Heaven: A Comprehensive Guide to Everything the Bible Says About Our Eternal Home

by Randy Alcorn

“All I could see was the fog. . . . I think if I could have seen the shore, I would have made it.”11 Consider her words: “I think if I could have seen the shore, I would have made it.” For believers, that shore is Jesus and being with him in the place that he promised to prepare for us, where we will live with him forever. The shore we should look for is that of the New Earth. If we can see through the fog and picture our eternal home in our mind’s eye, it will comfort and energize us.

“better country, even a heavenly one,”

“Resolved, to endeavor to obtain for myself as much happiness, in the other world, as I possibly can.”

Deadline

The Journey of Desire: “Nearly every Christian I have spoken with has some idea that eternity is an unending church service. . . . We have settled on an image of the never-ending sing-along in the sky, one great hymn after another, forever and ever, amen. And our heart sinks. Forever and ever? That’s it? That’s the good news? And then we sigh and feel guilty that we are not more ‘spiritual.’ We lose heart, and we turn once more to the present to find what life we can.”

19 We do not desire to eat gravel. Why? Because God did not design us to eat gravel. Trying to develop an appetite for a disembodied existence in a non-physical Heaven is like trying to develop an appetite for gravel. No matter how sincere we are, and no matter how hard we try, it’s not going to work. Nor should it.

the opposite—the reason we want it is precisely because God has planned for it to exist. As we’ll see, resurrected people living in a resurrected universe isn’t our idea—it’s God’s

In The Eclipse of Heaven, theology professor A. J. Conyers writes, “Even to one without religious commitment and theological convictions, it should be an unsettling thought that this world is attempting to chart its way through some of the most perilous waters in history, having now decided to ignore what was for nearly two millennia its fixed point of reference—its North Star. The certainty of judgment, the longing for heaven, the dread of hell: these are not prominent considerations in our modern discourse about the important matters of life. But they once were.”

Jesus said of the devil, “When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies” (John 8:44

Country of the Blind, H. G. Wells

Silver Chair

We succumb to naturalistic assumptions that what we see is real and what we don’t see isn’t. God can’t be real, we conclude, because we can’t see him. And Heaven can’t be real because we can’t see it. But we must recognize our blindness. The blind must take by faith that there are stars in the sky. If they depend on their ability to see, they will conclude there are no stars.

By God’s grace, may we stomp out the bewitching fires of naturalism so that we may clearly see the liberating truth about Christ the King and Heaven, his Kingdom.

human beings, whom God made to be both physical and spiritual, we are not designed to live in a non-physical realm—indeed,

We are physical beings as much as we are spiritual beings. That’s why our bodily resurrection is essential to endow us with eternal righteous humanity, setting us free from sin, the Curse, and death.

than ignore our imagination, I believe we should fuel it with Scripture, allowing it to step through the doors that Scripture opens.

the moment we say that we can’t imagine Heaven, we dump cold water on all that God has revealed to us about our eternal home. If we can’t envision it, we can’t look forward to it. If Heaven is unimaginable, why even try?

Jim's dream of Granny coming into Heaven and being greeted by Bumper. He asked her, "Where's Rupert?" She said, "He'll be here in a little bit." To which Bumper replied, "Well, I hope he won't throw hammers at me here in Heaven."

Today 9/1/20, I stumbled across this treasure written (see below) after the home-going of my Mother, Jim’s Granny. It touches me at the deepest level because she and my Dad are at home.

will understand that in order to get a picture of Heaven—which will one day be centered on the New Earth—you don’t need to look up at the clouds; you simply need to look around you and imagine what all this would be like without sin and death and suffering and corruption.

But imagine it—all of it—in its original condition. The happy dog with the wagging tail, not the snarling beast, beaten and starved. The flowers unwilted, the grass undying, the blue sky without pollution. People smiling and joyful, not angry, depressed, and empty. If you’re not in a particularly beautiful place, close your eyes and envision the most beautiful place you’ve ever been—complete with palm trees, raging rivers, jagged mountains, waterfalls, or snow drifts. Think of friends or family members who loved Jesus and are with him now. Picture them with you, walking together in this place. All of you have powerful bodies, stronger than those of an Olympic decathlete. You are laughing, playing, talking, and reminiscing. You reach up to a tree to pick an apple or orange. You take a bite. It’s so sweet that it’s startling. You’ve never tasted anything so good. Now you see someone coming toward you. It’s Jesus, with a big smile on his face. You fall to your knees in worship. He pulls you up and embraces you. At last, you’re with the person you were made for, in the place you were made to be. Everywhere you go there will be new people and places to enjoy, new things to discover. What’s that you smell? A feast. A party’s ahead. And you’re invited. There’s exploration and work to be done—and you can’t wait to get started.

