Rick Warren - The Reality of Heaven —Part One

Are Heaven and Hell real places? And what are they like?

Today?

On Pastor Rick's Daily Hope, the Bible Teaching Ministry of

Rick Warren, we continue his series called Eternal Realities, Heaven

and Hell. In these lessons, Rick shares what the Bible

says about heaven and Hell and how you can be

absolutely certain you'll go to Heaven. Up next, here's part

one of a message called the Reality of Heaven.

Now.

The truth is a lot of times we're just not

too excited about Heaven. I mean, we're much more interested

in Earth than we are about Heaven. And really that's

too bad, because we have been sold a bill of

goods about heaven. The fact is the reason we don't

get excited about Heaven is we have a faulty image

of it. We don't realize how cool, how exciting, how incredible,

how so much better than Earth it's gonna be.

I like Earth? Do you like her? I like Earth?

I love the sunsets, I love the sky, I love

the water, I love the weather. Shoot, we live in California.

I mean, come on, you know my idea of winter.

As I put on socks, this is an incredible place.

We live in paradise, and I like this place a

lot in spite of the fact that it's broken, that

nothing actually works the way it ought to work. No

relationship is perfect, no body is perfect except mine.

No, you know, no weather is perfect.

Nothing is perfect on this planet because sin has broken

the planet. But this is all we know, so we

can't understand how cool heaven really is. And as I said,

most of our ideas are warped because they came from Hollywood.

Now let me just say it again. I've told you

many times, when you get to Heaven, it's not gonna

be all white. You're not gonna have wings, you're not

going to be an angel, you're not gonna be a

little chubby cherub, you're not gonna wear a white robe,

you're not gonna float on clouds, and you're not gonna

play a harp. As I've told you many times. To me,

that would be hell. I can't think of anything more

boring than to be in a colorless place having to

play a harp. Oh, just that would make me not

want to go to Heaven. So the night we're gonna

look at the real thing. And honestly, there's so much

material I'm gonna get I'm gonna hit you with a

ton of verses that I can't even cover it all.

There's so much, And sometime we'll come back and just

do a series on this. Now, notice there on your outline.

The Bible says this in Colossians chapter three, verse one,

Since you have been raised to new life with Christ,

set your sights on the realities of heaven. Circle that

the realities of heaven, not what Hollywood gives you, not

the bill of goods that you've seen by artists and

what people have tried to think up. Set your side

on the realities of heaven, where Christ sits at God's

hand and the place of honor and power. Now, in

this weekend, we're going to look at the realities of heaven,

and specifically, we're going to look at these five questions.

What is heaven? Where is it?

What is heaven like, how do we get into it?

And what should we do if we're going to heaven.

So let's just get right into it. We've got a

lot of material to cover.

First.

What is heaven, Well, the Bible tells us three things.

Number one, it's where God lives and rules. It is

where God lives and rules through the Bible, it's called

the dwelling Place of God, the House of God. It's

called the City of God. Thirty one times. Jesus calls

it the Kingdom of God or the Kingdom of Heaven.

Actually he calls it the Kingdom of Heaven because it's

where God not only lives, but the Rules and the

Bible says in Psalm one twenty three, Verse one, Lord,

I look up to you, up to heaven, where you rule.

It's where God lives. In Rules number two, it is

a real place. Now, we talked about this last week,

and let me just cover it again. It's not a

state of mind. It's not a state of being. It's

not some disembodied condition where you're gonna float around without

a body. It's not nirvana. It's not nothingness. It's not

a dream like state. It's not something intangible and ethereal.

It's not a feeling. It is a real place. In fact,

the Bible says that in heaven there are streets, there

are trees, there is water, there are homes. It uses

a lot, it hints, and in all likelihood there's gonna

be animals there. There are mini scriptures that allude to

the fact that animals will be there. It is a

physical place, and you will have a physical body. It's

not just some kind of floating around in outer space,

which sounds pretty boring to me. Jesus said this up

here on the screen in John fourteen to two. He said,

there are many rooms in my father's home, and I'm going.

To prepare a place for you.

If this were not so, now less, he says, I'm

going to prepare a place, not a state of being

a place. If this were not so, I'd tell you plainly,

heaven is a real place. It's not a state of mind.

And in fact, notice there on your outline, Jesus said

in Matthew six point twenty, store up for yourselves treasures

in heaven. And then he tells us this where moths

or rust can't destroy it. You know, moths either way

close and rust destroys away metal, and where thieves can't break.

In and steal it.

Now, if heaven were just a state of mind, being

a consciousness, you couldn't store anything up there. But he

says you can store up treasure in heaven. Now we're

going to come back to that, because he says it

about five times in the New Testament. But it's where

God lives and it's a real place. And number three,

this is the cool thing. Heaven was designed for us.

It was designed for you and for me, specifically designed

for us.

This is such an amazing.

Thing that God not only designed the earth for us

so we could live and it could sustain life, but

he also designed heaven for us, not for himself, but

for us. Notice the Bible says, come, you, who are

blessed by my Father, Take your inheritance. I mean something

I've been planning to give my kids. Take your inheritance.

