Christmas 2018, Manger Diaries - The Shepherds: A Reasonable Choice, A Reasonable Response

Here is the next sermon of our Christmas 2018 series entitled Manger Diaries.  We are looking at the lives of various people who were present around the birth of Jesus.  This sermon looks at the Shepherds and we consider why God would choose these humble men as the recipients of the glorious news concerning the birth of Jesus.   

Christmas 2018, Manger Diaries - Mary: Troubled But Faithful Servant

Here is the first of our Christmas 2018 series entitled Manger Diaries.  We are looking at the lives of various people who were present around the birth of Jesus.  This sermon looks at Mary and ponders with her some of the things she wrestled with at her young age.  

What is Heaven Actually Like? | Heaven Series, Part 4

(Photo Credit - Beliefnet)

So what is Heaven really like according to the Bible?

This may not be the most important question to ask about the afterlife (for example - if Heaven is at all better than Hell, than a more important question is, "How does one get into Heaven?") but none the less, this is an important question.  Here are a few opening thoughts on this topic.

1. This question will help to shape our anticipation of Heaven.  If you tell me I am going on a surprise trip and you don't tell me anything else, I might not be sure if you are taking me to the next town over (which, while nice, I wouldn't vacation in Stratham, New Hampshire) or if you were taking me to the Bahamas.  If you tell me it's a tropical paradise, that all expenses are paid, and that my wife and kids and closest friends will be there, now you have started to build the anticipation.  And so if we have sense of what Heaven will be like, it will shape our minds and hearts to look forward to it.  Paul says we are to set our minds on things above (Colossians 3:2) and doing so will help us long for Heaven.

2. Heaven is not sitting on the clouds playing a harp in a white robe.  When you ask most people about Heaven, this is one of the first ideas that comes to people's minds.  Many people say that this idea came from Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress where he paints this image.  Nonetheless, this is not the image given of Heaven when we read the Bible.  Needless to say, I will build my arguments for Heaven based on the Bible, even if Pilgrim's Progress is a classic and one of the best-sellers of all time.  Which leads to my third point...

3. We should never build our understanding of Heaven based on pop-culture or pop-literature.  Whether it is from the 90's television classics "Touched By An Angel" or perhaps "Highway to Heaven", or from such books as Heaven is for Real, we should be very cautious about building a theology from a non-authoritative source.  While I do think we can glean some insight from anecdotes, we must always view them through the grid of Scripture.  The truth of God's Word will not be usurped by someone's story.  To be candid this is how cults begin - the Bible becomes secondary to someone's experience of God or the spiritual.

All this said, here are 4 truths about what Heaven is like.

1. First, Heaven is physical.  If Heaven were just a non-marterial reality, then the Resurrection would be quite strange.  How much easier would it have been to have Jesus raised spiritually but not physically?  But He was raised physically and even in His post-resurrection body, He was experienced by others as physical (able to be touched - John 20:24-29, able to watch him eat - Luke 24:42-43).  This is not only true for Jesus but it is true for His followers as well (see 2 Corinthians 5:1-10).  This and many other passages should lead us to the clear conclusion that we will not be floating around as disembodied beings in when in Heaven.

2. Heaven will be a restoration of what was lost in the Fall.  Read Genesis 1-2 and then contrast it with Revelation 22 and you will see an 'Eden 2.0' theme emerge.  The tree, the rivers, the presence of God without sin, all things healed.  If you long to see the world whole again, as God intended at the creation of all things, then just wait - it will all be made right again.

3. Heaven will offer experiences, real-life experiences.  Many fear that Heaven will be just about singing all day long.  Ask some people what Heaven is and you may hear, "It's just like an eternal worship service."  Yes, in way that is true.  But if worship means only music (though there will certainly be music in Heaven - see Revelation 4), then I would say we have too small a view of what worship truly is.  Romans 12:1-2 paints the picture of all of life being worship.  Colossians 3:17 reminds us that all of life should be lived unto God.  With pictures from Scripture as our guide we see that Heaven will be multi-faceted and we will have a wide array of experiences, from learning to building relationships to feasting (see this blog post for more on this topic - LINK HERE).        

