Revelation 4:1-2 After these things I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven, and the first voice which I had heard, like the sound of a trumpet speaking with me, said, “Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after these things.” 2 Immediately I was in the Spirit; and behold, a throne was standing in heaven, and One sitting on the throne.
The story of a King who was fascinated by heaven on earth
The story is told of how the King of Russia, Vladimir the Great, brought Christianity to his Russian homeland in the year 988 A.D. With a mixture of truth and fable, historians recount how this immoral, pagan prince was looking for a way to unite the empire over which he ruled. Vladimir felt the best way to achieve his goal was to select a singular religion. Vladimir dispatched ambassadors to investigate major world religions at that time. Upon their return, each of Vladimir's ambassadors relayed their findings. Some noted that they saw laws and prohibitions on what to eat and what not to eat. Another said that the religion he witnessed did not seem to convey any real benefit to the people one way or another. However there was one Ambassador who is recorded saying these words to King Vladimir: “We knew not whether we were in heaven or on earth, for surely there is no such splendor or beauty anywhere upon earth. We cannot describe it to you. Only we know that God dwells there among men, and that their service surpasses the worship of all other places. We cannot forget that beauty.” Whenever people visit our churches, should they not come away with a similar response: "We knew not whether we were in heaven or on earth". How often have you heard it said: "That person is so heavenly minded they're no earthly good." The only response I can give to that is this thought: "Unless a Christian becomes more heavenly minded they cannot accomplish God's earthly good." (Matthew 5:16; Colossians 3:1-3) Heavenly mindedness is the focus of today's blog, for it is central to the shifting of focus we see in the Book of Revelation. John begins Revelation with a vision of Jesus in Heaven in Revelation 1, followed by seven letters to seven churches in Asia Minor in chapters two and three. It is in Revelation 4 that we see John being summoned once again to consider the grand purposes of God in the heavenly realm. In today's post, we want to consider the value of being heavenly minded.
Meet the man who saw heaven
We could nickname the Apostle John as the man who saw heaven by virtue of the fact that no less than eleven heavenly visions are recorded through the book of Revelation.1 Out of all the 66 books of the Bible (with the exception of Matthew), the book of Revelation mentions heaven more than any other, accounting for roughly 10% of the total times we find heaven mentioned in the Bible. The Apostle John dips his pen into the ink once again. He is transported in vision by the Holy Spirit to behold the court of heaven, where the Father is on His throne in Revelation 4 and the Lamb of God is seated in equal glory with the Father in Revelation 5. If we were to characterize Revelation 1-3 as being about Christ and His church, we could assign Revelation 4-5 as referring to Christ and His Heavenly Throne. John's particular vision of heaven here in Revelation 4-5 is the second heavenly vision of the book. Before diving into the vision that will follow in Revelation 4-5, I felt it necessary for us to explore in brief the scripture's teaching on heaven in today's post: The Bible's 4 heavens. We aim to understand today the places called heaven and then conclude tomorrow with the practical benefits of focusing our minds upon heaven.
4 places called heaven.
The subject of heaven in the Bible is immense to say the least. According to Dr. John MacArthur, the Bible uses the word "heaven" 582 times in 550 verses.2 Obviously we won't be able to cover all of those instances, however we can glean a fundamental sense about what the Bible has to teach about the four main places or "realms" called heaven. When the Bible says God "created the heavens and the earth", the word "heaven" in the text is rendered plural - telling us that there are multiple heavens.
A. The 1st heaven - the sky
In Genesis 1:8 we see reference to what is termed "The first Heaven", the sky - "And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day." Quite literally the word translated "firmament" comes from a Latin root, which in turn is a translation of the Hebrew original that means "a stretched canopy or covering". Much like when you pitch a tent and have to stretch the canvas over a frame, God took the atmosphere of Nitrogen, Oxygen and other gases and stretched them around the globe he had made. Psalm 147:8 reminds us - "Who covers the heavens with clouds, Who provides rain for the earth, Who makes grass to grow on the mountains." Already He had set the earth rotating about its axis as it was illuminated by His glory. With the first heaven, the sky, now in place, Earth would be ready for the Sun He would create on day four and the birds He would create on day five.