The Kingdom prepared for who you circle the word you

was prepared for you, and it was prepared for you

from the foundation or the creation of the world. We

talked about this last week. When God start thinking up earth,

he also started thinking up heaven because we're not meant

to live here.

This is not all there is. And if the only

thing you.

Get this week is is this that there's more to

life than here. And now there's more to life than

just this life you're gonna spend how many times have

I said this eighty years on this planet, maybe a

little less, maybe a little bit more, But that's about it.

And really that's a good thing, because you don't want

to live in an imperfect place forever. You want to

live in a perfect place forever. So you're gonna spend

eighty at the most one hundred years here on the earth.

You're gonna spend trillions and trillions and trillions and trillions

and trillions, gazillion gazillions. I'm gonna make up a word

someday for the infinity to infinity and beyond. You're gonna

live in eternity. And God says, I designed it for

you now, friends, This is such an amazing expression of

the love of God. The Bible tells us that God

created the entire universe because he wanted a family. He

wanted a family, and he wanted a family that would

live with him forever. And I wasn't lonely. God has

never been lonely because God has fulfilled in himself and

he's in a relationship to himself because God is.

Love, father, son, holy Spirit. So he wasn't lonely.

But he said, I want to express my love by

creating human beings. I'm gonna make them in my image.

They're not gods. You're never going to be a god.

You're going to be a human. You're not going to

be a god in heaven. You're not going to be

an angel in heaven. You're going to be a human

being in heaven. But God said, I wanted to make

these human beings so that I could adopt him into

my family. Look at some verses here on the screen

Ephesians one to five. God's unchanging plan has always been

to adopt us into his own family by bringing us

to himself through Jesus Christ, and this gave him great pleasure.

You were planned for God's pleasure. We talk about that

in the Purpose Driven Life book, that God said, I

want you to be a part of my family. Now

there's a word for God's family. Look at this next verse.

It's verse Timothy three point fifteen, and it says there,

God's family is the church. God's family is the church.

We are.

The Church is the only thing that's going to last.

God's family is the only thing that's lawdst. One day,

this earth's going to burn up, and the only thing

that's going to last is people who are part of

God's family, who've chosen to be a part of his

family in faith and in obedience. Now the Bible says

this here on the screen one Peter one four. God

has reserved a priceless inheritance that's heaven for his children,

and it is kept in heaven for you. All the

things He's gone plan for you, pure and undefiled, beyond

the reach of change and decay. So what is heaven.

It's the place that he's preparing for his family. Oh

and by the way, another analogy in scripture, the Bible

calls the church the bride of Christ. And it's like

he's saying, I'm preparing this place for my bride. I

want to give her the best. And he says, my

family and my bride. He said, this is what I'm

preparing for you to spend eternity with me forever. And

the Bible says this up on the screen. This is

God's purpose that when the time is ripe, he will

gather us all together from wherever we are in heaven

those who've already died, or on earth those who haven't

died yet, to be with Him in Christ forever. Now

know this, it says, forever. You've heard me say this

before you were made to last forever. That's why your

mail in God's image and the implications is you're gonna

last forever one of two places, heaven or hell.

And as we talked.

About last week, you get to choose which door you're

going to go out My way or God's way, Jesus way.

Jesus said, I am the way. Hebrews thirteen fourteen says

for this world, let's read this verse together, for this

world is not our home. We are looking forward to

our city in heaven, which is yet to come.

You see, once you've.

Become a part of God's family, there's a whole lot

more to life than just here and now.

And really, this world is not in my home.

I'm just passing through. I think every believer should be

given a green card because this is not your ultimate citizenship,

your ultimate citizen. You're only here on earth sixty seventy

eighty ninety one hundred years. God says, your ultimate home

is in heaven. Now, that's what heaven is. It's a

real place. It's where God lives, and it was designed

for us. Now, the question then, is where is heaven?

And the answer is we don't know. All we know

is this. You can write this down. It's out of

this world. We know that it's out of this world.

We definitely know that it is not on earth. Heaven

is not a place on earth. Regardless of what the

songs say. Heaven is not a place on earth. It

is out of this world. And that's why the Bible

says in many places like Psalm fifty three, verse two,

God looks down from heaven, it says, at people on

earth to see if there are any who are wise

and who worship him.

Now, while we don't know.

The location of heaven, it's a specific place. We don't

know the location, but we do know the way. Jesus said,

I am the Way. I am the Way, the Truth

and the life. No one comes to the Father but

by me, And the Bible says this up here on

the screen Roman Street, God has shown us a different.

Way to heaven.

Not by being good enough, which none of us can

be good enough to get into a perfect heaven and

trying to keep his laws, but by a new way

promised in scriptures a long time ago. Okay, so what

is heaven like now? This is the one we really

want to know the answer to. And the Bible says

that heaven is a mystery. It is a mystery, and

part of it is we just don't have the mental

capacity to understand other dimensions when we live in a

three dimensional world. We live on a planet that rotates

around the Sun and has a twenty four hour rotation,

and so we have a concept of time. If you

weren't living on this planet, you wouldn't have the same

concept of time that you do as you do in space. Now,

the Bible says this in job chapter eleven. Can you

understand the mysteries surrounding God Almighty? They are higher than

the heavens and deeper than the grave.