4. Heaven will be better than anything we can imagine on Earth.  I often challenge people by asking what they think would be the most exhilarating experience they think they could have in life.  I then tell them to multiply that expense by infinity to get a sense of what Heaven will be like.  There is nothing we can imagine that will ever compare to all that we will experience in Heaven.  All of this life - no matter how wonderful the experience is - is tainted by sin.  We always have the sub-conscious specter of death looming over us, the pain and hurt that we have had in the past and that we fear in the future, as well as the knowledge that every good experience here on earth will, eventually, end.  And yet in Heaven we read that there will be no more tears, death, mourning, crying, or pain (Revelation 21), and we no longer have to fear those things creeping into our existence.

We cannot fathom Heaven fully, but we do ourselves a great service if we will learn to daydream biblically about what Heaven will be like.  This type of thinking will prepare us for our true home.

- tC

Where Do Christians Go When They Die? | Heaven Series, Part 3

More than any other question about Heaven that I have been asked, this one is the most common:

Where do Christians go when they die?

The question is certainly a reasonable one.  If we are all due to one day breathe our last breath and depart from the land of the living, most of us would like to know about the next location of our existence.  And so let's answer this question on a few different levels.

1. Let us note that there is much that the Bible does speak to on this topic, and yet there are also unknowns.  Many people have had near-death experiences where they spoke about a white light or feeling like there were floating out of their bodies.  While these are - in some cases - what people truly experienced, we should be slow to let these experiences become the basis for our conclusions about the afterlife.  Even if a person did not want to consider a religious answer to the question of the afterlife, it only makes sense to be skeptical about the stories of near-death experiences.  Was it a real experience or just a psychological one because of the intensity of the moment?  How clearly was the individual thinking when he/she had this experience?  All this to say, let's move from what we do know to what we are less sure about.  And the Bible will be the basis for my conclusions stated below.

2. In the view of most Christians throughout history, the biblical conclusion is that when a person dies, he or she is immediately in the presence of God.  As noted in the last post, this does not mean that we are in the New Heavens and New Earth of Revelation 21 and 22., but the Bible does teach that a person who dies with faith in Christ is with God immediately after death.  This would be called unconditional immortality.  We will give more information on this in a moment.

3. I want to note that the other main perspective held by some Christians (though it seems to be the minority according to my research) is the notion of a person dying and entering 'soul sleep'.  This idea would be that when I die in Christ, I rest (as in "Rest In Peace") until the return of Christ when He will usher in the New Heavens and New Earth.  There are a variety of passages that people have interpreted this way, but I think the argument is less compelling.  This stance might be called the 'soul sleep' approach or more formally known as conditional immortality.

With these three statement as a foundation, I'd like to make the case for the idea that when a person who has put his/her faith in Christ dies, he/she goes directly into the presence of God.

1. Philippians 1:19-22

"...for I know through your prayer and the help of the Spirit of Jesus Christ this will turn out for my deliverance, as it is my eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed, but with full courage now as always, Christ will be honored in my body, whether by life or by death.  For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.  If I am to live in the flesh that means fruitful labor for me.   Yet which I shall choose I cannot tell.  I am hard pressed between the two. 

My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better."  

In this passage , Paul is talking about living on this earth and serving God, or dying and being with God.  Notice that Paul's language is either/or language - either stay and serve or go and be with Christ.  He doesn't seem to give any hint about going to be with Christ after a time of soul sleep.  He speaks to immediately serving or immediately being with Christ.  And this theme of immediacy seems to flow through many passages about death and then being immediately in the presence of God.

2. Matthew 17:1-13

This passage is the Transfiguration of Christ as observed by Peter, James, and John.  Interestingly enough it is also experienced by two other people - Moses and Elijah.  The passage says that Jesus took Peter, James, and John up to the top of a mountain, and there Jesus began to shine like the sun and His clothes glowed white.  And then we read, "And behold, there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with HIm."  At first one might argue that these are hallucinations.  But as is often noted about Jesus being seen after the Resurrection, hallucinations are very individualized, whereas this passage seems to communicate that the three apostles saw Moses and Elijah.  Another interesting fact is that Jesus was speaking with them, with Moses and Elijah.  One as mentally-well as Jesus does not speak with someone who is not there.  And so we conclude that it REALLY was Moses and Elijah who were there speaking with Jesus.