“You didn’t complete the sentence. You also have to read verse ten.” Here’s how the complete sentence reads: “‘No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him’—but God has revealed it to us by his Spirit” (emphasis added). The context makes it clear that this revelation is God’s Word (v. 13), which tells us what God has prepared for us. After reading a few dozen books about Heaven, I came to instinctively cringe whenever I saw 1 Corinthians 2:9. It’s a wonderful verse; it’s just that it’s nearly always misused. It says precisely the opposite of what it’s cited to prove!

your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God” (Colossians 3:1). This is a direct command to set our hearts on Heaven. And to make sure we don’t miss the importance of a heaven-centered life, the next verse says, “Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.” God commands us to set our hearts and minds on Heaven.

command, and its restatement, implies there is nothing automatic about setting our minds on Heaven. In fact, most commands assume a resistance to obeying them, which sets up the necessity for the command. We are told to avoid sexual immorality because it is our tendency. We are not told to avoid jumping off buildings because normally we don’t battle such a temptation.

have you been doing daily to set your mind on things above, to seek Heaven? What should you do differently?

C. S. Lewis observed, “If you read history, you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were just those who thought most of the next.

Aim at Heaven and you will get earth ‘thrown in’: aim at earth and you will get neither.”

C. S. Lewis said, “While reason is the natural organ of truth, imagination is the organ of meaning.”

you’re a Christian suffering with great pains and losses, Jesus says, “Be of good cheer” (John 16:33, NKJV). The new house is nearly ready for you. Moving day is coming. The dark winter is about to be magically transformed into spring. One day soon you will be home—for the first time. Until then, I encourage you to meditate on the Bible’s truths about Heaven. May your imagination soar and your heart rejoice.

safest road to hell is the gradual one—the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts. C. S. Lewis

For every American who believes he’s going to Hell, there are 120 who believe they’re going to Heaven.

“There seems to be a kind of conspiracy,” writes novelist Dorothy Sayers, “to forget, or to conceal, where the doctrine of hell comes from. The doctrine of hell is not ‘mediaeval priestcraft’ for frightening people into giving money to the church: it is Christ’s deliberate judgment on sin. . . . We cannot repudiate Hell without altogether repudiating Christ.”

“There is no doctrine which I would more willingly remove from Christianity than this, if it lay in my power. But it has the full support of Scripture and, specially, of our Lord’s own words; it has always been held by Christendom; and it has the support

of reason.”

is an in-between world touched by both Heaven and Hell. Earth leads directly into Heaven or directly into Hell, affording a choice between the two. The best of life on Earth is a glimpse of Heaven; the worst of life is a glimpse of Hell. For Christians, this present life is the closest they will come to Hell. For unbelievers, it is the closest they will come to Heaven.

Pause, stranger, when you pass me by: As you are now, so once was I. As I am now, so you will be. So prepare for death and follow me. An unknown passerby scratched these additional words on the tombstone: To follow you I’m not content, Until I know which way you went.

doctrine is one reason the Christian life should not and cannot be lived in isolation.

C. S. Lewis, “All your life an unattainable ecstasy has hovered just beyond the grasp of your consciousness. The day is coming when you will wake to find, beyond all hope, that you have attained it, or else, that it was within your reach and you have lost it forever.”

This first judgment is not to be confused with the final judgment, or what is called the judgment of works. Both believers and unbelievers face a final judgment. The Bible indicates that all believers will stand before the judgment seat of Christ to give an account of their lives (Romans 14:10-12; 2 Corinthians 5:10). It’s critical to understand that this judgment is a judgment of works, not of faith (1 Corinthians 3:13-14). Our works do not affect our salvation, but they do affect our reward. Rewards are about our work for God, empowered by his Spirit. Rewards are conditional, dependent on our faithfulness (2 Timothy 2:12; Revelation

the present Heaven is a space/time universe.

The text is clear that Stephen and Gehazi saw things actual and physical. This supports the view that Heaven is a physical realm. Physical and spiritual are neither opposite nor contradictory. In fact, the apostle Paul refers to the resurrection body as a “spiritual body” (1 Corinthians 15:44). God is a spirit, and angels are spirit beings, but both can—and on the New Earth will—live in a physical environment.

If we are to draw inferences about the nature of Heaven, we shouldn’t derive them from the nature of God.

The question is whether finite humans can exist as God does—outside of space and time. I’m not certain we can. But I am certain that if we can, it is only as a temporary aberration that will be permanently corrected by our bodily resurrection in preparation for life on the New Earth.

