What Is the Reward for Good People?

Actually, you might not be used to this. I'm used to doing this all the time in Pressensburg in Athens, where we do announcements and a sermon... and the siren. No, not used to that part. But I'm curious, I'm guessing most everybody's going to answer in the affirmative to this. How many of you have heard at least one joke that includes a person going to heaven? It's pretty common, right? Most of them have a person or a group of people appearing at the so-called pearly gates, and then they have to confront Peter, because we all know he has the keys, and sometimes it might be God himself. And then the joke goes from there to either explain how they got there or their accommodations there, and there's some irony that makes it rather funny. And I thought with that kind of introduction, I should have some samples. So I do have some. The first one is one I've heard before, but it's interesting because of the way they describe what people think heaven might be. This one compares heaven with hell. It says, heaven is where the police are British, the chefs are Italian, the mechanics are German, the lovers are French, and it's all organized by the Swiss. That sounds good, but the contrast is in hell, the police are German, the chefs are British, the mechanics are French, the lovers are Swiss, and it's all organized by the Italians. I'm curious, has anybody not heard that one before? It still seems own. Okay, it's quite a few. Well, here's a couple new ones I hadn't come up before, but once again, focus on the description of what heaven's like. This one starts with a cat. The cat dies and goes to heaven, and God meets him at the pearly gates. He says, you've been a good cat all these years. Anything you desire is yours. All you have to do is ask. The cat says, well, I lived all my life with this poor family on a farm, and I had to sleep on hardwood floors. God says, say no more, and instantly a fluffy pillow appears. A few days later, a similar thing happens with six mice. They're involved in a tragic accident. They go to heaven, and God meets them at the gates, and he makes them the same offer. Anything you want is yours. The mice say, all our life we've had to run. Cats have chased us, dogs have chased us, women with brooms have chased us. If only we could have a pair of roller skates so we wouldn't have to run anymore. Say no more. They have the beautiful pair of tiny roller skates for each mouse. Move forward about a week later, you know, God is conscientious. He wants to check up, so he comes back to see how the cat's doing. Cats sound asleep on its comfy pillow, and he gently wakes the cat up and says, how are you doing? Are you happy here? The cat yawns and stretches and says, oh, I've never been happier in my life! And those Meals on Wheels you've been sending over are terrific!

Okay, one more. And as I said, these have a point. We're going to focus on this description of what heaven is like. There's an 85-year-old couple who had been married nearly 60 years, and they're involved in a tragic car crash. Now, they had both been in good health, especially the last 10 years. The wife has focused on exercise and eating health food. You know, the health food that doesn't necessarily taste so good, but they're in pretty good health for those last 10 years, and they end up both going to the pearly gates together because they ended their lives in a car crash.

They reach the pearly gates. St. Peter takes them to their mansion, and it's decked out with this beautiful kitchen, a master bath suite with a jacuzzi. They're going, ooh, and ha! It's kind of like something on Home and Garden Channel. And the old man leans aside to Peter, how much is all this going to cost? It's free, Peter says. This is heaven! Next, they go out back to see the championship golf course that the home backs up to.

They'll have golfing privileges every day, and each week the course changes to a new one representing the great golf courses from around the world. The old man says, well, yes, but what are the green fees? Peter's reply? This is heaven! You pay, you play for free! Then he takes them into the clubhouse, and they see this lavish buffet dinner with cuisines of the world laid out. How much does it cost to eat? Ask the old man. Don't you understand yet, Peter says? This is heaven! It's all free! Well, and then he says, Tim and Lee, well, you'll have to show us the low-fat and low-cholesterol foods.

Peter says, this is the best part. You can eat as much as you like of whatever you like. You'll never get fat. You'll never get sick. This is heaven! The old man now turns to his wife and says, you and your bran muffins! I could have been here ten years ago! Now, in general, despite your religious beliefs, we don't generally get upset at jokes like this.

Because they're just jokes, as I said, we tend to imagine, or I shouldn't say we, we know we're not going to heaven, but people tend to imagine this idea of heaven, or whatever the reward for good people after they die is, in light of what type of experience you would like to have now. And that doesn't seem unreasonable. You'd think you'd want to have something good, and we imagine what we'd understand. Many of you, long ago, when you first came into God's Church, one of the first thing you did was study and come to an understanding that we don't have an immortal soul and that heaven or hell isn't something that's in store for us as soon as we die.

But I want to think about these different ideas of heaven, or paradise, that different religions and cultures have devised over the years. And then think about what are we looking forward to? What really is the reward of God's people? Now, you might think that this message is going to overlap quite a bit with ones that you just heard a couple days ago, and yes, it probably will, but hopefully will complement. I wasn't intending this, like I said, for the last great day, but it does sort of fit.

And I'll be honest, this grew out of an article that I was working on for the Vertical Thought website, and I said, boy, there's a sermon in this, too. But before I discuss some of these different ideas that exist about heaven, maybe we should review what does the Bible tell us about heaven?

What do we know? The answer might be surprising. Let's start in 2 Corinthians 12. 2 Corinthians 12 will read the first several verses. Now, in this section, the Apostle Paul takes a break from discussing doctrinal matters and correcting the Church to focus on, you know, basically justifying who he is and what he's been doing, or explaining that he doesn't want to do that.