B. The second Heaven - The Universe
The first picture on the left was taken by the Cassini spacecraft orbiting the planet Saturn on July 19, 2013. The picture captures the "pale blue dot" of earth suspended in the blackness of the universe nearly a billion miles from the Cassini probe's location. The second picture on the right comes from the Hubble Space telescope's survey of an area of the universe that is about the size of a needle's eye held at arm's length. This is a fine example of what we could call - the second heaven - the universe. In Genesis 1:14 we see the first reference the details of second Heaven or "universe" - . "And God said, Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens, to divide between the day and the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years". The second heaven is the domain of stars, planets, moons and space itself. By the time of Genesis 1:14, God had already created the space in which the earth was suspended. (Job 26:7-10) In continuing the stretching forth of the universe, God made the sun, the moon and later on the stars. (Genesis 1:16) Astronomers estimate our earth and moon, along with the seven other planets and other objects going around the sun, with their attendant moons, are sweeping through our Milky Way Galaxy at 500,000 m.p.h. Our Galaxy is composed of over 100 billion stars, with over 100 billion galaxies populating our universe. If you were to take a spaceship and travel at an average speed of 17,000 m.p.h, it would take you several days to reach our moon and nearly a year to reach our sun. To get to Saturn at the same rate of speed (like the Cassini Space probe above) would take you over five years! To measure the distances in space, the ruler used by astronomers is what is called "the light year", which measures the distance traveled by light in one year. Any signals sent by spacecraft such as Cassini travel at the speed of light, and take on average 80 minutes to reach receiving stations here on earth. To get to the nearest star traveling at the speed of light (670 million m.p.h) would take you four years (or over 100,000 years in the space shuttle!) However as you travel deeper into space, even the light year (some 6 trillion miles long) begins to lose significance, with our Milky Way Galaxy alone being 100,000 Light Years across, and our visible universe being composed of an estimated 100 billion such galaxies of smaller or greater size! As you study each of these "heavenly realms", each one gets larger and more different from common, everyday experience.
C. The Third Heaven - God's Throneroom
Clearly we don't have any photographs of what the Bible terms "the third heaven" in 2 Corinthians 12:2. No other book in the world but the Bible gives us the necessary, sufficient and accurate description of this third realm. As we travel through Genesis, we see another 30 or so mentions of the word "heaven" with most references to either the first heaven (sky) or second heaven (universe). In Genesis 28:12 we read: "And he dreamed, and behold, a ladder was set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to the heavens. And behold, angels of God ascended and descended upon it." Though scripture up to this point indirectly alludes to the existence of a distinct realm in which God occupies as Sovereign and Lord over His creation (Genesis 2:1-3), as well as the existence of angels, yet this verse shows the activity of the third heaven touching down here on earth. According to John 1:51, what Jacob saw was none other than an Old Testament appearance of Jesus Christ. It is in 2 Corinthians 12 that the Apostle Paul refers to this realm as the "third heaven" (hence the reason for terming the first two realms as "1st heaven" and "2nd heaven"). From what we see in the Bible's descriptions of the third heaven, that realm of God's abode must be far larger and more grander than the second heaven - the universe. It is to the third heaven that believers go who die in the Lord. 2 Peter 1:10-11 includes this phrase: "for in this way the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you." It would seem that the third heaven in comparison to the second heaven is greater than the second heaven (the universe) is to the first (the sky). What John will be describing in Revelation 4-5 confirms this notion - being that from the present third heaven, the Father and the Son are and will be orchestrating all of the events and coming judgments that will impact both the second heavens and the world living under the first heaven in Revelation 6-19. More could be said but for now we must move on to the the fourth major type of realm, a realm that is referred to as "the New Heavens".
D. The "Fourth" place called Heaven - The New Heavens
Admittedly the the "New Heavens and New Earth" described in many Old and New Testament passages is a realm that is in one sense future to us, and yet in another sense is impacting our current lives as Christians. Its main time of manifestation will occur when Christ has ruled and reigned for 1,000 years and sets up the Great White Throne Judgment. Bible Scholar George Eldon Ladd summarizes how the reality of the "New Heavens and New Earth" is partially impacting us presently as a result of Jesus' resurrection from the dead in the following chart:3
Many Bible teachers call this Biblical pattern an "already/not yet" experience, meaning that we are "already" experiencing a foretaste of the age to come, even though it is clearly "not yet" here. We can also say that when we as Christians experienced the New Birth, that greatest of all realities described at the end of the Bible is being "previewed" in us, since the Bible describes the Christian as a "new creation in Christ". (2 Corinthians 5:17) The Bible tells us in Revelation 20-22 that following the Great White Throne Judgment, a New Heaven and a New Earth will be established by God. Some have suggested that God will do away with this present order completely and re-create a whole new earth and a whole new Heaven. However it appears, from other scriptures such as Romans 8:21-25, 2 Corinthians 5:17, that God will somehow (in a way we don't completely comprehend) transform our current world and perhaps the third Heaven into that incredible reality spoken of at the end of Revelation. More could be said on these two thoughts, but I want to hasten onto the main point of Revelation 21.
