Revelation 21:1-4 (Sunday 2nd April 2006) Where is God when we Contemplate Death?
Bill Humphries
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. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven like a beautiful bride prepared for her husband.
I heard a shout from the throne, saying, “Look, the home of God is now among his people! He will live with them and they will be his people. God himself will be with them. He will remove all of their sorrows, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. For the old world and its evils are gone forever.”
The first time I ever read this passage, I was really upset by six little words at the end of verse 1, “And the sea was also gone.”
I like the sea …… and I couldn’t understand why if it was part of God’s creation that he himself had
described as excellent in every way, it would not feature on the new earth.
And then I read this in 2nd Chronicles chapter 4, which speaks of the time Solomon made the bronze furnishings for the Temple. “Then he cast a large round tank…. It was 71/2 foot deep and 45 feet in circumference……It could hold about 16500 gallons of water.”
It was big! And do you know what it was called? Verse 2 states, “It was called the sea.”
This sea of cast metal with its enormous reservoir of water replaced the bronze basin of the tabernacle and was used by the priests for ritual cleansing.
The theme for our service this morning is: “Where is God when we contemplate death?” And you may be asking the question, “What has all that to do with death?”
Let me explain, to enter the temple the priest had to wash himself in that large reservoir of water known as the sea in a form of ritual cleansing.
Revelation 21:22 states:
“No temple could be seen in the city, for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.”
There is no sea because to enter this temple ritual cleansing will give no access……..
………….. You can scrub as much or as hard as you like, but it will make absolutely no difference. ….
…….The only way to enter this city and this temple is through the blood of Jesus Christ and that has everything to do with where God is when we contemplate death.
Why do people die?
Let me begin by saying that death is unnatural.
We read in Romans: 5:12
When Adam sinned, sin entered the whole human race. Adams sin brought death, so death spread to everyone, for everyone sinned.”
The Bible describes death as an enemy to be destroyed. The last enemy in fact.(1st Cor 15:26)
This means that suffering and death are abnormal.
Jesus could be sorrowful, compassionate and also angry when faced with pain and death…… WHY? ……Because they were not part of his creation, rather they were the result of people’s rejection of him.
When we read the early chapters of Genesis we can see that it was God’s will for us to eat from the tree of life and live forever.
……….The only command that God gave Adam and Eve was not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, which of course they did.
But we know don’t we that God can always turn what was meant for evil into good.
Do you remember what Joseph said to his brothers who had sold him into slavery, “What you meant for evil, God turned into good.” (Gen 50:20)
And paradoxically death becomes an act of God’s mercy as he bars the way to the tree of life…….lest they should eat from it and live forever……….. Live forever in rebellion and separation from God, which of course would be hell.
However death does not have the final word but in the words of 1st Cor 15:54 is “Swallowed up in victory.”
“Where O death is your victory? Where O death is your sting.
Death itself is swallowed by the grave, which is the death of death so to speak, it will be no more.
Only when we fully appreciate the tragedy of death, that it is un-natural for the children of the eternal God, only then can we really grasp the victory of Christ over death
And to help us truly grasp just how great this victory by Christ is, I want to begin by looking at what the biblical hope of resurrection actually is.
Do you know I have spoken to people who have been Christians for years but are frightened of the prospect of death because that are frightened that they will be some kind of body-less spirit devoid of all personal identity.
Let me say first that the idea of the soul being some separate entity which separates itself from the body at the point of death is one of those Greek Hellenistic ideas that have so often sought to detract from a true biblical understanding of the resurrection.
The ancient Greeks considered the spirit of a person to be imprisoned within the physical body and set free only upon death of the body…….
….. Consequently, in the first two or three hundred years of Christianity, in ancient Alexandria, theologians tries to relate to their faith through this Greek idea of the spirit or soul being set free from the prison of the body at the point of death…..
……. and this false line of thought permeated the church, and still clouds the understanding of many Christians today.
The simple fact is that we do not have a soul…….. We are a soul!