2 Corinthians 12, he says, it's doubtless not profitable for me to boast. I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord. Now, I know a man in Christ who, 14 years ago, whether in the body I don't know or whether out of the body I don't know, God knows, such a one was caught up to the third heaven. So, this is somebody that knows something about what heaven's like. And I know such a man, whether in the body or out of the body, I do not know, God knows, he was caught up into paradise and heard inexpressible words, which it's not lawful for a man to utter.

Of such a one I'll boast, yet of myself I will not boast, except in my infirmities. So, this man, whoever he is, seems to have had a vision of heaven, but we don't really get much of a description.

What's interesting is later in this chapter, Paul sort of admits that he felt compelled to boast a little. And because of that, and because there's no record of someone else that this might have happened to, most scholars think that Paul probably was speaking about himself, that God gave Paul a vision of heaven, and he called it paradise. Things were inexpressible, but he didn't tell us what it looked like, or didn't tell us what was there.

However, some years later, another apostle also had a vision of heaven, and he did write a description. Let's turn to Revelation chapter 4, and we'll read what the Apostle John wrote. I found this interesting. Remember, John, we believe, was probably around 90 years old, and we'll see that he's having a vision. But John, by this time, had been with Jesus Christ, had seen a lot, experienced a lot. He probably couldn't be very easily impressed, but I think in this he was impressed.

Revelation 4, verse 1, John writes, After these things I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven. And the first voice which I heard was like a trumpet speaking to me, saying, Come up here, I'll show you things which must take place after this.

Immediately I was in the spirit. Now this means he was having a vision. We know he stayed there on the Isle of Patmos, but he was having a vision seeing things. So I was in the spirit, and behold, a throne set in heaven. One sat on the throne, and he who sat there was like Jasper and Sartiet and the Sartiest stone in appearance. And there was a rainbow around the throne, in appearance like an emerald. Around the throne were 24 thrones. And on the thrones I saw 24 elders sitting, clothed in white robes, and they had crowns of gold on their heads.

From the throne proceeded lightnings and thunders and voices, seven lamps of fire burning before the throne, which are the seven spirits of God. And here I wonder, was it seven actual lamps made of fire that were spirit, or just John coming up with the best words he could come up with to describe this fantastic sight he was seeing. And before the throne there was a sea of glass like crystal.

And in the midst of the throne and around the throne were four living creatures full of eyes, in front and back. The first living creature was like a lion. The second, like a calf. The third, had a face of a man. And the fourth was like a flying eagle. The four living creatures, each having six wings, were full of eyes, around and within. They don't rest day or night, saying, Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord, God Almighty, who was and is and is to come. Whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to Him who sits on the throne and who lives forever, the 24 elders fall down before Him, and they cast their crowns before the throne, saying, You are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power, for You created all things, and by Your will they exist and were created.

Now, my Bible's margin has a label that calls this the throne room in heaven. Well, that's interesting. Well, it seems to describe thrones. Is this a room? I'm not sure if it says that, and it strikes me. Do we know how much more there is of heaven? There is this depiction of these thrones. We've heard of throne rooms.

Are there other sections of heaven? How much more of it is there? And I say, well, this is one of those things I suppose is on a need-to-know basis. If we needed to know, the Bible would tell us. There are ways to gather a little bit more about heaven.

We know that the Holy of Holies, that was first in the tabernacle and later in the temple, was modeled after God's throne in heaven. So we can pick up hints here and there of what heaven might be like, and we can make presumptions about what it's not like. We don't read anywhere of buffets or golf courses. And really, descriptions of heaven don't even include streets of gold or pearly gates.

Those are included in a description of the New Jerusalem that comes down from heaven. Now, you could say, well, if it comes down from heaven, maybe it's up there now. So maybe there are streets of gold and pearly gates, or maybe the New Jerusalem doesn't even exist yet. And, you know, that's one of those things you can debate about.

Certainly, there's no description of mice wearing roller skates, you know, providing good meals for cats on fluffy pillows. And we know that, you know, in general, theologians and people reading the Bible have taken a few scriptures, because there are only a few, and misinterpreted them to come up with an image of what they think good people will see or get when they go to heaven. But imagine if people died and went to heaven, what would they see when they got there? Would they find what we just read in Revelation 4? Because if so, I think that sounds a little bit intense, doesn't it?

Thunder and lightning and lamps of fire and these weird creatures with eyes all over shouting and praising God, which is good. But I think, boy, it's kind of unsettling. I mean, would it be like living in the middle of a rock concert all the time with, you know, pyrotechnics and loud noise? I'm not sure how long I'd want to stay in a place like that.

So I thought maybe that's why when people come up with their ideas of heaven, they turn to their own hopes and dreams to fill in the gaps of what they think it might be like. And that makes sense. And thinking along those lines made me think of, I've seen scenes in some movies and TV shows, and to be honest, I've seen it enough times that I'm envisioning just a generic scene in a movie, and it's usually sort of a quiet scene with some of the main characters, and they're getting to know each other and open up, and they reveal what they think will happen after they die.

What will heaven be like? And it might be, there might be a factory worker, and he might say, I'm sure that in heaven there will be no time clocks, and nobody will have to do boring, tedious labor. Or there might be, you know, a little child from a poor family, and he says, oh, I've heard that in heaven there's the best amusement park with the greatest rides, and you can get in for free. There are never any long lines.

Or perhaps a man who's struggling to watch his wait will say, there's the greatest buffet ever in heaven, and all the food is no calorie but tastes great. You know, does that make sense? Have you seen scenes perhaps like that? Writers like to use these scenes not because they describe heaven. It's all from their imagination. But what this does is it allows them to tell something about the character.