God's goal in the Bible: for heaven and earth to be together
The point of Revelation 21 is that the New Heavens and the New Earth are no longer separated from one another. The Glory of God will indeed flood the New earth and Heaven will touch down upon our planet. All those who by grace through faith have believed on the Lord Jesus Christ will be in that august company of the redeemed as ordained by the Father and promised by the Son. (John 14:1-3; Jude 24-25) Just as the second heaven exceeds the first, and just as the third heaven far exceeds the second in beauty and grandeur, this "New Heaven" will exceed them all, being that it will be saturated with God's unending glory. Furthermore, the "New Heavens" will saturate the "New Earth" with God's unending glory, literally fulfilling His ultimate will of "the earth being filled with His glory". (Habakkuk 2:14)
More tomorrow...........
Endnotes:
1. Revelation 1; 4:8-11; 5:9-14; 7:10-13; 11:15-17; 12:10-12; 14:2-3; 15:3-4; 19:1-10; 21:1-9 and 22:16-21.
2. John MacArthur. "The Truth About Heaven, Angels and Eternal life".
3. George Eldon Ladd. "The Gospel of the Kingdom."
Amos 3:2 “You only have I chosen among all the families of the earth; Therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities.”
Review
Yesterday we explored Genesis through Deuteronomy to discern the Bible's teaching on God's elective purpose of grace. We discovered the following truths:
1. The purpose of election: Godliness
2. The target(s) of election: The helpless
3. The motive behind election: God's love
4. The timing of election is outside of history or eternity
In today's most we will consider the remainder of the Old Testament's testimony on this important doctrine of what the Baptist Faith and Message deems: "God's elective purpose of Grace."
Historical Books affirm Sovereign Election
As you survey the historical books (Joshua-Esther), the poetic books (Job-Song of Solomon), the Major Prophets (Isaiah-Daniel) and the twelve Minor Prophets (Hosea-Malachi), you will find no less than 65 references to God's election of Israel as a nation and individuals unto salvation or vocation. We learn that God chose Saul to be Israel's first king in 1 Samuel 10:24 before the people ever concluded or affirmed him has their leader. Scripture progressively reveals its truths, and so as you go further and further along in the sacred books, you find out more detail. You also discover that seeds and principles outlined in earlier portions of scripture are affirmed and spelled out more explicitly in latter portions. Individuals like David (1 Chronicles 28:5) for example were chosen both to serve as king as well as chosen unto salvation.
God's Sovereign Election in the Poetic Books
Moses was chosen by God unto vocation and salvation. (Psalm 106:25-26) Again in studying the doctrine of election, one must also consider that scripture equally affirms that God's choice is the background behind those who chose to believe on His promises. Moses and David for example are included in the famous faith chapter of Hebrews 11. This particular observation is to remind the reader of the Biblical pattern on Sovereign election, namely that it does not contradict nor cancel out the other Biblical teaching on man's need to respond to the Gospel. As the Baptist Faith & Message 2000 states: "Election is the gracious purpose of God, according to which He regenerates, justifies, sanctifies, and glorifies sinners. It is consistent with the free agency of man, and comprehends all the means in connection with the end. It is the glorious display of God's sovereign goodness, and is infinitely wise, holy, and unchangeable. It excludes boasting and promotes humility." The fact we see men like Moses and David in the famous faith chapter of Hebrews 11 helps us to see both truths of God's Sovereignty and human responsibility as complementary, rather than contradictory truths.