This presses us to ask, "Where then were Moses and Elijah from the time of their deaths to this moment on the mountain top?"  The Bible does not give a definitive answer but we can conclude that these two saints were not in a state of 'soul sleep'.  If they were, they wouldn't have been present since Jesus has not yet died, come back to life, ascended into Heaven, and then returned to usher in the New Heavens and New Earth.  That has not yet occurred when we read this story and so we most logically conclude that while Moses and Elijah are not yet fully restored people (as per the end of Revelation), they are still very much present and in a conscious state of existence.  And so it should be for all those who die in Christ.

3. 2 Corinthians 5:1-10

This passage contains the well-known phrase, "Absent with the body, present wth the Lord."  While we never want to rip a verse out of context, this one line is very much just what it looks like when it is read in context.  Paul is contrasting life on earth in our broken bodies with life in the presence of God.  The key I find in this passage is that Paul again (as in Philippians 1) seems to be contrasting two immediate states of being - one is being in the immediate state of earthly living and other is being in the immediate presence of God.  I would agree if one were to argue that there is more ambiguity in this passage. I don't think this passage standing alone makes the case for entering immediately into the presence of God, but added to other passages I do think it adds to the already strong argument.

There are a few additional passages worth noting.

- John 3 speaks about eternal life, and John does so in a way to describes eternal life not as something that we get when we die, but that - for those in Christ - eternal life begins the moment a person comes to faith in Jesus.  Again, the continuing of life with Christ is emphasized.  And so if I come into eternal life at age 16 and then I die at age 99, it seems most reasonable that I continue on with my eternal life and that it is not in a 'paused' state until Jesus returns.

- John 11:17-27.  In this passage we see the death of Lazarus.  It's worth noting that Lazarus has died and when asked if she (Martha) believed that Lazarus would live again, she mentions the final resurrection of all believers.  Jesus could have just agreed with her, but He pressed the issue deeper when He said the whoever believes in Him, though they die they will live.  Then Jesus presses it even deeper again when he says that everyone who believes in Him will never die.  The emphasis appears to be on the continuity of life for the Christian.  When  person comes to faith in Christ, he or she is IN eternal life, and that eternal state will continue on without pause i.e. without soul sleep.

There are additional passages that I believe make the case for the continuity of the Christian's life, but these 5 speak to it strongly.

I do want to bring up a point here.
Committed, Bible-believing Christians can, have, and do disagree on this issue.  But let's ask the question: how does determining who is right about this argument impact my view of the afterlife?  If the soul sleep perspective is correct, then I will one day die, be in a state on unconscious soul sleep, and then the next thing I know, I will be with Jesus.  On the other hand if it is true that when a Christian dies, he or she is immediately with God, then to a large degree the experience is very much the same.  Theology matters and so we should discuss and debate these questions, but it's worth noting that the real question is about process and not the ultimate end-state for all believers.

Since I have made the case that the Christian does go immediately into the presence of God, we will next address the question: where is this 'heaven' that Christians go to in the in-between state before Jesus returns in all His glory.

And that will be our next post.  Thank you for reading.

- tC

Where Is Heaven & Do Multiple Heavens Exist? | Heaven Series, Part 2

(Great Bay - New Hampshire) 

"Where is Heaven?"
This is a good place to continue our series here on the topic of Heaven.

Let me start off with some wisdom I received from a professor in graduate school.  Dr. Dillon once said to my class, "If Larry King were to ask you a question about Christianity in America, you should always start with the following phrase: 'Well Larry, it depends on what you mean by...' ."

Dr. Dillon was making the point that we need to define our terms when we are speaking because if we are beginning our conversation with a different definition of - in this case - Heaven, when we will may end up with significantly divergent views.

And so let's begin with the various terms about Heaven.  To do so I am going to offer a biblical but non-exhaustive (or non-exhausting) perspective.  I won't cover all the Hebrew and Greek words used for Heaven, but will focus more on the conceptions shared between the terms.

3 DEFINITIONS OF HEAVEN

1. Heaven as in 'heaven and earth.', the total of all creation.  This first definition we see in places like Genesis 1:1 (the Hebrew word shamayim) and Acts 17:24 (the Greek word ouranou) and it essentially refers to the entire universe - sometimes other than the earth, but the earth falls under this 'heaven'.  This term is used when we see something grand being described or the location of God's complete rule and reign, and as one would likely think, it is a broad notion.  It's less about a location found on a map or in a GPS and more about a universal region or umbrella under which human life occurs.  