What are their deepest hopes? What are the things they want the most? What do they feel deprived of? Well, think of it this way. There are a lot of different teachings in religions and ancient cultures about what heaven would be like. And I think they tell us something about the people that believe them. They don't tell us about reality. The most reality we have are the scriptures we just read.

Let's think about what they do tell us, though. One is the fact that almost every religion and every culture believes that life automatically continues after a person dies. That tells us something. Man does not accept his own mortality. We don't want to accept that. Even though, what does the Bible tell us? In Ezekiel 18.4 it says, The soul that sins shall die. I memorized that scripture when I was 10 or 11 years old. Romans 6.23 says that eternal life is the gift from God. And we see that that's yet to be received. Most of mankind has always assumed that God already has given people that gift. They believe the lie that Satan told Eve. You shall not surely die. When God said, you eat of that fruit, you're going to die. This belief that man will somehow continue living forever, regardless of what he does, echoes back as far as ancient civilizations have been documented. We know in ancient Egypt they believed it. The Greeks took the idea and elaborated and developed the idea that a spirit essence somehow joined to a physical body and then when the body dies, the two separate. And that idea is passed to most western religions. But a lot of primitive religions have similar views. As a matter of fact, they're so similar, it occurred to me, to be honest, if you're looking for something interesting to study, if you study their depictions of punishment for bad people, those seem much more imaginative and descriptive. I'm not going to go into that today. I want to focus on this reward of good people. I did some research and I've got a paragraph each for several different civilizations that I'd like to review. Starting with ancient Egypt. All ancient Egyptians believed in the afterlife and spent their lives preparing for it. Pharaohs built the finest tombs, collected elaborate funerary equipment. That's harder to say than to spell. And they were mummified in the most expensive way. Others were able to provide for their afterlives according to their earthly means, meaning not everybody was a pharaoh and had gold and silver in their tomb. But regardless of their wealth, however, they all expected the afterlife to be an idealized version of their earthly existence.

Let me say that again. They all expected the afterlife to be an idealized version of their earthly existence. Or the way I would say it is they expected more of the same, only maybe a little better. More of the same but better.

The ancient Greeks. The Greeks feared death, believing that journey after death was to a land known as Hades. This underworld offered punishment for the bad and pleasure for the good. The Elysian Fields, a sunny and green paradise, was home to those who had led a good life. Which is interesting. In those Elysian Fields, the wealthy would move into nice mansions. The peasants would go out and work those fields and continue doing what they had done in life.

How about Polynesia, the South Pacific? Pacific Islanders saw death as a journey and included crossing a river. A key hope and expectation was that of reunion with family and friends who had gone before. The path to the other side featured monstrous creatures, dangerous cliffs and fear. But, once there, life would be familiar and comfortable.

The ancient Vikings, I love theirs and I didn't write it down. I've just read it enough times. Of course, they believed for warriors, especially if they died in battle, they would go to a great hall known as Valhalla. Where they would spend their time with Odin and Thor and they would continually go to battles.

And then come back and enjoy victory feasts, continuing to do what they tried to do in life. American Indians and some Native American religions, spirits would have to walk balance beams to get to the afterlife. And they needed the aid of holy people's prayers to make it to the better part of the afterworld. But those who made it were rewarded with the happy hunting grounds. And I ponder, what is it that makes hunting grounds so happy? My thought is the deer are probably fat and slow. And maybe with bad noses. What seems to be the common element in these beliefs is that for the top level of society at least, heaven amounts to more of the same of what they experienced in life.

And maybe even better. But too bad for the lower levels of society because they also would get more of the same. And hopefully a little better. And in some ways that makes sense if you like what you're doing in life, if you like your station, it makes sense you'd want it to just keep on going. Now most of us are familiar with modern day, you know, the various Christian religion's beliefs of the reward of the saved in heaven.

So I'm not going to go into going to heaven and sitting on clouds and playing harps. There are a lot of variations, especially between Protestant and Catholic. What's interesting is Muslims share a similar belief. They believe that in the afterlife a good person enjoys worldly delights. And I've read and I'm still not sure how much it's people that aren't Muslim making fun of the belief that, you know, for men who are good Muslims they get 70 virgins when they...

because I thought, well, what's the reward for the virgins? And I'm not sure about that. Now one of my thoughts when I look at Christianity, and I'm going to speculate here, I'll call it speculation, it's based on my understanding of history, but I haven't done solid research. But I suspect that over the centuries the view of what heaven would be has changed as working conditions have changed. In other words, the idea, you know, centuries ago, the idea of going to heaven and just lolling around on clouds doing nothing sounded pretty good to peasants who did backbreaking labor all of their life.

And even later to factory workers and mill workers who did tall... or dull backbreaking hard labor, they loved the idea of heaven being a lot of doing nothing. And I thought, well, I wonder if it's in more recent times when working hours got shorter, working conditions got better, that this idea of heaven started changing from laying around doing nothing to instead golf courses and tennis courts and maybe video games, who knows.

But even so, it still reflects people's hopes and wishes. As I said, just like the movies, they tell us more about the people who believe them than about what the Bible tells us is truth. Now, I am going to turn to see what the Bible does tell us, but before that I want to consider one other view of the reward for good people that's radically different from anything else we've looked at.

And to lead into that, I'll mention that this alternative view can be seen somewhat depicted in some movies or in various books. And that's the idea that a person has success in his quest for immortality.