God's Sovereign Election in the Prophetic Books
As you continue on in the Old Testament, you discover that God's elective purpose of grace included the preparation for the Savior of the world. Isaiah is perhaps the one book out of all the prophets that is the most detailed in the doctrine of election. In addition to revealing God's Sovereign choice for rulers whom He would use to carry out purposes of judgment, such as Cyrus in Isaiah 45, a much greater revelation is given concerning God's Sovereign purposes in preparing for the Savior's coming. Isaiah writes about how the Messiah is God's chosen servant in Isaiah 42:1 and 43:10. God most certainly was not up in heaven hoping and wishing that Jesus in his humanity would acquiesce to the promptings of His Divine purposes. God already had the Savior of the world chosen, an arrangement He worked out with Jesus in His Deity in eternity past. (Acts 2:23-24; 2 Timothy 1:9; Titus 1:2)
Now it must be remarked that God's choosing of other people was done so before their birth (Jeremiah 1:5), however God's electing of other people is not attended with the same conditions as the Messiah's election. Biblical revelation teaches nothing about human beings pre-existing. Rather the easiest way to think of God's Sovereign elective purpose is to realize that God had such people on His mind from all eternity. This particular truth of election's timing is covered in the greatest detail in the New Testament.
As a side note
In future posts we will look in detail at the Biblical Survey of election in the New Testament. Essentially God's progressive character of revelation in His Word must be kept in mind when studying any topic in scripture. As the old saying goes: "The New Testament in the Old is concealed and the Old Testament in the New is revealed." Seeds of thought made known in the Old Testament become full grown trees in the New. The outline of election traced here in the Old Testament becomes a full colored painting by the time we reach the Gospels, Acts and Epistles of the New Testament. That survey, as we said, will be done in the near future as a continuation of the Biblical survey we have done these past two days.
Conclusion
For the purposes of today's post, we close out the Old Testament treatment of God's Sovereign elective purpose by noting that the final mention is made of Jacob and Esau in Malachi 1:2. Whenever you survey all the 65 plus references to election in the historical, poetic and prophetic books, you come away with the same fundamental truths we discovered in our survey of Genesis through Deuteronomy yesterday:
1. The purpose of election is Godliness.
2. The motive of election is love.
3. The target(s) of election are the helpless.
4. The timing of election is outside of history or eternity.
Genesis 18:19 "For I have chosen him, so that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice, so that the Lord may bring upon Abraham what He has spoken about him.”
Introduction
When God says of Abraham in Genesis 18:19 - "I have chosen Him", it is the first mention of the word "chosen" in the Bible. The Baptist Faith and Message 2000 calls this truth: God's elective "purpose of grace": "Election is the gracious purpose of God, according to which He regenerates, justifies, sanctifies, and glorifies sinners. It is consistent with the free agency of man, and comprehends all the means in connection with the end. It is the glorious display of God's sovereign goodness, and is infinitely wise, holy, and unchangeable. It excludes boasting and promotes humility." In past blogs we have noted the practical importance of election as well as a thumbnail sketch of its relationship to human responsibility in salvation. God's Sovereignty and the human responsibility to believe the Gospel are both taught in scripture as complementary, not contradictory truths. The importance of Divine election in the Biblical record cannot be overestimated. For starters, the subject of election can be divided into four subheadings:
1. The corporate election of nations, such as Israel. (Psalm 105:6,26; 106:25)
2. The election of Jesus as the Savior of mankind. (Isaiah 42:1; 45:10; Luke 9:35)
3. The election that deals with certain vocations like kings, priests, prophets, apostles and other vocations. (Jeremiah 1:5; Galatians 1:15)
4. Then of course the most common designation, election unto salvation. (The majority of passages, such as Ephesians 1:1-14 and 1 Peter 1:1-2)
Though we can certainly make mention of the first three, the fourth area is what we will be considering as we trace election through the Bible. Moses' writings will be featured today, being that the doctrine of election is first mention in the books of Genesis through Deuteronomy. We won't focus on every passage (since there are over 100 in scripture), however we can treat a fair number to gain a sense of the common principles God has ordained in the Biblical doctrine of Election unto salvation.
