PEARLS OF PAUL
EARTH AND HEAVEN
ANNIVERSARY SUNDAY
DR. JIM DIXON
2 CORINTHIANS 5:1-10
MARCH 5, 2000
It’s kind of fun as we begin a new millennium and a new century to look back a century ago at the year 1900 and see what things were like. They were far different than they are today. In the year 1900, only 6% of the people of America had graduated from high school. Only 6%. Ninety-five percent of the babies born in this nation were born in homes. It was a rare thing to have a baby born in a hospital in the year 1900. Ninety percent of the physicians in the United States in the year 1900 had not gone to college. They had gone to med schools that were condemned by the media and by the United States government as being substandard.
Of course, penicillin had not been invented or discovered, nor antibiotics. None of the antibiotics we use today had been discovered. Drugs, dangerous drugs, were readily available. They were available over the counter. You could just go to your local drugstore and you could buy marijuana or heroin or morphine. There were pharmacists and physicians who claimed that these drugs produced health. Of course, Coca Cola in the year 1900 was laced with cocaine instead of caffeine, and perhaps it’s no surprise that the average life expectancy in the year 1900 was 47 years. That was the average lifespan.
Women in the year 1900 only shampooed their hair once a month, and they used borax or egg yolks when they shampooed their hair. There were only 8,000 automobiles in the United States of America in the year 1900. Unbelievably, there were only 144 miles of paved road in this nation. The average speed limit in American cities was 10 miles per hours. There were only 1.4 million people in the entire state of California. Only 30 people lived in Las Vegas, Nevada. Amazing. Of course, only 8% of the people of America had a telephone. To make a phone call from Denver to New York cost $11.00. That was an incredible amount of money, because the average person in America only made 20 cents an hour, and the average American worker only made $200 to $400 a year.
Times have changed, and the world continues to change. Life is constantly changing in this world and in the years ahead, life will change some more. But there’s one thing which never changes and that is the word of God. The word of God never changes. As we live life in this changing world, as we live life in this crazy world, we have three teachings from God’s word this morning. The first teaching is this. This world is not your home. If you’re a Christian, if you believe in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, then this world is not your home. In our passage of scripture for today, the Apostle Paul writes, “We would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord.” You see, as long as you’re in that body, you’re away from home. Of course, the Apostle Paul refers to our earthly body as a tent. That’s the way he describes it in our passage of scripture for today. As long as you’re in a tent, you’re away from home.
In the year 1978, Barb and I purchased a tent. It was 22 years ago. We went to Gart Brothers Sporting Goods in Aurora, and we bought a tent. It was our first tent. It was really ugly. It was blue and orange. I know for you Bronco fans, it’s hard to imagine that anything blue and orange could be ugly, but this tent was ugly. It held four people, and we used it a lot. We got it on sale. We took it to Wellington Lake many times near Bailey. Barb and I camped there. As the kids came along, they camped with us. We camped together up at Lake Granby, and we went camping at Shadow Mountain Lake. We went up to the Grand Tetons in Yellowstone National Park, and we all stayed in that tent up there. But wherever we took that tent and whenever we were in that tent, we were away from home.
Of course, it’s true that there were times that I put the tent up in the back yard so Heather and her friends could spend the night in the tent, or Drew and his friends could spend the night in the tent. But that’s because they wanted to pretend they were away from home. Whenever you look in the mirror and you see your tent, whenever you look in the mirror and you see your body, you should be reminded that you’re away from home. There’s going to come a time when, as a human being, you’ll set that tent aside, dust to dust, ashes to ashes, and your soul will leave your body. For a brief time, you will be, in the words of the Apostle Paul, unclothed. But, as a Christian, it is not your destiny to remain unclothed but, rather, it’s your destiny, in the words of the Apostle Paul, to become further clothed because you’re going to receive a new body when you get home. One day you’re going to receive a new body. All of us in Christ are going to receive a new body.
