Ep 92: Heaven is a Place on Earth

How does the story of the Kingdom of Light wrap up? Do our “ideas” about Heaven match up with what the Bible teaches about the final consummation of the Kingdom? Will we spend eternity playing harps on clouds, or do the New Heaven and New Earth have more in common with our life right now than we assume?

Let’s explore our ideas of Heaven, and discuss when and how it’s coming to Earth.

TRANSCRIPTION

Heaven is a Place on Earth

We’re on the home stretch of Season 4 of the Soil & Roots journey, with just four episodes to go including this one.

Season 4 is all about the third of our Three Primary Problems – the Forgotten Kingdom.

The Kingdom of God is a primary theme of the Bible, yet if we were to line up 10 people who follow Jesus and ask them what the Kingdom is, when it is, and what our role is in it, we’d get a lot of different answers, and they wouldn’t agree. That’s a problem.

The Forgotten Kingdom is a major obstacle in our journey to become more like Jesus. He came to establish this kingdom of light and to rescue us into it from the kingdom of darkness.  If we don’t understand the kingdom of light, we won’t fully understand Jesus’ purposes. And if we don’t understand His purpose, we won’t fully understand our purpose.

Our ideas, our unconscious assumptions, about our purpose are powerful forces in our lives. That’s why Ideas of Purpose are one of the Six Core Ideas we touched on back in Season 1, along with our ideas of identity, anthropology, value, power, and love.

The End of the Story (sort of)

In Season 4, we’ve explored a few definitions of the kingdom, how our views of the End Times shape how we understand it, and mined some of the qualities of someone whose life is centered on the kingdom.

Today, we’re going to explore how the story of the kingdom wraps up, at least from this side of eternity.

We’re going to dig into three questions:

1. How does our idea of heaven relate to the final consummation of the Kingdom?
2. Where are we in that consummation process right now?
3. Why does it matter for our spiritual journey today?

For many people who follow Jesus, the end of our earthly story is our deaths and our entrance into “heaven.”  To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.  We expect that, when we die, our spirits will be ushered into a realm filled with happiness and joy, streets paved with gold, and an eternity of bliss, while our physical bodies slowly or quickly turn back into dust.  The earth, creation, culture, and nations become irrelevant.

To many, heaven is a purely spiritual realm, divorced from the earth. They live in the idea that the earth and our bodies are irredeemably bad and play no part in the afterlife.  Decades of Hollywood movies and shows, the media, bad theology, and modern notions about heaven have many convinced that there will be no physical world and no physical bodies in the afterlife, and that our final destination has little or no relevance to our lives here.  We will do nothing but sing praises and play our harps all day from our personal clouds.

Theologian Michael Vlach describes his early views of heaven this way:

Around age 11, I was in the kitchen and asked Mom what she thought heaven would be like. She said, “Heaven is where we will live in God’s light forever and have great joy that is indescribable.” What I picked up as a boy then was that Heaven would be a spiritual experience. Nothing of earth or anything tangible would be there.  Activities like eating, playing, and working would be long gone.  We would only think about spiritual things.  Time would not exist. Heaven would be an out-of-the-world experience far removed from anything we encounter now.  This was not something I longed for, but I figured I would be okay with it when that day arrived.[1]

Some believe we won’t even have personal relationships with each other anymore.  We will be completely and solely transfixed on God.

So, in short, many people believe that heaven is a completely separate reality from the earth, the physical world and our bodies will be no longer, and all of eternity will be spent in one long worship service.

But is that accurate?  Those may be our ideas about the consummation of the Kingdom, but are they God’s ideas?

New Heaven and New Earth

The good news is that the Biblical reality about where we’ll spend eternity is starting to come back in fashion after disappearing for decades in the West, and it’s popping up from people who normally disagree on things related to the end of this age.

The popular concept of Heaven as being a purely spiritual experience may be accurate, but it’s only part of the story. When an apprentice of Jesus dies, she is certainly in the presence of the Lord in a place called “Heaven,” but the next stage of the story is not this temporary state but the resurrection, redemption, and restoration of the universe.  Remember, Jesus’ Kingdom is all about words starting with the prefix “re.”