Election's Purpose: Godliness
Genesis 18:19 is the first mention of the word "chosen" in the Bible that states: "For I have chosen him, so that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice, so that the Lord may bring upon Abraham what He has spoken about him.” Abraham is the proper starting point, being that he is designated the father of faith and is used often in scripture as an illustration of many other fundamental truths of salvation. Abraham is designated as having believed God, and it being credited to him as righteousness. (Genesis 15:16) Abraham, the father of faith (Romans 4:11,16), was chosen by God the Father. God chose Abraham for the purpose that Abraham would command himself and his children to do righteousness. This speaks of the purpose of election. Other scriptures reveal this to be the reason why God chose as many people as possible to call and convict unto salvation. (Ephesians 2:10; 2 Thessalonians 2:13-14)
Election's targets: the helpless
Though Genesis 18:19 is the first mention of the word "chosen", it most certainly is not the first time we run across the teaching or idea of God's Sovereign choice. As you go back through the proceeding chapters of Genesis, you discover God has chosen Shem and his bloodline to be the bloodline of redemption following the flood. In Genesis 10 we see ten generations stretching from Shem to Abram, indicating God's Sovereign choice. Were those men and that bloodline composed of people who could save themselves? No! In fact the theme of death runs through the genaeologies of both Adam to Noah in Genesis 5 and Shem to Abraham in Genesis 10. All men were born sinners. Helpless, blind, incapable of saving themselves. Furthermore, in Genesis 12 we see God choosing and calling Abraham himself out of paganism and into His redemptive promises. (Joshua 24:1-3; Acts 7:1-8). Abram was 75 years old when he heeded God's call. If God had not intervened, he would had remained in darkness. To compound the helplessness of his condition, his wife Sarai was barren and incapable of having children. (Genesis 11:30) Scripture is quick to remind us that whenever Abraham heard the call of grace, in faith he trusted God and began looking for a city whose builder and maker is God. (Hebrews 11:8-19) Election and human responsibility are complementary truths that we believe because they are taught in scripture. Consistently through the Biblical record, God's Sovereign choice explains why a person believes while asserting that a person must believe in order to be saved. So from Moses' writings we have learned so far that election's purpose is godliness and God's Sovereignly elects helpless people. However there is another important consideration of Sovereign election we learn from Moses: namely the motive of God's elective purpose.
Election's motives: God's love
As you move past Abraham's life, you discover God's elective purpose continuing to work. We see that Isaac was chosen to be the son of promise, not Ishmael (Genesis 17:18-19) and that God loved Jacob but hated Esau. (Malachi 1:2-3) In all of the people God chose unto salvation, the end result was godliness and it is clear that each one God chose was helpless to save themselves. So what is God's motive in election? Whether speaking of individual, corporate, Christ's election or election unto vocation, the motive is singular: God's love. Moses writes these words in Deuteronomy 7:6-8 "For you are a holy people to the Lord your God; the Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for His own possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. 7 “The Lord did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any of the peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples, 8 but because the Lord loved you and kept the oath which He swore to your forefathers, the Lord brought you out by a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt."
Now notice how Moses under Divine inspiration brings together the three of the four headings of God's elective purpose. First, he states in Deuteronomy 7:6 that God wanted a holy and Godly people - hence election's purpose. Next in Deuteronomy 7:7 we see that Israel was a helpless targeted people, the weakest and the smallest among the nations. Thirdly, we see in Deuteronomy 7:8 the motive for why God chose Israel: love. God did not choose Israel because of His foreseeing her faith. If anything, a summary of Israel's history will reveal repeated failure and apostasy and the ultimate treachery, the crucifixion of His Son along with the Romans. God chose to love Israel in order to bring about His glorious purposes. Moses repeats this singular motive for God's elective purpose, both individually and corporately in passages such as Deuteronomy 10:15 and 14:2. The New Testament affirms this singular motive for Sovereign election in passages such as Ephesians 1:4 and 1 John 4:19. So Moses' writings teaches us that election's purpose is Godliness, it's targets are helpless apart from grace and it's motive is love. From the final book of Moses, Deuteronomy, we pick up on one more truth concerning election....
Election's beginning: Eternity
Deuteronomy 32:8 states - “When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance,
When He separated the sons of man,
He set the boundaries of the peoples
According to the number of the sons of Israel." To what event is Moses speaking about in this text? For one thing we know that when Jacob, Abram's grandson, went down to Egypt with his family to live in time of famine in Genesis 46:27, there was a total of 70 persons. According to Genesis 10, the so-called "table of the nations" that lists all of the descendants of Shem, Ham and Japheth numbers a total of 70 persons from whence all of the nations and peoples in the Bible would derive. How could God set the boundaries of each nation and the number of each nation unless He had already chosen Israel before any of her forefathers were born? As faintly as the Old Testament can trace it, we can say that in the Old Testament revelation, a clue is given for the first time that God's elective person did not begin the moment someone chose Him or even right before their birth, but happened outside of history.
Conclusion
As we have discovered in our survey of Moses' writings, God's elective purpose aims at the goal of making Godly people, has targeted individuals who are otherwise helpless, is rooted in the motive of God's unending love and fourthly, is a choice God made outside of history (or what the New Testament brings out most clearly as being before time began).
More tomorrow....