2. Heaven as in the various locations of air, outer space, and the home of God.  The main reference that is helpful here is 2 Corinthians 12:2 where Paul writes about the third Heaven.  The idea is that the first heaven is the air, the second is outer space, and the third is the dwelling place of God.

3. Heaven as in the (current) home of God and His followers.  This third term will be our main focus in this and other posts, but it essentially refers to where God abides and where His people go after they die.  Some core references might be: the eternal Kingdom of 2 Peter 1:11, the better country of Hebrews 11, or the Kingdom of Heaven of Matthew 25:1.

     

(Newmarket, New Hampshire)

And so then - where is this place where God dwells and where His followers are...currently?

Let's start with the second half of the question and note that the current dwelling place of people like Moses and Elijah is not where they will be for all eternity.  Revelation 21 gives us a picture of what John the Apostle calls a 'new Heaven and a new earth."  Why new?  Because - according to John - in the future the old ones will have passed away in that Heaven and Earth are to be combined.  

Stop with me for a moment and ponder this truth.

In our first post we acknowledged that people sensed the brokenness of this world.
There was a longing for things to be made right, to be made whole.
And yet sometimes we see a picture of Earth being consumed and tossed out by God as it were.

Again, Revelation 21 speaks in very different terms about our planet.  When all is made right, Heaven and Earth are melded into one, and the dwelling place of God is with humanity (Revelation 21:3).  God will take the mess and make it as He intended.

We can dig into this idea more in the future, but the clear teaching of the Bible is that at the climax of God's redemptive work in our world, Heaven will not be 'out there', but instead will be right here as Heaven and Earth are wed together.  When Jesus returns, Heaven and Earth will become one. 

This means - logically - that if people like Moses and Elijah (as in Matthew 17:1-13) are not yet in the New Heaven (here on the future-restored earth), and yet we know they are among those who are very much alive after their physical death, then they must be somewhere?  So where are they?  And where are those faithful who die in Christ?

We will address that topic in our next post.
- tC    

Heaven: What Do People Think About It & Introductory Thoughts | Heaven Series, Part 1

Heaven.  

What comes to mind when you hear that word?  

Ask Google and here are some of the top images that pop up:

The Pew Research center (according to a 2015 study) found that about 72% of Americans believe in Heaven.  The definition of Heaven used for their research was "where people who have led good lives are eternally rewarded."  (See the entire Pew Research article HERE)

When I asked people (via my Facebook page) to give me a few words to describe Heaven, here's a look at some of what people said:

- Unfathomable and indescribable 

- Eden, paradise

- Peace, Peaceful

- Perfection

- Rest, home

- Peace and light

- Jesus, intimacy

- Never-ceasing worship

- The mountains and a nice creek or river

- Can't say - haven't been there 

- Peace and harmony

- Forever peaceful

- Coinherence

- Perfect reunion

- My home

- God's foreverland

- Utopia

- Amazing, peaceful

- Home, peace

- No judgment, Complete understanding

- Home, perfection

- Serene, peaceful

Interesting.  Notice no one said things like "evil, darkness, confusion, sadness, loneliness."  

Heaven is seen as a place of peace and goodness with almost never any mention of sickness or sadness.  It is literally 'all good.'

You may read that and say, "Well of course there is nothing negative - that's not what Heaven is about!"  Yes, I agree, but I would just note that if you asked people to describe life on this planet (as I did) you get a more mixed bag, like these responses: 

- Finite journey
- Not our home
- Asleep awake
- Really hard
- Stumbles and starts
- Pursuits, uncertain
- A glass darkly
- Hunger Games
- Hedonistic, terrifying
- Shadowland
- Broken, fallen
- Beautiful and challenging
- Bleak, exhausting

So what does this tell us?  More specifically how do our views of Heaven inform me as I start a series of blog posts on the topic of Heaven.

1. People see Earth as broken and Heaven as perfect or at least fixed (compared to the earth).  The blessings that this life has to offer are wonderful, but most people see them as mixed with great pain and suffering, confusion and sadness.  Heaven seems to be a antidote to the brokenness of this world.  