Our final destination is not in a disembodied, spiritual state. It’s as resurrected embodied souls in what’s called the New Heaven and the New Earth. It’s what N.T. Wright refers to as the “life after life after death.”

Anthony Hoekema writes: “God will make the new earth his dwelling place…Heaven and earth will then no longer be separated as they are now, but they will be one.  But to leave the new earth out of consideration when we think of the final state of believers is greatly to impoverish biblical teaching about the life to come.”[2]

Randy Alcorn wrote a comprehensive book on this subject, Heaven, and included a chapter titled “This World is Not Our Home…Or Is It?”

He notes:

Many books on Heaven say nothing about the New Earth…Other books address the New Earth but undercut its true nature: ‘Is this new earth like our present earth? Probably not.’ But if it isn’t, why does God call it a New Earth?… Many religions, including Buddhism and Hinduism, characterize the afterlife as vague and intangible.  Christianity specifically refutes this notion.  Biblical Christianity doesn’t give up on humanity or the earth…

We are homesick for Eden. We’re nostalgic for what is implanted in our hearts.  We long for what the first man and woman once enjoyed – a perfect and beautiful Earth with free and untainted relationships with God, each other, animals, and our environment.  Every attempt at human progress has been an attempt to overcome what was lost in the Fall.[3]

The Bible doesn’t give us much information about the temporary state we normally refer to as Heaven: the period between when we die in Christ and when Christ finally consummates the Kingdom, restoring the entire universe to a sinless state. But there is a fair amount of information on the final New Heaven and New Earth.

Michael Vlach lists 16 elements of the New Heaven and New Earth from the Bible that drive home the point that we will spend eternity not on some other planet, not in some invisible state, but right here – on this terra firma with God and the entire community of believers past, present, and future.

According to him, here are a few things we can expect:

1. We’ll have bodies. Why else would Jesus have been resurrected and the Bible talk so much about our eventual bodily resurrection?
2. The earth – this earth – will be renewed and restored.
3. Nations and ethnicities will be preserved and continue. Randy Alcorn wonders if this includes cultures from times past. Will there be a Roman empire in the New Heavens and the New Earth? A redeemed Incan nation?
4. Governments, societies, and culture, including music, art, and literature, will persist.
5. We’ll experience food, drink, and celebration.
6. The New Heaven and New Earth will feature houses, farms, economy, and work.
7. We’ll experience creation, nature, and yes, time.
8. We’ll enjoy wonderful relationships and friendships.
9. We will continue to enjoy animals, birds, and fish.[4]

In other words, our eternal life in Christ follows on a continuum of our lives now.  The Biblical story is Garden to Garden, Eden to Eden. God doesn’t give up on us, and He doesn’t give up on His creation.

Listen carefully to what Howard Snyder writes because he’s referencing our ideas about heaven:

Many of us have unconsciously accepted a worldview that inverts the direction of salvation.  We think salvation means going up to heaven rather than heaven coming down to earth, as the Bible teaches. We have been taught that Jesus ascended to heaven so that our spirits could join there eternally! – rather than what the Bible says: Jesus will come to earth to redeem all creation, including our own physical bodies. To a surprising degree, contemporary Christians are modern-day Gnostics.[5]

A gnostic is someone who devalues the physical in favor of the spiritual.  Christians do it all the time. The earth is bad, culture is bad, the body is bad, society is bad, everything’s bad.  The ancient philosopher Plato held a similar view, and his perspective continues to seep into modern Christianity.  But he was wrong.

So, what’s the relationship between heaven and the Kingdom of God?

What we typically think of as “heaven” today is a stop on the way toward the redemption of the entire cosmos.  The New Heaven and the New Earth, the final consummation of the Kingdom Jesus incepted when He stepped onto the planet, is where you and I will work, play, create, explore, worship, discover, learn, grow, and spend eternity in wonder, amazement, love, and joy.

