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Wednesday, July 08, 2009

Heaven

I am concluding my series on Revelation tonight, with a glance at Heaven. In reviewing some stuff on our eternal state, I am greatly comforted by the reminder of what we have to look forward to.

We will serve in heaven, study in heaven, supervise in heaven, share in heaven and sing in heaven.

I would suggest that what will make heaven incredibly heaven will not be the streets of gold or the physical environment, but the presence of God.

To live eternally with no sin, and in the perfect presence of the living God!

I asked for some questions concerning heaven, and here are a few that I received, which I will attempt to answer tonight.

Questions I received (and answers):

Q: If we will rejoice when we see our loved ones in Heaven with us, how do you imagine we will handle the sorrow when we don't see other loved ones that never got it? Actually, how might we handle the sorrow just knowing there are so many people in hell, even if we didn't know them?

A: First of all, we will be so focused on Christ and those around us in heaven that the things of this world will be but a distant memory. Secondly, our emotions in heaven will be different to the extent that they will be godly. Perfect. God like. Thus our sorrow, will be a sorrow of a different kind. Our anger will be an anger of a different kind. Thirdly, while we will still have memories of our time on earth and of people we know who have gone to hell, the emotional effect of those memories will be greatly diminished. We will realize just how powerful the grace of God really is.

Q: By having rewards and crowns in Heaven, doesn't that entail recognizing levels of achievement and/or accolades for people? If so, then we will once again not be equals there either. Since God doesn't play favorites how can that be?

A: There is a difference in the role and function that we all play and the equality that is there in the eyes of God. God does not play favorites. The Bible does explicitly tells us of rewards for what we have done on this earth in promoting and helping in the Kingdom of God. We will all be in God's presence, we will all know God for who He is and see Him face to face, but we will all serve in different capacities.

Q: Will we have a free will in Heaven. Yes! The only difference will be that there will be no temptation or sin. No more sin! No more temptation!

Thus, the ability to choose will be there, but the options of sinning or not sinning will not.

In my studies, I'm also glad that there will be "eating and drinking in heaven." Won't it be great to eat without having to worry about calories?

I found this today: It's called the "The Worst Drink in America".

It's a Baskin-Robbins Large Heath Bar Shake which has:

2,310 calories
108 g fat (64 g saturated)
266 g

Let's look at America's Worst Drink in numbers:

73: The number of ingredients that go into this milkshake.

66: The number of teaspoons of sugar this drink contains.

11: The number of Heath Bars you would have to eat to equal the number of calories found in one Baskin Robbins Large Heath Bar Shake.

12: The average number of minutes it takes to consume this drink.

240: The number of minutes you'd need to spend on a treadmill, running at a moderate pace, to burn it off.

Oh, won't it be wonderful there....as the old hymn goes....Eternally drinking milkshakes with no after affects!

What are your thoughts about Heaven? What are you looking forward to?

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