The Apostle Paul, in our passage of scripture for today, uses two Greek words to describe the new body. He uses the word “oikia,” which means “house,” and “oikodomeo,” which means “building.” But he’s describing a permanent residence. We’re going to leave aside our tents, our temporary residence, and we are going to receive a permanent residence when we get home. We’re going to get new bodies. In 1 Corinthians, chapter 15, the Bible describes those new bodies. The Bible tells us that those new bodies will be heavenly. The Greek word is “epouranoi.” It means “fit for the heavens.” We’re also told in that same passage that the new body will be indestructible. The Greek word is “aptharzia.” It means “not subject to decay.” We’re told in that same passage that the heavenly body will be powerful, the Greek word “dunamis,” from which we get our English word “dynamite.” We’re told that our new bodies will be spiritual, the Greek word “pneumatikos,” which means “governed by the Spirit” instead of governed by the flesh. We’re told in the same passage that our new bodies will be glorious, the Greek word “doxa,” which means “worthy of praise.”
So we’re all going to receive new bodies. In this life, in this world, we’re not home. That’s why the Bible says that as Christians we are “strangers and sojourners on the earth.” That’s why the Bible says we are “aliens and exiles on the earth,” because we’re not home yet. This world is not our home. It is guaranteed, the Apostle Paul tells us in our passage of scripture for today, that we have this inheritance in heaven and that these new bodies will be given. It is guaranteed. “He has given us His Spirit as a guarantee,” Paul writes. The guarantee there is the Greek word “arrhabon,” and this word means “down payment.” It is the word used today in the modern Greek language. The word “arrhabon” is used to refer to the engagement ring, but it means “to seal the deal.” I mean, the deal is already sealed. You’re going to get a new body someday.
I love the a true story of a missionary who lived and served in Africa for 40 years, faithfully sharing Christ and the love of Christ. His wife died while he was in Africa, but he continued to serve faithfully there though he was lonely. At the end of 40 years, he returned to the United States where he was going to retire in a retirement home for missionaries. He came into New York Harbor on a ship. On that same ship was the president of the United States. When the president came off the ship, there were crowds of people cheering and welcoming the President home, though the president had only been gone for three weeks.
There was hardly anybody to greet this missionary. Some folks from the retirement home where he was going to be living picked him up. They drove him to the retirement home. That night, as he was having dinner with some other missionaries who were retired, he commented on how strange it was to come into New York Harbor on that ship and see the President so welcomed after only being gone for three weeks, and yet, he had been gone for 40 years and there was hardly anybody there. Another missionary smiled at him and said, “Don’t feel sorry for yourself. Remember, you’re not home yet!”
I love that story because it’s true of all of us in Christ and all of us who belong to Christ. We’re not home yet. And so this morning, Christ wants to remind you who believe in Him that you’re not home yet. That body you live in is just a tent, and as long as you’re in that body, you’re not home yet.
The second teaching this morning is to make it your aim to please Him. The Apostle Paul writes, “Whether we are at home or away, we make it our aim to please Him.” God would ask you this morning, “Are you making it your aim to please Him?” Every day when you wake up, is that your aim? To please Christ? “We make it our aim to please Him,” Paul writes, “because we must all appear before the judgement seat of Christ so that each person might receive good or evil, according to what has been done in the body.” We all must appear before the judgement seat of Christ, the Greek word for judgement seat is the word “bema.”
Long ago, I was given a false teaching regarding the meaning of “bema.” I was told that the judgement seat, the Bema, was the seat upon which a Roman authority sat at the Greek games. Whether it was the Olympic Games or the Isthmian Games or the Pythian Games, a Roman ruler sat on the Bema seat. After the games, from the Bema seat the Roman ruler distributed various awards to victorious athletes. So, the image was that when we get to heaven, Jesus Christ is going to begiving us various rewards for our lives on earth and the way we lived them. That was what the Bema seat was all about.
As I studied it and as I’ve examined it, I realize that it’s not true. That’s not what the Bema seat refers to. The Bema seat was the seat of the provincial governor throughout the Roman Empire. In every providence and every province throughout the Roman world, there was a governor. That governor sat on the Bema seat. A Roman proconsul sat on the Bema seat. That Roman proconsul on the bema seat had the “potestas gladii,” the “power of life and death,” the “power of the sword.” It was sometimes called the double-edged sword, and people throughout the Roman Empire were brought to the local bema seat where judgement was rendered, and they were given life or death.
