament, turn to John 14:6 and circle every time Jesus refers to himself using the pronouns «I, » «me, » or «myself». I’ll not give you the answer here, but I think you’ll get the point. When anxiety is near, what you need is not a therapy. You need Jesus. You need the person of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Later on, later on in the same chapter, Jesus said, «Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give it to you, but let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid». If I didn’t have Jesus in my life, I would be filled with despair and agony and wondering what’s gonna happen next. But he’s what I know. He knows the future. And while I don’t know the future, I know the one who does. And every day when I speak with him and pray to him and read his words in the scripture, a little bit of heaven seeps into my heart even now.
So first of all, heaven means believing in a person. But secondly, heaven means believing in a place. Now, I have to say this because a lot of people that I’ve talked to over the years think that heaven is like a state of mind. You know, «Oh, this is heavenly». What they mean is it’s utopian. But heaven in the Bible isn’t some state of mind. It’s not some good feeling about the future. In the Bible, heaven is an actual place. «In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you». Now watch this. «I go to prepare a place for you». The word Jesus used is the Greek term «topos, » from which we get our word «topography». It refers to a literal location. Jesus says that heaven is a literal district, neighborhood, region, or habitat.
Hebrews 11:16 calls it a heavenly country. Revelation describes it as a vast capital city. The Psalms refers to heaven as Zion, where God dwells. And during the course of these messages, we’ll look at all of those designations. But most of all, it’s important for you to know that heaven is a place, and he describes that place with my favorite term for heaven, listen to this. It’s the Father’s house. It’s the Father’s house.
When Donna and I were in seminary in Dallas, Texas, we went to seminary from Cedarville College where we were students. Got married after college and went there to go to seminary. And we used to, believe it or not, we both had jobs. She worked there, and I had a job, plus going to school, because you had to do that in order to afford the seminary. And every once in a while, we’d get so homesick, we would leave after work on Friday and drive 1050 miles to Cedarville from Dallas, to be there for maybe 5 or 6 or 7 hours because we had to turn around and drive back because we had to be at work on Monday.
Why did we do that? We were enamored with the father’s house. My mom and dad had a home, and we had known so many wonderful things there. Donna went to college there, and we had a lot of meals at the father’s house. It was home, and there’s something… in fact, when my parents got older and decided to downsize, I was mad at them for 2 or 3 years because that was a special place. And you all know what I’m talking about, the father’s house, and that’s how God describes heaven.
Heaven is a place. What kind of place is it? It’s the Father’s house. The Father’s house is where God lives, and there are many mansions there. And the Greek word for mansion means a place to stay, a dwelling, a home. But mansion is a perfectly good word to describe any kind of place, and heaven is a mansion compared to what we got down here, amen? Heaven is not a feeling, it’s not a fantasy, it’s a prepared place for a prepared people. We’re going to gather there and we’re going to congregate there and we’re going to interact there and we’re going to enjoy our time.
Jesus said something really comforting. He said, «I go to prepare a place for you». He didn’t just say heaven is real. He said it’s personal, «A place for you, » a place for me. When you get there, what will happen? In the first few moments of your existence in heaven, you’re gonna go, «Whew, so that’s what I’ve been waiting for, » amen. Remember, we’re not home yet. Remember the old spiritual, «This road is not my home, I’m just a-passing through»? Well, that’s true. The Bible describes us as pilgrims and strangers on this earth. We may have our own homes, even beautiful ones, but they’re only temporary because we’re not here for long, are we? Heaven is your forever home, which you will enjoy in a resurrected body with a glorious friend named Jesus Christ.
So, heaven means believing in a person, and it means believing in a place, but it also means believing in a promise. Jesus said, «I go and prepare a place for you, and I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also». Within the context of our Lord’s impending death, his resurrection and ascension, the only logical interpretation of this promise involves his return and rapture of the church. It’s incredible to consider how much the Lord wants to be with us. He wants us to be where he is. He prayed in John 17:24: «Father, I desire that they also whom You gave Me may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory».
I don’t know that I ever realized that until recently. In studying the New Testament, how many times it says in the New Testament that Jesus wants us to be with him. Now, we want to be with Jesus, but it’s amazing, Jesus wants us to be with him. It’s the desire of Jesus Christ to be with us. He said, «I’m going away to prepare a place for you, and I’m gonna come and get you and bring you where I am so that where I am, you can be also». And that’s a wonderful truth. Someone has said, «God makes a promise, faith believes it, hope anticipates it, and patience waits for it». Of all his promises, the Lord’s simple words that he is preparing a place for us and will come again and receive us and take us to be with him for eternity, well, I don’t know if there could be a better promise than that. We all need our Lord’s promise. We need it badly, and we have it.
People ask me all the time, «Why is it important to study heaven»? Because we’re not there yet. Heaven is the anchor of your soul, the Bible says that. And when you know that God has got this all worked out and the plan for the future is definite, and there’s no possibility that it can fail, then one day you’re gonna be with Jesus, somehow the things you have to go through down here are a little bit easier to deal with because you know this is not forever. God’s got something better planned for all of us. So heaven means believing in a person. It means believing in a place, and it means believing in a promise. And heaven means believing in a plan.
Now, the interesting thing about heaven is that everybody sort of thinks they’re going there, but it’s not true. And if you don’t know for sure how to get to heaven, you should listen up because I’m gonna give you the plan. I’m gonna tell you what the Bible says right from this passage of scripture. It couldn’t be clearer. And if you’re watching on television at home, I hope you will listen up. If you’re not a Christian, you say, «Well, I don’t know if I’m a Christian or not». When you get done with these next few moments, you’re gonna know whether you have done what the Bible says you need to do to go to heaven. Not everybody who says they’re going to heaven is going to heaven. You don’t just get to go there because you think you’re going there.