Why Can’t We All Just Get Along?

I mentioned at the beginning that this view of the New Heaven and New Earth is starting to come back into favor, and that’s a good thing.  There is so much confusion around the Forgotten Kingdom; it’s encouraging to see many different scholars agree on what the final consummated Kingdom looks like, at least as best as we can understand it.

It does beg the question, though: is this cosmic restoration happening right now?  Are we in the middle of the restoration of all things, or is there some other story to tell?

We may want to give a collective groan at this point. As many Christian leaders now agree on the continuity of God’s plan – that He will dwell with His people on this Earth – that heaven and earth will be rejoined in the end – there is tremendous disagreement over whether heaven is coming to Earth right now and how that might be happening.

To explore this question (Where are we in this cosmic restoration?), we need to briefly revisit our mini-series on the End Times in Episodes 66-71.

You may recall that modern Christians can be separated into two very broad categories when it comes to our views of the End Times: Splitters and Joiners. The terms were coined by theologian Michael Heiser.

Let’s remind ourselves of what these terms mean.

There are four prevailing views of the End Times at present, each with a long name: premillennialism, dispensationalism, amillennialism, and postmillennialism.

In general, premils and dispensationalists are Splitters.  Amils and postmils are Joiners. That’s not universally accurate, but we’re painting in broad strokes here.  I broke this down for you in Episode 68.

A Splitter examines the meta-narrative of the Bible and believes the story splits into two groups in the New Testament: the people of Israel and the Church.

Splitters identify certain promises God made to the people of Israel in the Old Testament as being unconditional and unfulfilled.   Because God is faithful, they must be fulfilled as they were presented in the Old Testament at some point in our future.  This conclusion impacts how they interpret various prophecies in the Bible and leads to beliefs of a future Rapture (a secret rescue of the church), a worldwide era of unprecedented destruction and death called the Tribulation, a literal 1,000-year millennial kingdom, and an important role in the future for modern-day Israel.

To a Splitter, there is still quite a bit of prophecy from the Bible that has yet to happen.

Splitters interpret the Bible differently from Joiners. They have some fundamental disagreements on the nature of the Bible and how it should be read.

Splitters see the Old and New Testaments on equal footing and reject the notion that the New Testament may redefine, reinterpret, transform, or “spiritualize” passages and ideas from the Old Testament.  As one Splitter notes, “[This method] believes in great continuity between the testaments. Old Testament revelation is the foundation for the New Testament. The New Testament builds upon the Old. It does not replace the Old or transform it.”[6]

As you might expect, Joiners don’t agree with that conclusion.  One Joiner wrote, “[The Splitter method of interpreting the Bible] goes against the dominant method of interpreting Scripture in church history. More importantly, it goes against the way the apostles appealed to Old Testament passages as being fulfilled in the present era in Christ. In fact, Jesus taught his followers to read the Old Testament with himself at the center (Lk 24:25-27) …[7]

In other words, Joiners accept and embrace the idea that the New Testament does transform, amplify, and reinterpret Old Testament ideas in the person of Jesus, and believe it’s fairly self-evident when it does that.

This contributes to how Joiners read the meta-narrative of the Bible – the story merges the people of Israel and the church in the New Testament. It’s the story of one people and one plan.

Joiners find very little Scripture that has yet to be prophetically fulfilled.  Most prophecies in the Bible ended with the destruction of Jerusalem and the Second Jewish Temple in AD 70. A Joiner doesn’t hold to a Rapture or a literal 1,000-year kingdom reign of Jesus here on the earth.

What does all of that have to do with the consummation of the Kingdom?  Splitters and Joiners don’t agree on how the Kingdom is coming to earth right now, which impacts our discipleship.

Some disagree with me, but I’ll continue to maintain that our End Times views have an enormous impact on our ideas of identity and purpose – who are we and why are we here?  And that has a tremendous impact on how we operate in the world and on our spiritual formation.