2. Most people believe in some form of the afterlife.  Do we all agree on what Heaven or the after-life look like?  Certainly not, but it is worth noting that the notions put forth by - for example - the new atheists like Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, and Sam Harris - are not representative of what the majority of Americans think.  The idea that there is nothing after death and that we all just become worm food - most people don't seem to think that is the case.

3. We live in a tension of wanting it and yet rarely thinking about it.  There is an irony to our views on Heaven.  While most people believe in the afterlife or Heaven, most people spend very little time thinking about it.  There are many reasons for this - fear of the unknown, the frenetic pace of life, and I would argue that a large part of this is because of modern healthcare.  Regardless of your opinion on Obamacare or the VA, the world is in the healthiest place it has ever been.  Sicknesses that would have been a death sentence 25 years ago are now being managed or cured.  This makes us think less about death and the afterlife since we don't see it as a looming threat.  Travel back in time  few hundred years and people were living decades shorter, and so there was a greater felt-need to figure out what we believed about Heaven.  

4. We seem to know there is something wrong.  We long for a better home, a fuller experience of life. We long to see relatives who have passed away.  We ache to have wrongs made right and justice served.  We desire to see brokenness and pain and sickness end, and to have life made whole.  In general, we agree that there is no human effort that can finally resolve all these issues, and so we long for a new, perfect home. 

C.S. Lewis said it this way:

"If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, 

the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world."

In the next several posts, I will be looking into the topic of Heaven and engaging with the idea both philosophically and theologically.  I hope you'll join me.

- tC

What Motivates You To Do What You Do?

I'm here at home tonight.

My wife Jenny is out - she has a hair appointment.
That makes sense for her.  For me, not something I need...ever.

But as I sit here and fold laundry for the family, I am listening to a message from Dr. David Platt.  He is speaking on video from a conference in 2013 and his title is "Why The Great Commission Is Great" (click HERE to listen to the the actual message).

The Great Commission comes to us in Matthew 28:18-20 where we read this:

"And Jesus came to them and said, 'All authority in Heaven and on earth has been given to Me.  Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.  And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age."

Platt is making the case for why we need to bring the Gospel message to the ends of the earth.
This got me thinking about a passage in 2 Corinthians 5 where Paul says these words:

"Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade others. But what we are is known to God, and I hope it is known also to your conscience. 12 We are not commending ourselves to you again but giving you cause to boast about us, so that you may be able to answer those who boast about outward appearance and not about what is in the heart. 13 For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you. 14 For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died."

   
Note the words Paul uses here.  In verse 11 he says we persuade others.
In verse 14 he notes that the love of Christ controls us.  Some translations use the word 'compels' - the love of Christ compels us.

And so let me ask you a question:
What is your motivation in life?  What controls you?   

Some will answer that motivations are complex, and that motivations are often mixed.
That's fair -life can be complicated.

But I want to give an image here of something Paul seems quite clear on.  His motivation - which leads him to work on persuading others - is the love of Christ.
The love of Christ leads him to try to persuade others.  Naturally the question arises: persuade them into what?  Persuade them to believe what?

The answer is to believe in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

We live in a confused world.
On one level, the message we constantly hear the chorus that we are not to ever - at any time, nor for any reason - try to change a person's perspective, opinion, or approach to life.  This is a cardinal sin in our day.  Interestingly though, the entire narrative we see in American politics and media is that one side is completely in the right and the other side is completely wrong.
One message is don't ever change people, the other message is you must change people.

Paul would agree with the latter - we must work to change the perspectives of people.

But Paul's motivation - rather than being identity politics (an identity that will always fail to fulfill)
is love.  Love motivated Paul to travel to distant lands and to suffer at the hands of the people with whom he wanted to share the Gospel (see a list of Paul's sufferings HERE).

And so I ask again:
What is your motivation in life?  What controls you? 

While we have examined just one image of Christ and the Gospel and the love of God as the motivating factor for Paul, this is the theme of the evangelistic and missional drive of the church.

The love of Christ controls us and sends us to share that message with others.

Has that love captivated you?  If it has, praise God for the clarity He has given you.
If that love has not yet controlled and compelled you, pray that your heart would be blown open to see the love Christ has shown for you, and in turn the loving message of the Gospel that He wants you to share with the world.

- tC