, the Greek philosopher, believed that material things, including the human body and the earth, are evil, while immaterial things such as the soul and Heaven are good. This view is called Platonism. The Christian church, highly influenced by Platonism through the teachings of Philo (ca. 20 BC–AD 50) and Origen (AD 185–254), among others, came to embrace the “spiritual” view that human spirits are better off without bodies and that Heaven is a disembodied state. They rejected the notion of Heaven as a physical realm and spiritualized or entirely neglected the biblical teaching of resurrected people inhabiting a resurrected Earth.

book of Hebrews seems to say that we should see Earth as a derivative realm and Heaven as the source realm.

word paradise does not refer to wild nature but to nature under mankind’s dominion. The garden or park was not left to grow entirely on its own. People brought their creativity to bear on managing, cultivating, and presenting the garden or park. “The idea of a walled garden,” writes Oxford professor Alister McGrath, “enclosing a carefully cultivated area of exquisite plants and animals, was the most powerful symbol of paradise available to the human imagination, mingling the images of the beauty of nature with the orderliness of human construction. . . . The whole of human history is thus enfolded in the subtle interplay of sorrow over a lost paradise, and the hope of its final restoration.”

I offer here twenty-one brief observations concerning this passage: 1. When these people died on Earth, they relocated to Heaven (v. 9). 2. These people in Heaven were the same ones killed for Christ while on Earth (v. 9). This demonstrates direct continuity between our identity on Earth and our identity in Heaven. The martyrs’ personal history extends directly back to their lives on Earth. Those in the present Heaven are not different people; they are the same people relocated—“righteous men made perfect” (Hebrews 12:23). 3. People in Heaven will be remembered for their lives on Earth. These were known and identified as ones slain “because of . . . the testimony they had maintained” (v. 9). 4. “They called out” (v. 10) means they are able to express themselves audibly. This could suggest they exist in physical form, with vocal cords or other tangible means to express themselves. 5. People in the present Heaven can raise their voices (v. 10). This indicates that they are rational, communicative, and emotional—even passionate—beings, like people on Earth. 6. They called out in “a loud voice,” not “loud voices.” Individuals speaking with one voice indicate that Heaven is a place of unity and shared perspective. 7. The martyrs are fully conscious, rational, and aware of each other, God, and the situation on Earth. 8. They ask God to intervene on Earth and to act on their behalf: “How long . . . until you judge th...

10. People in the present Heaven know what’s happening on Earth (v. 10). The martyrs know enough to realize that those who killed them have not yet been judged. 11. Heaven dwellers have a deep concern for justice and retribution (v. 10). When we go to Heaven, we won’t adopt a passive disinterest in what happens on the earth. On the contrary, our concerns will be more passionate and our thirst for justice greater. Neither God nor we will be satisfied until his enemies are judged, our bodies raised, sin and Satan defeated, Earth restored, and Christ exalted over all. 12. The martyrs clearly remember their lives on Earth (v. 10). They even remember that they were murdered. 13. The martyrs in Heaven pray for judgment on their persecutors who are still at work hurting others. They are acting in solidarity with, and in effect interceding for, the suffering saints on Earth. This suggests that saints in Heaven are both seeing and praying for saints on Earth. 14. Those in Heaven see God’s attributes (“Sovereign . . . holy and true”) in a way that makes his judgment of sin more understandable. 15. Those in Heaven are distinct individuals: “Then each of them was given a white robe” (v. 11). There isn’t one merged identity that obliterates uniqueness, but a distinct “each of them.” 16. The martyrs’ wearing white robes suggests the possibility of actual physical forms, because disembodied spirits presumably don’t wear robes. The r...

18. God promises to fulfill the martyrs’ requests, but says they will have to “wait a little longer” (v. 11). Those in the present Heaven live in anticipation of the future fulfillment of God’s promises. Unlike the eternal Heaven—where there will be no more sin, Curse, or suffering on the New Earth (Revelation 21:4)—the present Heaven coexists with and watches over an Earth under sin, the Curse, and suffering. 19. There is time in the present Heaven (vv. 10-11). The white-robed martyrs ask God a time-dependent question: “How long, Sovereign Lord . . . until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?” (v. 10). They are aware of time’s passing and are eager for the coming day of the Lord’s judgment. God answers that they must “wait a little longer” until certain events transpire on Earth. Waiting requires the passing of time. 20. The people of God in Heaven have a strong familial connection with those on Earth, who are called their “fellow servants and brothers” (v. 11). We share the same Father, “from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named” (Ephesians 3:15, ESV). There is not a wall of separation within the bride of Christ. We ...

The positions of authority and the treasures we’re granted in Heaven will perpetually remind us of our life on Earth, because what we do on Earth will earn us those rewards (Matthew 6:19-21; 19:21; Luke 12:33; 19:17, 19; 1 Timothy 6:19; Revelation 2:26-28). God keeps a record in Heaven of what people do on Earth, both unbelievers and believers.