Splitters and Joiners and the Consummation of the Kingdom

Let me give you an example.

I’ve quoted Michael Vlach today.  He teaches and promotes the New Heaven and the New Earth. He maintains that the final stage of the Kingdom of God is the restoration of all things – and that includes the earth.

He talks about this New Creation on three levels:

1. The new situation for a person in Jesus.
2. The new situation for the community in Jesus.
3. The new situation for the created order because of Jesus.

“Jesus eventually brings a new situation to all three realms.  The first two have particular relevance for the present as a result of Jesus’ first coming. Fulfillment with the third – the created order – awaits Jesus’ second coming and kingdom, although care and concern should occur now as well.”[8]

Vlach is a Splitter; he’s a Dispensationalist.  He agrees that all things will be renewed and restored, but he splits that restoration into two time frames.  Jesus’ first coming impacts the individual and the community (or the church), but only His second coming impacts creation.

As we discussed in the End Times series, Splitters maintain that the Great Commission (to make disciples) will be somewhat successful, but the Cultural Commission in Genesis 1:28 (to rule and steward the earth) will be highly unsuccessful.  Most Splitters hold to the idea that culture is going to become increasingly evil and that both culture and creation are largely going to be destroyed in a coming tribulation.

Joiners generally don’t split the cosmic restoration of all things up into two timeframes.  They would question why Jesus’ life, death, resurrection, and ascension would create a new situation for individuals and communities, but have no impact on creation and culture.

Why should these be divorced?  Should we not expect a growing worldwide community of believers to spread the Gospel of the Kingdom in a way that brings restoration to all four of our relationships (with God, others, ourselves, and creation), since we are integrated beings living in an integrated world?

As one Joiner writes, “(our interpretation) sees the future as a canvas for God’s redemptive work, transforming not just individuals but whole families, cultures, and nations. This view does not naively ignore the presence of sin and misery in the world but instead acknowledges a substantial decrease in its power and influence by the Risen Lord Jesus. Through this global transformation, which will happen slowly over many generations, the world will experience a foretaste of heaven as more and more people come to know God, are filled with His Spirit, and begin living out Christ-like behaviors and attitudes on earth.”[9]

There is no small difference between well-meaning, earnest Christians.  And it has a tremendous impact on how we live our lives, our ideas of the Gospel, and how we operate in the world.

If we don’t expect creation and culture to be restored to some degree right now in Jesus’ kingdom, and if our expectation is that creation and culture will be destroyed before Christ’s second appearance, we have little incentive to engage with creation and culture.

However, if we believe Jesus’ first coming did and does have a cosmic impact right now (including creation and culture), we’re far more likely to be engaged in that type of work.

The implications of these two opposing views are really staggering. They lead to two different purposes.  I think it’s fair to take a look at modern culture and do a little digging to see where the church has intentionally been impactful and where it hasn’t…and why.

These competing ideas about the redemption of creation and culture right now are well worth wrestling through, though I wonder how often that happens.

The Kingdom and Spiritual Formation

Regardless, for many of us, this idea that Heaven will be coming to Earth is hard to get our arms around.  The suggestion that Heaven has already started coming to Earth may be too much to handle!

Our ideas of the afterlife have been so molded in the concept of a Heaven entirely divorced from Earth, of a spiritual-only existence that looks next to nothing like life right now, that we may find ourselves confused or even offended by the reality of the coming New Heaven and New Earth.  But that’s the story of the Bible.

So, was Belinda Carlisle right? Is Heaven a place on Earth?

It sure seems that God is continuing to press His agenda here – to be with His creation on the planet.

Let’s take a little walk-through of history.

The Garden of Eden has long been recognized by theologians as a type of temple.  A temple is where God dwells, where He makes His home with humans.  It’s where Heaven and Earth overlap. God walked and talked with Adam and Eve in Eden. Heaven and Earth joined together.

This garden/temple theme is carried forward in the next place God dwelt with His people – in the Tabernacle.