Somebody finds a way to finally become immortal, and then they discover that it's a curse, and they're wishing they could get out of it. The example that came to mind when I thought of this is in the third Indiana Jones movie. I'm an Indiana Jones fan. If you remember, the third one is the one with Sean Connery, which is one of the reasons it's so memorable, and they're looking for the Holy Grail. Well, towards the end of the movie, Indiana comes in and he finds a cave with all these different cups, one of which is the Holy Grail, guarded by one of the Knights Templar, who's gained immortality, and his job is to stay there and guard the Holy Grail.

And when Indiana Jones, well, I think the bad guy chooses poorly, you know, and he drinks and he dies, and the knight says, he chose poorly. Indiana Jones picks the right cup, and you've chosen wisely, and of course the cave starts to fall apart, but the impression is that the knight will be finally released and finally have peace. And I thought, well, yeah, you know, immortality would seem a curse if you had to sit in a cave by yourself forever looking at all these cups.

You know, who would want to do that? Then again, you can start thinking, well, even things that sound good right now, if you had to do them forever, would they start to lose some of that? You know, for instance, I like eating pizza. Now, most of us, that's one thing because almost everybody likes pizza. But if you had to eat pizza for every meal for a week, how much would you like pizza? How about every meal for a year? Then think of eternity. Pretty soon you start to hate pizza.

And I'm thinking of that because when I was a teenager, there were times, understanding God's truth and our hope of eternal life, where I started to think, you know, what if I get bored? You know, living forever can start to seem a little bit scary, if you think, in those terms. Now, teenagers can get bored easily. But, you know, that crossed my mind. Now, I got past that.

It's not something that worries me anymore, and I'll talk a little bit about how and why later. But I want to use that as a basis to introduce the idea that there's a large portion of the Earth's population that has a similar view, and a similar view that fits with that of what their reward and the saved are.

Here, I'm talking about Hindus and Buddhists. Hindus and Buddhists believe in reincarnation. I think most of us are familiar with that. In other words, when you die, your soul or whatever is born again in a new life. And it doesn't really have memories, but they say people might have some inclination of what happened in a prior life. It's funny, that slipped into our culture.

If somebody's mean to us for no good reason, we might say, did I wrong you in a prior life? It's a common phrase. They believe that what happens is when a person is reincarnated, they'll either move up or down in status and social position, depending on whether they were good or bad. So if you're not so good, you might be born in a poorer part of the world.

Or you might be born as an animal, or even a bug. You're really bad, you come back as a mosquito and you get swatted. Or if you're very good, you're born again into a richer family. Or you have better talents, you're better looking, you might become a wealthy businessman or a famous movie star. And the idea is eventually, I'll say, if you're a jerk and just out for yourself, you move down. If you become more morally pure and selfless, you move up. And the ultimate goal is nirvana. What they call nirvana is basically when you lose all self-concern, you're very morally pure upon death, your consciousness merges with the universe.

You lose individual identity and individual consciousness. Which to me sounds like nothingness. You cease to exist. And of course, they believe in the cycle of life over and over again, the soul might be moving up on the scale, then you might get a little bad and start moving down the scale. If you go on a long, long time, and that's why they're saying, oh, you want to finally be released, it reminds me of the movie Groundhog Day.

I don't know if very many of you... That's one of my favorite movies because it's so clever. And that movie, Bill Murray, has to live the same day over and over again.

And he goes through being a jerk, he goes through being smart, and finally he starts putting his life to good use and serving others and learning to play piano and such. And at the end, he's finally released, but he doesn't merge into nothingness. He gets to go to the next day. But my understanding of Hindu belief is that life is so tedious and boring, they just want to be released from the cycle. So this idea of nirvana, to merge with the universe, to lose consciousness, I said it's nothingness, ceasing to exist.

And I stop and look at the choices and say, Well, wait a minute. Is that it? Are we out of choices? You're telling me, you know, one choice is to go to heaven and do a lot of nothing.

Or perhaps to go to some next life where you have more of the same. Or to merge with the universe and become nothing. I'm not thrilled with any of those choices all that much. And that's my point. We don't have to be. God's truth says more, and now it includes some aspects of many of those. And it surprised me when I got to the end and put this together. It's like, well, there's some aspect of truth in almost all of them, but none of them is quite right, and the truth is so much better.

So let's discuss a little bit about what the Bible does teach. What does happen to good people? Now, we've reviewed, and I'm not going to turn to Scriptures to remind us, that eternal life is a gift from God.

We don't have it automatically. He can give it to us. He wants to give it to us. So let's turn to Hebrews 9 and verse 27 to review some of the basic facts. The understanding that we know that man is mortal and can die and will die, and of course this will tell us that we'll die, but there's something else after that. Hebrews 9 and verse 27. It is appointed for men to die once, but after this, the judgment. Okay, everybody's going to die, but there's something that happens after.

So the idea that we can and will live again is valid, but not that we automatically have a mortal life. But this idea of a judgment fits with Revelation 20. If we'll turn there, Revelation 20, and we'll read verses 11 and 12. This might sound very familiar because I'd be surprised if most of us didn't read this just a couple of days ago. Revelation 20 and verse 11.

And by the way, I'm going to turn away from Revelation and come back to it, and this morning I started apologizing because, oh, I should have told you to keep your finger there.

So now I'm going to tell you, keep a marker or a finger if you want, or of course, Revelation's not hard to find since it's not the end. But Revelation 20, verse 11 says, Then I saw a great white throne, and him who sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away. And there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, standing before God, and the books were opened.