When David in Psalm 6 said, “My soul is in anguish,” (v3) he was not referring to a spiritual experience…. he was stating that his very self, as a living, breathing being was in anguish.
In the Bible the word soul means the whole person, heart, body, mind, thoughts, logic, love….all that we are. The biblical understanding of the resurrection is the resurrection of the whole person.
The booklet on the Lent course that many folk are taking part in at St. Josephs, says this:
“When it talks of the glories of heaven, the Bible does so in terms of physical resurrection, rather than spiritual survival……
…..… In this area, modern Christians are sometimes rather tentative about embracing the full-blooded faith of the New Testament.”
So in the full-blooded faith of the New Testament, what does physical resurrection mean?
It means full body resurrection, all that we are. Our complete identity, with one exception, our sinful nature cleansed and renewed to fully reflect the image of Christ.
And our identity, all that we are, is described right in the opening chapter of Genesis, where we read:
God created people in his own image…. ………Male and female he created them.
This means that my identity in which God created me is in my male-ness. It is how I think, how I act, how I feel, it is who I am….
…….. Norma’s identity in which God created her, is in her femininity, it is how she thinks it is who she is.
We were each created in equal dignity as a son and daughter of God, and in the resurrection we shall each stand in equal dignity as a son and daughter of God.
In Matthew 22:30 Jesus said, “At the resurrection people will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like
the angels in heaven.”
………Some take Jesus’ words to imply that the masculine or feminine aspect of our identity will no longer exist…
………Whereas in fact, Jesus is simply pointing out to the Sadducees the absurdity of their logic in denying the resurrection……
…. by stating that in our new resurrection life there will no longer be biological procreation…..
…. We will no longer make babies and raise families.
It does sometimes seem, that one of the patriarchal hangovers that Jesus so radically went out of his way to demolish, can accept the resurrection of mankind under the synonym ‘sons of God’ but stumbles at the thought that womankind can be raised to the full dignity of her gender……created in the beginning by our loving heavenly father.
Yet this physical resurrection is the full-blooded faith of the New Testament.
Again, as it states in the Lent course booklet, “You will still be recognisably you.”
So other than the fact that it is still you or I, and that it is raised imperishable, what will this resurrection body actually be like?........
…….The Bible doesn’t say, it doesn’t give us a blue print, if you like, of what it will actually be like.
However, the Bible describes Christ as the ‘firstfruits of those who will raised from the dead’, (1st Cor 15:23) …..
…….This means that our resurrection body will be like his, so we can gain some understanding of what our resurrection body will be like by looking at what Jesus’ was like.
When the disciples first saw Jesus after his resurrection, Luke reports they were terribly frightened, thinking they had seen a ghost, and Jesus said to them:
“Look at my hands. Look at my feet. You can see that it is really me. Touch me and make sure that I am not a ghost, because ghosts don’t have bodies, as you see that I do.”
Folks do not listen to false teachers who say that that Jesus’ resurrection and consequently also ours, is only spiritual.
…They have no understanding of how great is this victory that Christ has won for us…..
How many people know that spirits do not eat food……Luke reports that the disciples gave Jesus a piece of broiled fish and that he ate it as they watched. (24:37-43)
We need to move away, as far as we can, from this Greek infection, for want of a better description, of disembodied souls and spirits so that we may fully understand that the biblical promise is a full body resurrection …
……and a home, not in some spiritual realm, but here on earth.
Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit..…the earth.
Not a different earth, but this earth, no so much new as renewed.
This is why Paul, looking forward to this new heavens and earth says in Romans 8:21, “All creation anticipates the day when it will join God’s children in glorious freedom from death and decay.”
This is where we are going, a resurrected body and a resurrection life on a on a renewed earth…… in the full presence and glory of Jesus Christ.
In John 6:40 Jesus said:
“For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.”
………….What does Jesus mean by the ‘last day’?
