“And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.’” — Revelation 21:3
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Super Bowl Sunday is one of my favorite days of the year. After weeks of analysis and ever-rising anticipation, my friends gather around a television to witness the largest spectacle in American sports. Yet after the game ends and the confetti falls, after my friends say goodbye and the restaurant closes, a twinge of sadness comes over me. That was it — the last NFL game for months. Just like that, my mind focuses on the future absence of an enjoyable activity (watching football) rather than the magnificent day I’d just lived.
Sadly, when many Christians think of Heaven, they also tend to focus on what won’t be there. They will lament, for example, that they never got to visit Paris like they’d always wanted to, or they’ll worry themselves with Jesus’ words about Heaven in Matthew 22: “People will neither marry nor be given in marriage.”
Yes, Paris is a beautiful place, and yes, marriage is an incredible gift. But it’s not about what won’t be in Heaven, it’s about what — or Who — will.
“And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.'” — Revelation 21:3
God is Himself goodness. Everything we experience as good on this earth, like a belly laugh or a perfectly cooked steak or even a hug from your child, is simply a shadow of the perfect goodness of God. He is the true fulfillment of the glimpses of good we experience in the world.
Why would we lament the loss of shadows in Heaven when what we gain is goodness Himself?
We don’t have the capacity to understand this truth, but we do have the capacity to trust it, and to trust in our Lord who said that it is so. Therefore, if you are in Christ, anticipate that day when you will look with unveiled face at the Great I Am, and when you will run into the arms of your loving Heavenly Father for an everlasting embrace. That’s Heaven. Only there will you find the truest, fullest, deepest good.
May this fill you with joy today.
— Kevin Mercer
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