Now this fits with the idea of you die and you go suddenly to heaven and there's a judgment. You know, either the gates open and you're allowed to go in, or St. Peter pulls a lever, the trap door opens, you know, and zoom, you take the chute down to hell.

You can see where people might get that idea, but that's not quite what it says. So the dead, small and great, standing before God, and books were opened. And another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged according to their works by the things which were written in the books. Notice, they're not judged by what's written in the book of life, but the books, plural.

Now we believe that those books are these books that are in our hand, this collection of books that are bound together and called the Holy Bible, and that it's going to be open to people's understanding, which means they're going to be judged on works that happen after those books are open. You have to have a period of time to do those works. You're not judged by the works that you do before the books were opened to you. As we would say, God's not unfair. He doesn't judge us by criteria that we don't understand.

Although, well, this period of judgment, Sorrow is going to mention something about the pearly gates and such. Like I said, people get this idea from here, but there is no description of that. Let's go to Ezekiel 37. As I said, knowing we're going to come back to Revelation. But Ezekiel 37, this is commonly called the dry bones chapter. Ezekiel sees all these dead bones, and he's asked the question, well, can these bones live? And instead of giving an answer, he's supposed to say, well, you know. He says, yeah, they can live. Prophesy to them. And he sees the bones come together. He sees suddenly sinew and flesh come on them and skin cover them over. So then there's all these bodies, and he's told to prophesy to the wind, and the wind comes in, and they come alive again. Not as spirit or immortal beings, but as we see, obviously flesh and blood, and they stand up. And they're living again, a physical life. Now let's read starting in verse 13.

This is, um, said, not continuation of life as an immortal soul. Verse 13 says, you shall know that I am the Lord when I've opened your graves, O my people, and brought you up from your graves. And I'll put my spirit in you, and you'll live. I'll place you in your own land. Then you'll know that I, the Eternal, have spoken it and performed it, says the Lord, or the Eternal. Now, this wouldn't be necessary if souls were already in heaven or hell, would they? They wouldn't have to be put together as flesh and blood, and they wouldn't have to be given any period. It took time to get to know God. Now, we believe that this all happens after the millennium, which we just spent a week celebrating and reviewing that thousand-year reign of Christ on earth, and what it means, and what our part will be in it. But the Bible shows that after that, there's going to be a resurrection not to spirit life as those who know God now, but to physical life. Let's go to verse 24.

The nations also will know that I, the Eternal, sanctify Israel, when my sanctuary is in their midst forever. Now, people have looked at this over the years and sometimes had different opinions. Do these scriptures apply to the millennium itself or to the time after that when all people will be resurrected?

Well, as I said, I think it's after the millennium when people are resurrected to a physical life. But we want to remember, you might wonder, what are life's conditions going to be like after the millennium? For those people resurrected to physical life, is it going to be radically different than the thousand years before? I suspect not. I suspect that'll continue on and we'll have this world that's perfectly developed ready for people to move into it. We know that during the millennium, agriculture will be a much more predominant feature in the way people live, as it was in the past.

Micah 4, 4 tells us everyone will have his own vine and fig tree. Perhaps this signifies that every family, every person, will have land. I like during his sermon in Cincinnati, Mr. Swaggerty was talking about that and he said, he read that scripture and he said, well, that must be talking about the Sabbath because they're sitting there under their vine and fig tree.

He said, the other six days of the week, they'll get out from under there and go work that land to produce food. Amos 9, verse 13 says, the plowman will overtake the reaper. The mountains will drip with new wine. If we didn't know those were prophecies of the millennium, we might take them to be descriptions of heaven. We might think this is describing the conditions of heaven, but they're not about heaven.

They're about earth. All the prophecies that talk about Jesus Christ and his second coming show that he'll come to earth. He'll rule the earth and the saints will reign with him as children of God.

They'll reign for a thousand years, as it says back in Revelation 20, Revelation 20, verse 6. Blessed and holy is he who has part in the first resurrection. Over such, those in the first resurrection, the second death has no power. They'll be priests of God and of Christ and shall reign with him forever.

As I said, it's after that that we read of a resurrection for everyone else. But again, we could ask, well, what will life be like for them? Probably a lot like it was for physical people living into the millennium.

And what a happy life for them to come and finally have a world without Satan leading people astray. They'll be resurrected and suddenly, as I said, it's a world of peace, of abundance. No unemployment. Everybody can have a job doing something productive. They can understand why they exist.

They can know the true religion. It'll be a great world. And they can enjoy all the blessings of living that way. That might sound like some people's views of heaven. Some people would say, that's great, that's enough, let's stop there. But I don't think things are going to go on indefinitely that way. Now, I should qualify that.

The general condition of everyone living God's way, and everyone being subject to God's government, will continue forever. Remember, there are a couple places we saw in Ezekiel 37 where it did use the word forever. David is going to be a king forever. And people will obey God, live his way in his government forever. But we'll see a clue as to whether things will change, or there'll be something else back in Isaiah 65.

Isaiah 65 and verse 20. This is another verse we might have looked at very recently. This is much better than the last time I was up here speaking. Isaiah 65 and verse 20 says, No more shall an infant from there live but a few days. They're not going to meet children born and then die there in the hospital, nor an old man who has not fulfilled his days.

So no one's going to die before the right time. The child shall die a hundred years old. But the sinner, being one hundred years old, shall be accursed. They'll build houses and inhabit them. They'll plant vineyards and eat their fruit. It goes on to talk about the just conditions.

