Continued from previous post:
The world is destroyed, the wicked are dead, and Satan and his angels are trapped with nothing to do. The rest of us have been caught up in the clouds with Jesus and our loved ones. The burning question at this point is: what happens next? What is heaven like and what will we be doing there? The apostle Paul says, …Things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard, and which have not entered the heart of man, all that God has prepared for those who love Him. (1 Cor. 2:9) We cannot imagine what heaven will be like. Our eyes and ears have never been exposed to anything resembling what is awaiting us, and our wildest imaginations cannot even come close to what the reality will be. But the Bible gives some clues as to what to expect.
Heaven
New Bodies:
…flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God…but we
will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last
trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable,
and we will be changed. For this
perishable must put on the imperishable, and this mortal must put on
immortality. (1 Cor. 15:50-53) When Jesus returns and the saved are reaped
from the earth, everyone will immediately receive a new, immortal body that
will never experience sickness or death.
And no resident will say, “I am sick”… (Is. 33:24) For they cannot even die anymore, because
they are like angels, and are sons of God…
(Luke 20:36)
The Party:
God keeps several books, one of
which is called the Book of Life. Those
who have their names written in the Book of Life are those who are in
heaven. (See
Phil. 4:3; Rev. 3:5; Rev. 21:27) Jesus
does the entering or deleting of names in the Book of Life before he returns to
earth to collect the saved. Now at
that time Michael, the great prince…will arise.
And there will be a time of distress such as never occurred since there
was a nation until that time; and at that time… everyone who is found written
in the book, will be rescued. (Dan.
12:1) The seven bowls full of the seven
last plagues bring to this earth a time of distress that had never been
experienced before. We who have our
names written in the Book of Life will be rescued and caught up in the clouds
with Jesus before the world ends.
Our Deeds Judged:
But that is not the end of our judgment. All of us have to stand before Jesus and be judged by him. …we will all stand before the judgment seat of God. (Rom. 14:10) For not even the Father judges anyone, but He has given all judgment to the Son… (John 5:22) But why are we being judged if we are already in heaven? What is it that is being judged? For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad. (2 Cor. 5:10) Every person in heaven will receive rewards based on his or her deeds. What these rewards are, the Bible does not say.
Deeds of the Lost Judged:
Our time in heaven will not be a time of idleness. Along with the great and unimaginable
pleasures we will be experiencing, we will have work to do. …do you not know that the saints will
judge the world? Do you not know that we
will judge angels? (1 Cor. 6:2,
3) Then I saw thrones, and they sat
on them, and judgment was given to them.
And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their
testimony of Jesus and because of the word of God, and those who had not worshipped
the beast or his image, and had not received the mark on their forehead or on
their hand; and they came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand
years. (Rev. 20:4)
Satan, his angels, and those whose names are not written in
the Book of Life will have their deeds judged by the saints in heaven. Jesus has already judged who is and who is
not to be saved, so why are we going to judge the works of those who are not
saved? We can speculate and come up with
a twofold answer. First, the punishment
for their deeds must fit the crime.
Adolph Hitler was responsible for the murder of millions of people, but
Joe Schmuckatelly down the street simply did not believe in God and he never
killed one other human being. Do they
deserve the same judgment? Of course
not. Judgment occurs…so that each
one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body, according to what he has
done, whether good or bad. (2 Cor.
5:10)
The second speculative answer as to why the saints are allowed to judge the world is to satisfy questions we may have. For instance: Why isn’t that TV preacher here in heaven? When we look at his deeds we see he was not a servant of God, but instead he was a greedy and power hungry megalomaniac. He did not have a personal relationship with Jesus; he used Jesus’ name to advance his own agenda.
