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by
John Burke
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October 19 - November 16, 2019
Paul may be reflecting on his own near-death experience when he explains,
For we know that when this earthly tent we live in is taken down (that is, when we die and leave this earthly body), we will have a house in heaven, an eternal body made for us by God himself and not by human hands. We grow weary in our present bodies, and we long to put on our heavenly bodies like new clothing. For we will put on heavenly bodies; we will not be spirits
without bodies. While we live in these earthly bodies, we groan and sigh, but it’s not that we want to die and get rid of these bodies that clothe us. Rather, we want to put on our new bod...
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(2 Corinthians 5:1–4, 8–9 NLT)
Maybe the reason we never feel fully satisfied in this life is because we were created for the life to come. As Paul said, “Our
present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. . . . We
Imagine that—the first person we meet in heaven is ourselves.”3
What you believe about yourself is what shapes all your decisions and actions.
When we base our worth or identity on what we do or what was done to us, we will struggle with fear of failure, feel the need to prove ourselves, or manipulate others who get in the way of our success. We will become self-consumed. That’s because God never created us to get our identity from what we do or what others did to us, but from who we are to God.
What did you do with your life?
God never intended you to base your identity on accomplishments or performing. No one
God made you for himself—not to prove your glory, but to be his glory. His pride and joy. His beloved son or daughter. What he wants you to do is learn to be secure in his love, in who he made you to be, and from that place of security, you can do what he created you to do. And first and foremost, this is to love those you uniquely can love.
Wise King Solomon said it’s because God has “set eternity in the human heart” (Ecclesiastes 3:11).
Jesus taught that God the Father wants us to live in the security of knowing how valuable we are to him. “Are not two sparrows sold
for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground outside your Father’s care. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows” (Matthew 10:29–31).
He alone knows your name. In the book of Revelation Jesus says, “To everyone who is victorious . . . I will give to each one a white stone, and on the stone will be
engraved a new name that no one understands except the one who receives it” (Revelation 2:17 NLT, italics mine).
God made every one of His children to have a divine purpose, which only they can accomplish in the earth.’”8
In Heaven, we get clarity on who he intended us to be before we were born.
Knowing how God sees you sets you free to accomplish things God created you to accomplish.
that in his NDE,
Science used to think of matter as solid, but we now know the tiny atoms that make up matter are more like invisible waves, more mind-like than particle-like.
In fact, atoms are 99.999 percent empty space.3 Cambridge and Princeton physicist James Jeans wrote, “The stream of knowledge is heading toward a non-mechanical reality; the universe begins to look more like a great thought than like a machine. Mind no longer appears to be an accidental intruder into the realm of matter; we ought rather hail it as the governor of the realm of matter.”4
described. I wonder if this tunnel is like a wormhole, leading out of our space-time dimension into Heaven’s expanded dimensions all around us?
love subjects every person to—the
the possibility of rejection and heartbreak.
C. S. Lewis gives evidence of this common moral law summarized below:
Don’t do harm to another human by what you do or say (the Golden Rule).
Honor your father and mother. Be kind toward brothers and sisters, children, and the elderly. Do not have sex with another person’s spouse. Be honest in all your dealings (don’t steal). Do not lie. Care for those wea...
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The Jewish prophet Ezekiel appears to have seen Jesus’s preincarnate glory in his vision of Heaven: High above on the throne was a figure like that of a man. I saw that from what appeared to be his waist up he looked like glowing metal, as if full of fire, and that from there down he looked like fire; and brilliant light surrounded him. Like the appearance of a rainbow in the clouds on a rainy day, so was the radiance around him. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the LORD. When I saw it, I fell facedown, and I heard the voice of one speaking. (Ezekiel 1:26–28) Ezekiel had
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come and be killed. “The
Anointed One [Messiah] will be put to death and will have nothing. The people of the ruler who will come will destroy the city and the sanctuary [Jerusalem and the temple]” (Daniel 9:26). The Romans destroyed the temple in 70 CE and it has never...
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While on earth Jesus declared, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life” (John 8:12).
The writers of Scripture use similar descriptions.
Daniel said “his face [was] like lightning, his eyes like flaming torches” (Daniel 10:6). John said “his eyes were like blazing fire” (Revelation 1:14). Yet not like fire as we know it—imagine eyes so magical, you can’t stop staring.
“Then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known” (1 Corinthians
Imagine looking face-to-face
to-face into the all-knowing eyes of Love.
to
“This will be hard for people on earth to understand, but I was instantly in Messiah, in Him. . . . I knew I was me, and yet I was in Messiah. . . . His love is in a different dimension than our idea of love. There is no question of his love. . . . We are in him and he is in us (see Galatians 2:22). Yet we don’t lose our identity.”15
And as I lay there in worship in awe of this Creator, I remember saying, “I could worship You for eternity.”2
she believes that we aren’t meant to comprehend on earth what we will understand in Heaven. “All
I can tell you,” she says, “is that I know God’s plan is perfect. In his radiance, it all makes perfect, perfect sense.”3
David said,
“You keep track of all my sorrows. You have collected all my tears in your bottle. You have recorded each one in your book” (Psalm
56:8 ...
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David foresaw what Jesus would suffer, describing a vision of Messiah’s crucifixion one thousand
years beforehand (before crucifixion was even invented).
“All my bones are out of joint. My heart has turned to wax; it has melted within me. . . . You lay me in the dust of death. Dogs surround me, a pack of villains encircles me; they pierce my hands and my feet. . . . All the ends of the earth will remember and turn to the LORD, and all the families of the nations will bow down before him...
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Jesus proudly wears his scars of love in Heaven for a reason—we need to remember!