There is room for speculation on exactly what this means. Some people say, is this going to be for the mortals that live during the millennium? Will they have a hundred year span? Or is it talking about those people that are resurrected to a physical life after the millennium is over? And it might be both. As I said, there's speculation. It doesn't tell us for certain, but it does seem to indicate that people are given a certain amount of time, and then things are going to change. God does not intend for life to go on forever in the flesh, even in the ideal conditions described.

It seems that God intends to give all people a period of time to learn, to grow and develop and experience and accept his way of life. And that period, this indicates a hundred years. We could say maybe it's applying to something else, but we could see God's idea is that people will develop righteous character, become spirit-born sons of God, or, after perhaps a hundred years, if they still refuse that, then their life can end forever.

There's where I said the Hindu idea has some element of being correct. For someone that would be unhappy living God's way of life, they have the option to be released, to cease existing. And that's described in Revelation 20, verse 14, the idea that it's not going to continue in the flesh.

Let's see a couple of scriptures that will show us that. Back in Revelation 20... Now, review back in verse 13, matter of fact, I'll show this. The sea gave up the... Well, we see people being judged by their works and judged by what's written in the books in verse 12. Verse 13 talks about what we believe is another resurrection of the sea giving up the dead, death and Hades delivering the dead that were in it, and they were judged according to their works. So there's judgment that happens.

And then, in verse 14, death and Hades, or death in the grave, were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And anyone not found written in the book of life is cast into the lake of fire.

So we know the option of death is available. But it also seems that at some point that option will cease being available. At some point, that won't be an option anymore. I get that idea from 1 Corinthians 15. Let's turn there. And other places, but I specifically want to go to 1 Corinthians 15, which is properly called the resurrection chapter. Let's begin in verse 24. Verse 24, Then comes the end, when he, that is Jesus Christ, delivers the kingdom to God the Father, when he puts an end to all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all enemies under his feet. And the last enemy that will be destroyed is death. The last enemy that will be destroyed is death. That seems to be saying that the option of dying is eventually going to be taken off the table. That's an enemy, but it's going to be destroyed. It'll be a time when no one can die anymore. We see that again in verse 54. So when this corruptible, that is this flesh and blood, has put on incorruption, when this mortal, being subject to being able to die, has put on immortality, meaning cannot die, then shall be brought to pass the saying that's written, Death is swallowed up in victory. This is saying at some point, maybe quite a ways into the future, but at some point there will be no more dying. That seems to come after those who were mortal and corruptible have become immortal and incorruptible. Now, we know that those choosing that option won't continue living forever being tortured in fire, as the idea of burning in hell pictures, because Malachi 4 tells us that the wicked will become ashes under the soles of our feet. So once again, it seems that God's plan calls for all human beings eventually to either accept his way of life, and it's the only way that brings happiness, or to be able to cease to exist. Those accepting God's ways, which they'll be able to do because God's Spirit will be in them. It's not going to happen from our own doing, but with God's Spirit and his power, it becomes possible to accept his way of life, to become like him, to learn to think as he thinks and do as he does. They'll become immortal, and then death will be destroyed. That's all well and good. It's still...part of my mind comes back to that question that I had earlier on. So what are we going to do then? What are we going to do with our time? There's going to be an unending amount of it. The Bible doesn't give us nearly as much specific information on that. Not nearly what it tells us about the earlier periods. We know some things that people won't do. There won't be any stealing, no lying, no cheating, nothing that's contrary to God's way. But I would say, well, do you suppose we would have to stop doing any things we enjoyed previously?

I don't know. I think one reason God doesn't give us that much detail on what we'll all do forever, long after the millennium, long after the great white throne...that can be hard to say up here very fast... long after those things are long past, one reason he doesn't tell us exactly what will happen is maybe he doesn't know. And I mean he doesn't know in the fact that he hasn't decided. He hasn't programmed and said, you're going to do this and this is your fate, that's what you'll do forever. He isn't deciding at all for us. By analogy, I thought, well, you know, I don't know what Connor's going to do with all of his life. Now, right now he's under Sue and I's control. We kind of make a lot of his decisions for him. You're going to eat now, you're going to go to bed here, you're going to wear these clothes. But as he matures, he's going to start taking more and more of a hand on those things. And when he becomes an adult, as we're helping to train and prepare him for, when he grows up, he'll have to make those choices. He'll choose what type of educational path to pursue. He'll choose a career. Now, if this world goes on long enough, he'll choose a mate, hopefully one that will respect Sue and I and will love. You know, he can choose his own hobbies, his own career and those things. So we're growing into sons of God. I imagine he'll want us to participate in deciding what we'll do for all that eternity. You know, because we'll be mature sons, he doesn't want to decide it for us now. He wants us to grow up and take a hand in that. Now, I can think of one particular example of how some things will stick with you. You know, when I was younger, I loved playing basketball. You know, I wasn't very good at it, but I loved playing, and I still like to play now and then. At summer camp this year, I got into a game where I played for about five minutes, and I played with the 13-year-olds, so I'd look like I was pretty good. I could keep up with them. I thought, you know, I might enjoy playing basketball into eternity every now and then. Maybe once every few hundred years, I'll get into a pickup game. Now, it's funny, somebody pointed out to me this morning, it's like, well, what's the point of that? If you're perfect, you can hit every shot. I thought, well, maybe we can manifest ourselves in the flesh and have some of the same limitations temporarily, and I'm speculating here. I wouldn't want a fate of having to only play basketball for all eternity. That would be like some depictions of hell, right? Something you like gets old after a while, but like I said, once every two or three hundred, every couple thousand years, get into a game with some of the guys and have fun.