Justin Taylor writes: “The tabernacle, like the garden of Eden, is where God dwells, and various details of the tabernacle suggest it is a mini-Eden. These parallels include the east-facing entrance guarded by cherubim, the gold, the tree of life (lampstand), and the tree of knowledge (the law). Thus God’s dwelling in the tabernacle was a step toward the restoration of paradise, which is to be completed in the new heaven and earth (Revelation 21-22).”[10]

Then came the temple, a more permanent home for God on earth with His people.  Both the tabernacle and temple are places where Heaven and Earth meet – where they overlap.

God then took another extraordinary step forward in His quest to be with His people.  He came as one of us.  When John writes that Jesus came and “dwelt among us,” the word means He “tabernacled” among us.  Immanuel. God with us. God dwells on Earth with us. Heaven comes to Earth. Jesus is coming to be with His creation.  Heaven on Earth.

Then Paul makes the terrific claim in 2 Corinthians 6 that God didn’t stop with Jesus.  Because of His life, death, resurrection, and ascension, the third person of the Trinity now makes His home on Earth.  Where?  In us.

We are now God’s temples. There isn’t just one tabernacle, one temple, or God present as one man.  He is now present in untold numbers of people worldwide.

So, is Heaven a place on Earth?  Yes.  It’s you. It’s me.  And everyone is apprenticing with Jesus right now all around the world.

Whether it was the Garden of Eden, the tabernacle, the temple, Jesus Himself, or the indwelling of God in billions of human temples, Heaven does appear to be increasingly coming to Earth, if we define Heaven as the place where God dwells.

What does this mean for our discipleship, our spiritual formation?  Should we expect this massive invasion of Heaven on Earth to impact all four of our relationships – with God, others, ourselves, and creation and culture?

We don’t need to go far to explore the answer.  Just look at the life of Jesus.  Did His life impact all four relationships? Certainly, His life has impacted countless individuals, leading them to a reconciled relationship with God. He has redeemed untold numbers of marriages, friendships, families, communities, nations, and even our relationship with ourselves over the centuries.

Did Jesus and His ideas impact creation and culture?  Has His radically different way of living life in His Kingdom resulted in greater human flourishing, truth, love, and beauty at various times and places throughout history?  Did He have an impact on music, art, literature, science, politics, and education?

If so, we might prayerfully hope and expect our lives to do the same.

In the end, the very good news is that you and I and all who are temples of God will enjoy the New Heaven and New Earth – the final and permanent joining of God’s place and mankind’s place.

As C.S. Lewis noted in The Last Battle, that really isn’t the end of the story. We haven’t even scratched the surface.

“All their life in this world and all their adventures had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.”

[1] Vlach, Michael (2023). The New Creation Model: A Paradigm for Discovering God’s Restoration Purposes from Creation to New Creation (p. 6). Theological Studies Press.

[2] Alcorn, R. (2004). Heaven, (p. 77). Tyndale Momentum.

[3] Alcorn, R. (2004). Heaven, (p. 77). Tyndale Momentum.

[4] Vlach, Michael (2023). The New Creation Model: A Paradigm for Discovering God’s Restoration Purposes from Creation to New Creation (various from Chapters 6 and 7). Theological Studies Press.

[5] Vlach, Michael (2023). The New Creation Model: A Paradigm for Discovering God’s Restoration Purposes from Creation to New Creation (p. 145). Theological Studies Press.

[6] Vlach, M., (2023) Dispensational Hermeneutics (pp. 98-99). Theological Studies Press.

[7] Parker B. & Lucas R., (2022) Covenant and Dispensational Theologies (p. 183). Intervarsity Press.

[8] Vlach, Michael (2023). The New Creation Model: A Paradigm for Discovering God’s Restoration Purposes from Creation to New Creation (p. 14). Theological Studies Press.

[9] https://postmillennialworldview.com/2024/04/26/genesis-proves-postmillennialism/#more-19542

[10] https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/justin-taylor/what-does-the-tabernacle-symbolize/