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What Will Heaven be Like?

People can have a large number of differing ideas about what they are likely to find in heaven. For many the image of having wings like an angel and sitting on a cloud playing a harp comes to mind. Once a teenage boy asked me if there would be cars in heaven. I responded that without roads or gasoline, a car would not be much of an advantage.

After the future millennial kingdom (Rev 20:3) and the Great White Throne judgment (Rev 20:11) there is a condition called the “eternal state” (Rev 21:1). This is described as a new heaven and new earth. One characteristic of the new earth is that there is no more sea. It is interesting to note that entrance to this new earth is associated with the loss of memories (Rev 21: 4). This is an interesting statement because so much of our present life is structured by our memories. In trying to imagine what exitance would be without prior memories, we might speculate that our faith, character, and beliefs might be all that survive the transition to our new environment.

It could be a mercy to have old memories removed because who of us in an environment of perfection would not be overcome by the knowledge of all the wrong we did and the right we failed to do. There is a description given to the city of a new Jerusalem that descends from heaven above. It is described as without a temple because God and the lamb are its temple.

There is limited information available as to what life in the eternal state will be like perhaps because it will be so different from what we know today that we couldn’t fully understand. We do know that there will be nations (Rev 22:2). While the sun and moon will no longer be needed, it is not clear if they no longer exist (Rev 21:23).

Perhaps one way to imagine the future state is to contrast the world today as directed by Satan (Eph 2:2) with the future state.Satan epitomizes selfishness and self-seeking (Is 14:12-14). The selfish pursuit of lust and pride sort of define this age (1Jn 2:16). Alternatively God, who is love (1Jn 4:8), offered Jesus to pay for the sins of the whole world so that those who trust in him could be with him forever in heaven.

Love is an interesting quality. The the bible defines it pretty much as selflessness (1Cor 13:4-7). Selflessness is what Christians are called to (2Cor 5:15). Jesus is our example of selflessness (Phil 2:5-8). We can have a taste of heaven whenever we experience compassion, love, mercy, or other acts of selflessness. In heaven the corruptive influence of selfishness will be absent (Rev 21:27).

So much of our life today is allocated to earning the money to buy food and pay the rent that it is easy to lose sight of that which has eternal value. Living a life of selfless love can seem as unreal as considering what heaven will be like. When we die today we go to be with Christ (1 Thess 4:14, 2Cor 5:8). At the return of Christ our new bodies will be spiritual and immortal (1Cor 15:53-54).

In a new world with no more curse (Rev 22:3) we might expect the weariness of the flesh and the toil of each day to be absent. We might not need sleep. From our current perspective this might suggest boredom, however, with the record of those others that serve the Lord there does not seem to be the discontent that some might imagine (Rev 22;9).

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