Think of this. We just finished the feast, and we're already planning for next year, am I right? Some of you have ideas where you'd like to go. How many of you have planned out what you're going to have for dinner each evening of the feast next year? Of course not! Now, you might be thinking, well, I'm sure I want to get a good steak one of those nights. Or if you know the site you're going and you're familiar with the restaurant, you might be saying, yeah, we're going to make it a point to go to such and such a restaurant sometime during the week.

But you also leave some flexibility. You want to discover what's there, or you might want to leave the flexibility if you bump into a group and say, hey, we're going over here, you want to come join us? Well, sure I will.

Well, we might want to do that for eternity as well. Leave ourselves some flexibility to do different things. Will it get boring? Well, what will you want to do with all that?

I think there might be some clue in some of the advice that Solomon gave. If we'll turn to the book of Ecclesiastes. I want to go to Ecclesiastes 5 and verse 18.

Over the years I found I used to think of Ecclesiastes as just Solomon looking back on his life and saying, boy, I blew it. I wish I'd done things differently.

And I think that is in Ecclesiastes, but I also think he looks and says, okay, now that I found I could do anything and have anything, now I know what really is worth having and doing.

And he points out what things make for a happy life. And they're not the stuff you have to be a wealthy or to be a king to do. They're stuff that's in reach of all of us. Ecclesiastes 5 and verse 18.

Here's what I've seen. It's good and fitting for one to eat and drink and enjoy the good of all his labor in which he toils under the sun all the days of his life which God gives him. It's his heritage.

As for every man to whom God has given riches and wealth and given him power to eat of it, to receive his heritage and rejoice in his labor, that's the gift of God.

In other words, God lets you do a particular job and enjoy it and enjoy the benefits of it. That's a gift. For he won't dwell unduly on the days of his life.

Even if those days are endless, you won't think about how many they are because God keeps him busy with the joy of his heart.

That means simple pleasures, things we can enjoy doing. Happiness comes from engaging daily in whatever task you have to do and enjoying the results.

I don't know that that would necessarily change just because dying isn't in your future.

And that's important to remember now that we've just finished the feast and we're going back to a normal life, it's a key to happiness now.

I'm interpreting that it could be an eternal life, but now that all the excitement of the feast and having extra money to spend and things to do is over, it's good to think, well, take joy in doing your daily tasks and in eating the food that you have, even if it's not filet mignon and salmon.

Let's go over to chapter 9. Ecclesiastes 9, starting in verse 7.

I think of this as having most of the keys to happiness summed up right here.

Go eat your bread with joy. Drink your wine with a merry heart. God has already accepted your works. Let your garments always be white. Let your head lack no oil.

So, as enjoying your work, enjoying the food you earn, live joyfully with the wife whom you love, all the days of your vain life which He's given you under the sun, all your days of vanity.

That's your portion in life. Now, you could interpret that and say, oh, woe is me, that's all I've got. Or you could interpret it and say, I've got this.

And all these days you can enjoy your family and you could add friends to that. Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might.

There's no work or wisdom or device or knowledge in the grave where you're going, but rather than being despairing, oh, it's not going to matter, I'm going to go to the grave, especially if you're not going to go to the grave.

What you're doing, do it with your might. Take on a challenge.

And as I said, I think of these as keys to a happy life. Enjoy your work. Enjoy your food. Enjoy your drink. And enjoy your family.

I think those things will add pleasure to life and eternity. We know Jesus Christ, after he'd been crucified and resurrected as a spirit being, appeared to the disciples and ate breakfast with them.

He showed up and said, hey, what have you got to eat? I don't imagine it being tasteless or whatever for him. He probably could enjoy that broiled fish and piece of bread.

And why not enjoy other good things? In Judges 9, there's a section of Scripture where it says, it speaks of wine as cheering the heart of God and man.

I thought that's interesting. Now I'm sure God doesn't get loaded and trip over his own feet, obviously. But apparently God could enjoy a good glass of wine.

And I guess when we're spirit beings, we could. We know John 5, 17 is where Jesus Christ says, the Father works, hitherto, and I work.

Like Mr. Stiver quoted that during a sermon, or a Bible said, I can't remember which, but he was talking about how he liked the fact that it said, hitherto. The New King James says something else, but the important thing is the Father works. Solomon says, what your hand finds to do, do it with your might. Take pleasure in your work. The Father does, so we can. And of course, we know God loves family. We'll have a huge family.

Eternity can be filled with enjoying these simple pleasures of life.

And when you think of the loved ones, have you ever thought, I spent too much time with them?

Maybe on a given weekend or day, some people, but generally it's like, I wish I had more time.

We had friends at the feast that it's coming to an end, and I said, oh, we hardly got to spend time together. I wish we had more time.

Well, in eternity, we'll have plenty of time. And that'll be good.

As a matter of fact, it reminds me, when I mentioned earlier that when I was younger, I worried about getting bored.

Will I get bored and wish I didn't have to live forever? No, I don't think that's anything to worry about.

Not when I take these things into account. God doesn't want us to be miserable or unhappy.

And I also thought, you know, all the people that I love spending time with, my family and friends, they're going to be there in God's kingdom.

I don't want to be the one missing out. If they're all there having a good time, I want to be there with them.