That brings us to this final truth in John 14. Jesus said, «'Where I go you know, and the way you know.' And Thomas said to Him, 'Lord, we do not know where You are going; how can we know the way? ' And Jesus said, 'I am the way, the truth, and the life. And no one comes to the Father except through Me.'» Jesus is our plan for salvation.
William Barclay illustrated it this way. He said: «Suppose you’re in a strange town and you ask for directions. And suppose the person asked says, 'Take the first to the right, the second to the left, cross the square, go past the church, take the third on the right, and the road you want is the fourth on the left, ' the chances are that you will get lost before you’re halfway there. But suppose the person we asked says, 'Come on, I’ll take you there.' In that case, the person to us is the way, and we cannot get lost because the person is the way, and he’s taking us there». And that is what Jesus does for us. He doesn’t just say, «Heaven’s that way». No, he says, «I am the way to heaven. If you want to go to heaven, you have to come through me».
He doesn’t give us advice and directions. He takes us by the hand, and he leads us and strengthens us and guides us personally every day. Now, that can sound narrow to our culture. Some say it’s intolerant. But if we follow Jesus, we don’t get to revise his words. You know, somebody said, «God created us in his image, and ever since then, we’ve been trying to create God in our image». We want God to be the God who serves us and makes all of our dreams come true. Unfortunately, God makes the rules, and here are the rules. Here’s how you get to heaven. You have to come through Jesus Christ. There aren’t many ways.
Some people say, «Oh, your way is as good as my way». No, the only way that counts is his way. God is the only one who gets to make a choice on that. And the Bible is very consistent about that, men and women. The Bible says: «Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven whereby men must be saved». There’s only one way. 1 Timothy 2:5 says: «There is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus». In this age of tolerance, when everybody thinks their way is as good as anybody else’s way, we need to remember what Proverbs says.
Proverbs says: «There is a way that seems right to a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death». Somebody said, «Well, they’re sincere». How many of you know you can be sincerely wrong, you know? I could say, «I’m sincerely believing that if I jump out of this plane without a parachute, I’ll be okay». But I will be sincerely wrong, and pretty soon the ground will remind me of that. You know, sincerity is a good thing, but it’s not the one thing you need to go to heaven. You need Jesus Christ. You need to put your trust in him. Listen to me, God doesn’t change his mind about going to heaven for each person. Just as every person is physically born the same way, through a mother and a father, every person is spiritually born the same way through the Word of God and the Holy Spirit.
You know, I know a lot of people are saying, «Well, they’re finding new ways to bring children into the world, » but they can find all the ways they want, but they still need two things. They need an egg and a sperm for there to be a child. And the Bible says if you’re gonna go to heaven, you need the Word of God and the Holy Spirit. You can’t be born any other way. That’s it. So listen to me. If Almighty God thinks it’s all right to have one way for physical birth, why should we think it’s strange if he has one way for spiritual birth?
There is one way. D.L. Moody once told the story of a wealthy man who was dying. And when the doctor said there was no hope, the man called for his lawyer to make out his will. He had a little 4-year-old daughter who didn’t understand what death meant. Her mother gently explained that daddy was going away. So the little girl tiptoed to her father’s bedside, looked into his eyes, and said, «Papa, do you have a home in the place where you’re going»?
That question hit hard because the man had spent his life accumulating properties and possessions, but none of it could go with him. He had many homes on earth, but no home in heaven. Someday, each of us will leave it all behind. We’ll leave our homes, our titles, our bank accounts. When that moment comes, one thing will matter, whether we’ve prepared for eternity. Most of us in this room have probably had to say goodbye to somebody that we love who’s left this life. My parents are both in heaven. My sister is in heaven. Donna’s parents are in heaven, her brother’s in heaven.
And I remember one day my father said something to me. He said, «David, as I get older, I got more friends in heaven than I got on earth». And I think that’s true. That’s what happens. As you get older, more and more of your generation goes to heaven. And the joy of knowing about that is that heaven is so real. It’s not an imagination. It’s not just a good feeling you have because you need to have a good feeling about something. No, heaven is promised in the Word of God. And during these days that we spend talking about it, I’m gonna try to make it as real for you as I can. I’m gonna tell you a lot of the things the Bible says about it that you may not know, and you’re gonna get excited about heaven.
Now, most of us would be honest that we wanna go to heaven someday. Not necessarily today. I love to tell the story about the little boy who was in class one day and the teacher asked, «How many of you want to go to heaven»? And everybody raised their hand but this little boy in the back row, and the teacher went back and said, «Johnny, don’t you want to go to heaven»? He said, «What do you mean»? She said, «Don’t you want to go to heaven when you die»? He said, «Yeah, when I die, but I thought you were getting up a load for tonight».
And that’s the way a lot of us feel, you know. We don’t want to go to heaven now, but we want to be ready to go to heaven when the time comes. In the meantime, God wants us to live our lives down here, and one of our goals ought to be not only to go to heaven, but to take as many people with us as we can, amen? If you really believe it’s true, if you believe what we’ve read and studied today, tell somebody about it. Ask them. One day God is going to say to everybody, «Why should I let you into my heaven»? You better have the right answer. And the answer is the only way you get into heaven is through Jesus Christ. Can I get a witness? Amen, amen.