Many passages in the Bible seem to imply that the final judgment and resurrection do not take place at one time for one person and at another time for another person….
………. but is in fact a corporate event that takes place at the second coming of Christ.
Yet in contrast to this, Hebrews 12:1 tells us that we are surrounded by a “Great cloud of witnesses” namely the great men and women of faith, who have lived before us.
For the moment let’s consider what is certainly a biblical basis for looking to a last day of resurrection and judgment.
The first clear reference in the Old Testament to a time of resurrection is in Daniel 12:2 which states, “Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake, some to everlasting life, others to shame and contempt.”
So if the resurrection takes place at the close of history, at the last day, what happens in the meantime to those who have died?
The train of thought that we find prior to Christ, in the Old Testament, is that those who have died are at rest, or sleeping, in what the Hebrew language calls ‘Sheol’ and the Greek language calls ‘Hades’ which simply means ‘the place of the dead’, until a time of universal resurrection.
In 1st Thessalonians Paul writes of those brothers and sisters who ‘sleep in death,’ and those who have ‘fallen asleep in Jesus.’ (4:13-14) But this play on words that Paul uses as a metaphor for death can also be translated, ‘those who are deceased’ and ‘those who are deceased in Jesus’.
Some take this metaphor, or analogy further and see this as a kind of ‘soul sleep’. (I don’t know whether you have ever heard that expression)……
… A sleep in which those who have died will remain until the Second Coming of Christ, when at that time they will be awakened to the resurrection and to judgment.
I cannot speak for those who, in the words of Daniel ‘will awake to shame and contempt,’ I am simply called to warn them of the consequences of their rejection of God and of his Christ…
……….but for those destined for eternal life in Christ, I would seriously challenge this idea of soul sleep.
How can we be surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses if they are all asleep?
Another reason that I would challenge this idea of ‘soul sleep’ is because of what Jesus said to the criminal on the cross:
“Truly I tell you, today, you will be with me in paradise.” (Luke 23:43)
The criminal on the cross had asked for a blessing, sometime in the remote future, “Jesus remember me when you come into your kingdom.” That was all he dared to ask or hope, to be remembered…………
………..but, just as the Bible promises, this criminal on the cross received infinitely more than he would ever dare to ask or hope. Eph 3:20
He immediately received a promise from Jesus…
“You will be with me - not in Sheol, not in Hades - but in my immediate presence. Not some time in the future, but this very day.”
Another line of thought about what happens to those who have died, is that because time itself is simply a part of God’s creation, all those who die, are immediately taken out of the created time line and into eternity….. To the day of final judgment
……. Although for the world and its history many thousands of years may have passed, to us resurrection is instantaneous because on death we are taken outside of time.
……………….. I have to say that that sounds more appealing to me than the idea of soul sleep.
But I do believe that the Scriptures that I now want to look at will also seriously challenge this line of thinking.
Our reading this morning speaks of a new heaven and new earth and a new city of Jerusalem……
……The Bible doesn’t talk so much about heaven being our permanent home so much as being a temporary home as we wait for God to reconcile all things to himself through Jesus Christ.
But although it may be temporary until the time of a new earth the Bible certainly does categorically state that we do have a home in heaven.
Ephesians 2:6, “For God raised us from the dead along with Christ and we are seated with him in the heavenly realms - all because we are one with Jesus Christ.”
In his second letter to the church at Corinth, Paul says:
“For we know that when this earthly tent we live in is taken down – when we die and leave these bodies – we will have a home in heaven, an eternal body made for us by God….. For we will not be spirits without bodies, but we will put on new heavenly bodies.” That’s2nd Cor 5:1-3.
Many scholars believe that Paul is describing an intermediate state in which those who have died await the greater glory of the full body resurrection until the time that God sends Jesus back to the earth in his second coming.
However Paul’s main concern in this passage of scripture is to assure the Corinthians that at no time will they either be body-less or separated from Christ.
In John 5:24 Jesus states that those who listen to his message and believe in God who sent him, have already passed from death into life.