And as I said, it'll be great to finally never run out of time.

And having said all this, I haven't even yet gotten around to one of the most amazing things that awaits spirit-borne children of God.

I know many of you are ahead of me wondering when I'm going to go to Psalm 8, so let's go there now.

Psalm 8 will begin in verse 3.

We believe this is one of David's Psalms. Oh yeah, it does say a Psalm of David.

So I don't have to just believe it. The Bible tells me that.

Verse 3, When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you've ordained, when I look up and see all that, what is man that you're mindful of him or the son of man that you visit him?

So God's created this whole vast universe. Was he paying attention to us on this little speck?

But you've made him a little lower than the angels. Or this could be interpreted a little while lower than the angels.

You've crowned him with glory and honor, and you've made him to have dominion over the works of your hands.

You've put all things under his feet, all sheep and oxen, the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, the fish of the sea, that pass through the paths of the earth.

Yes, human beings are the dominant species on this planet. We rule over all the others and over the planet itself.

That's one thing I like to remind the environmentalists. Now, we shouldn't abuse it, but...

And I tell that to the vegetarians also. God made us in charge. If we want to kill a cow so we can eat it, that's okay.

But it's not just the planet, of course. Let's go to Hebrews 2, to see how the writer here, most of us believe the Apostle Paul wrote Hebrews. Some scholars debate that.

But at any event, starts off quoting Psalms 8, Hebrews 2 and verse 6.

But one testified, that is David testified in a certain place, saying, What is man that you're mindful of him? Or the son of man that you take care of him?

You've made him a little lower than the angels, and you've crowned him with glory and honor, and set him over the works of your hands.

You've put all things in subjection under his feet.

So far there is a quote, but now he comments on that. He says, Well, for in that he put all in subjection under him, he left nothing that is not put under him.

Nothing not put under him. But now we don't yet see all things under him.

That's interesting. What do you mean we don't yet see all things under him?

At this time, even two thousand years ago, man was the dominant species, had power over all the different animals, could do what he wanted with the planet.

Of course, this is not limited to just the planet.

Think back to the original context in Psalm 8. It started out talking about the moon and the stars, the works of God's fingers.

There is a universe out there, of which God left nothing to not be put under man's feet when the time comes.

How many of you have been out in the wilderness, away from electric lights, at night and looked up?

Most of us have that experience, few and far between.

My dominant memory is once, years ago now, when I was in grad school in Texas, I was going to visit a friend who lived in Albuquerque, and I drove overnight.

At some point in the middle of the night, I stopped and I was out in the desert, and I got out of my car.

Someone went, wow! I never knew there could be so many stars!

They say, a lot of those individual dots that you see might be galaxies having thousands or millions of stars.

There are billions and trillions of them.

We don't know how many planets are out there. I saw a news item recently said, scientists have discovered the thousandth planet, and they're using these elaborate means to discover, studying the change in the Doppler effect of the light from a star, to tell that a planet must be rotating around it.

But there's got to be way more than that.

You'll remember a scripture that we read during the feast a couple of times in Isaiah 9, where it talks about the Prince of Peace.

On his shoulder will be the government. It says, of the increase of his government and his peace, there will be no end.

I'm not going to turn there because, as I said, we've read it.

For there to be no end of the increase, it must be continually growing and expanding.

And that's what scientists tell us about the universe.

They look out there and they say, the universe is expanding. It's growing continually.

Most astronomers now believe that stars are still being formed.

And that's mind-boggling. As many as there are, there are still more coming into existence.

And there's nothing to not be put under the feet of mankind when he stops being a little lower than the angels.

When we're made into spirit-worn sons of God, all that's going to be under our domain.

Now, I grew up as a Star Trek fan.

So, if you've ever watched Star Trek, each episode, they're off journeying into new planets and new discoveries. Imagine what it'd be like for us not being puny beings in a little ship.

Although, if I can make one that looks like the Enterprise, I might want to do that, because I always thought it was cool.

But when you think of what we can do, that's not just more of the same.

It's not boring. There's so much out there.

Now, we can have more of the things that we like of the same.

As I said, there's some elements of truth. For those of us that like, no, I should say those of you that like playing golf, because I don't play golf, but there's golf courses around the world. Probably there'll be golf courses throughout the universe.

As I said, you could set up a tennis court or a basketball court.

We can do things we want, and who knows what new things haven't been invented yet.

And then I stopped, as I was writing all this, and I wrote it in pen.

That doesn't mean we can't also stop and take a nap.

And as long a nap as you want!

You don't have to set an alarm clock.

Or enjoy reading a good book.

Or enjoy reading a good library.

Pull up a recliner by the fire.

Those are things we can do in eternity.

So they said, to some small degree, those jokes about heaven, they all have some things right.

The things that people like to do, as long as they aren't harmful or wrong, will be things that people can do.

And, as I said, they'll probably be golf courses.

And we can enjoy the best foods of what we like.

But God wants eternal life to be much more.

Much more than man has ever imagined.

It absolutely won't be just losing consciousness and merging into nothing, because God wants us to be part of His family.

He wants us to be happily occupied, to enjoy the other members of the family.

Now, we could do that much on the earth that we've known, but it turns out that man's ideas of heaven have been too small, too limited, to encompass what God has in mind for His family.

If we go outside on a clear night and gaze at the stars, that's where we can see our inheritance.

God will give His family all things, and He wants to be there and share them with us.

So let's look forward to eternity as part of God's family.

Thank you.