So what can you do when you know so little?

And these mysteries outreach the earth and the ocean.

When I was a little boy, we lived in.

Northern California, and one time we took a family vacation

near to southern California and my dad was trying to

explain to me what Disneyland was going to be, Like,

what a waste of time? You can't understand Disneyland until

you go. And when you get there, you're going, whoa,

the very first time. Now, the hundredth time you're gone,

it's just all well, after all, you know, But the

first time you go and you're a little kid, you're going,

this is heaven.

And no matter how well my dad tried to describe it, he.

Could not conquer, you know, communicate to me how cool

Disneyland was gonna be. There are some experiences in life

that are simply indescribable. You just can't excribe it, describe.

I mean, when my wife has tried to describe to

me the feeling she felt when she saw her three

children for the very first time, the second after they

were born. You know, I had my own feeling as

a dad, I was there, but she had a different feeling,

having carried those babies inside of her. That is an

indescribable feeling. And there are some things in life you

simply have to experience. And all the art and all

its songs, and all of the writing and poetry and

everything can't excribe, can't describe what heaven's really like, because

the truth is there's really nothing on earth to compare

Heaven too. We are a poor carbon copy, a xerox.

We're an imitation of something much much greater, more fulfilling,

more beautiful, more exciting. And the Bible tells us this.

They're in First Corinthings two. No eye has ever seen,

and no ear has heard, and no mind has has

ever imagined what God has prepared for those who love him. Now,

I know many of you are kind of like me.

I've got a pretty fertile imagination. I can think up

some pretty big things.

People have accused me of being.

A dreamer or a visionary, and I do have a

pretty vivid imagination. God says, Rick, you think of use

your imagination to think of the greatest thing you can

think heaven could be, and.

I can top that.

So all I can do is take the five or

ten top peak experiences in my life, throw them all together,

and multiply them by an exponential factor of a billion,

and go, that must be what it's like to be

in a perfect place.

So I don't.

Really know, and even the things that I'm going to

share with you today are just a pale explanation of

what heaven's like.

But the Bible does.

Give us some very important information on heaven. And I'm

going to throw a ton of verses at you because

i want you to see what it is. And I'm

going to give you five things that will not be

in heaven. And there are five things that will be

in heaven, and since I was going to cover all

these verses, I even wrote them down for you.

There.

What's not going to be in heaven and what is

going to be in heaven? So let's run through a

bunch of verses together. The first thing that's not going

to be in heaven is no sickness. Look at this

verse up here on the screen. The Bible says, everything

in the heavens has a body, and so does everything

on earth, but each one is very different. Now, these

earthly bodies will die, but the bodies that are raised

will live forever.

Our ugly and weak bodies.

How did he know that will become beautiful and strong?

Anybody want to say yay God?

On that one? Yay God? Okay?

It says our our ugly and weak bodies are gonna

become beautiful and strong. Eat your heart out, bread pit.

The Bible says that there won't be any sickness in heaven. Why,

because you're gonna get a new, perfect body. You will

have a body in heaven just like you got a body.

When Jesus arose and came back to Earth, and he

walked in and he actually walked through door a couple times,

walk through walls, and so it's kind of there's a

kind of a star trek thing to it that you

know you can dematerialize and go here and there. But

he also set out and ate a couple of meals.

So I know we're gonna eat in heaven because Jesus

did with his resurrected body. The only thing is your

stomach's never gonna growl there, and you'll never have gas.

And because you will never have any needs in heaven,

and when you eat, it will eat simply because of pleasure.

You just want to eat.

But you're gonna get a perfect body. Now, the Bible

says this up here on the screen. Just as each

of us now has a body like atoms, that means

we have a human body. Uh So someday we shall

have a body like Christ. And we get a little

fore knowledge of that. If you want to study this more,

you can go and look at the kind of body

Jesus had after he rose back from death. But we're

gonna have a perfect body. No, So that means no sickness.

Second thing, no sadness. Look at this verse. The Bible

says God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.

What a great message from Pastor Rick today, there's something

I always take away from his message.

Here's Rick to tell you how you can help support

this ministry.

Jesus told his disciples that they should live their lives

according to five specific purposes. He said, you've got to

love God with all your heart. That's worship, and love

your neighbors yourself. That's ministry. That's called the Great Commandment.

And then Jesus said, go make disciples. That's evangelism. Baptize

them into the Family of God. That's fellowship, a sign

of fellowship. And then he said, teach them obey everything

I've taught you. That's discipleship. And we call that the

Great Commission. We believe it Daily Hope, that a great

commitment to the Great Commandment and the Great Commission will

who is a great Christian, a great church, a great company,

a great community.

You know.

I started Daily Hope so I could spread the good

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the world. And we want people to know that God's

word is filled with hope and truth and the power

that we need to follow him every day is available

to every single one. You know as well as I

do that the Word of God changes lives. It's a

live it's active, and it breathes new life and new

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