Eternal life with Jesus is not simply a future hope, something to look forward to, it is also a present reality.
In Revelation 20:4-6 John speaks of the faithful witnesses of Jesus coming back to life to reign with Christ. He calls this the first resurrection and he says……..
…. “Blessed and holy are those who share in the first resurrection….. they will be priests of God and of Christ.”
Is this what Jesus had in mind, when speaking to a Pharisee about inviting the poor, the lame and the blind to a banquet, he said this…..
…..“At the resurrection of the Godly, God will reward you for inviting those who could not repay you.”(Mat14:14)
And I believe we see a foretaste of this first resurrection when Matthew reports in his Gospel that when Jesus died on the cross, the tombs broke open and the bodies of many godly men and women who had died were raised from the dead…..
…….After Jesus’ resurrection they went into the holy city of Jerusalem and appeared to many people. (27:52-53)
Folks, I have given you a lot this morning, but hopefully, I am now going to bring it all into sharp focus.
In order to do that, I would like to read you a transcript of a conversation that took place between Jesus and a very dear friend of his whose brother had recently died.
“Lord,” Martha said to Jesus, “If you had been here my brother would not have died. But I know that even now God will give you whatever you ask.” Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.” Martha answered, “I know he will rise again, in the resurrection on the last day.” Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection.”
The resurrection is the person of Jesus Christ…..
……He is our focus…
……….He is the one who said, “I hold the keys of death and Hades.” (Rev 1:18)
So how do we reconcile those Scriptures that point to our being in heaven with Jesus, with other scriptures that point to a time of resurrection and judgment at the last day?
Lets go back to those words of Jesus in John 6:40 Jesus said..
…….“For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.”
Although, as I said before, it is not for me to speculate in regards to those who in Daniel’s words, “awake to shame and contempt.” We cannot deny that the Scriptures certainly state that there will be a future day of resurrection and judgment.
But I believe that for those in Christ, the last day is not a day in the future, still to come, but a day in the past. I believe that those in Christ live the other side of the last day.
The day in which heaven held its breath as the Son of the living God, single handed took on all the powers of darkness and evil and death itself, and defeated every one of them….
………..Trampling them in the dust and making a spectacle of them through his death and resurrection.
I believe that that last day of Jesus’ life on earth heralded in a new beginning, when in his dying breath on the cross he said, “It is finished.”
And by his blood purchased for God, men and women of every tribe and language and people and nation. And made them to be a kingdom of priests to serve our God.
Jesus told his disciples, that’s not just the twelve, that’s each one of us as well…
………. “I will never leave you or forsake you.” “I will be with you always, even to the end of time.”
‘I will not abandon you to Sheol, I will not abandon you to Hades…….
……. Until the Kingdom of God is fully established upon the earth……
…..until the holy city, the new Jerusalem, comes down from God to adorn the new earth, you have a place in heaven with me.,
“There are many rooms in my Father’s home, and I am going to prepare a place for you.”
And then as if to assure the twelve, because he was literally turning upside down their traditional view of the ‘day of the lord’…
….. their traditional view of a day of resurrection and judgment.. he said “If this were not so I would tell you plainly.” (John 14:2-3)
Also on the night before his crucifixion Jesus prayed these words to his Father about his love for those who believe in him, his love for everyone here this morning:
“Father, I want these whom you’ve given me to be with me, where I am and to see my glory.” (John 17:24)
Romans 8:38-39, “Nothing can ever separate us from Christ’s love. Death can’t, life can’t, angels can’t, demons can’t, fears for today can’t, worries about tomorrow can’t, the powers of hell can’t. Nothing in all of creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.
The Christian hope is in the holy city of the new Jerusalem. A city of peace and justice, of men and women in relationship with God from every race, tribe, nation and language.
As we can understand from the Scriptures we have looked at eternal life with Jesus is not something in the future, but is in fact a present day reality. This means that those who share in the hope of this city will practice its values now.