Jesus Christ sits on the bema seat in heaven. The Father judges no one. “All judgement has been given to the Son, that all might honor the Son in the same way that they honor the Father.” He has the “potestas gladii.” He has the “power of the sword,” and He can grant life or He can grant death. He determines heaven and He determines hell. All of us must appear before the Bema seat.
Now, the Bible is very clear that if we’re Christians and we belong to Jesus Christ, we do not need to fear hell. We do not need to fear death. The Bible says that as Christians we’ve already passed out of death into life. The Bible says that, as Christians, “For those who are in Christ, there is no condemnation. We are bound for heaven.” Nevertheless, we must appear before the bema seat of the Son of God, and our lives must be evaluated. For everyone must appear before God.
Our son Drew loves to go camping. He and his friend Bryan Goldie wanted to go camping together, but there was just one problem. It was Spring Break and the forecast said the weather was supposed to be really bad. Well, we hesitated but we let them go camping, so they took their tent out and they went camping. And they wanted to make dinner, but the problem was it started snowing and the snow was just coming down sideways. So they took their stove into the tent, which you should never do, and tried to make dinner. And they practically created a fire ball and almost blew up the tent. So then they decided not to have dinner.
Well, that night as they were sleeping a foot and a half of snow fell and it caved the tent in. They were miserable. At first morning light, they began to hike out, and by the grace of God they made it out. But you have to be careful what you do in a tent and where you take your tent. Is that not true?And you’re in a tent. You better be careful what you do with it, and you better be careful where you take it. And you better remember that it’s going to be evaluated.
I read recently about Jeannie Palmahn. She, according to the Guinness Book of World Records, lived longer than any other person in modern history. She lived 122 years and died in 1997. When she was 110 years old she was asked what was the key to her longevity and what was the key to her long life. She smiled and said, “Not dying,” which I suppose is true. And that is the problem, the death rate is 100%. And scientists tried to discover what was the key to her long life. Amazingly, they discovered that she ate two pounds of chocolate a week. So they said maybe chocolate is good for you. On the other hand, they discovered that she didn’t stop smoking until she was 116 years old. And I don’t think anyone in their right mind would suggest that smoking was good for you. And so what they decided was this: she was a genetic fluke. And indeed she was.
I don’t know what your genetics are like, but I know this: As long as you live life in this world, take care of your tent. It’s important what you eat. It’s important how you live. But even more important than how you treat your body physically is what you do with your body spiritually, because your body is a “skene.” The word Paul uses for tent is also the word for “tabernacle,” and you see, your body is a kind of holy of holies. God lives within you. The Holy Spirit has come to take up residence within you when you accepted Christ as your Lord and Savior. You are a temple of the Living God. Be careful how you live.
There’s been a lot of discussion recently about posting the Ten Commandments on school classroom walls. Of course, it’s a subject of considerable controversy, but the most important thing is that those Ten Commandments (and indeed, all of the commandments of God) are posted on our hearts, posted in the souls of our lives. What’s most important is that we want to honor Christ. Jesus said, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.” “Why do you call Me Lord, Lord, and not do what I tell you to do?” You see, it’s all going to be evaluated. It’s all going to be evaluated someday, so make it your aim to please Him.
Finally, your destiny is in the heavens. This is the third and final teaching from this passage. This world is not your home. Make it your aim to please Him, and your destiny is in the heavens. The Apostle Paul writes, “We know if this earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.” “Aionion en tois ouranois,” “eternal in the heavens.” The NIV mistranslates this and simply says “in heaven,” but “en tois ouranois” means “in the heavens.” The RSV and the new RSV and the American Standard and the Jerusalem Bible and even the New King James—most of the translations—properly render this “in the heavens.” That’s your destiny.
Of course, we live in a world which is fascinated with the whole subject of the heavens. There’s an organization you may have heard of, and it’s called SETI, Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence. That organization is vast. The SETI organization is today centered at the University of California at Berkeley. They operate radio telescopes all over the earth. Those radio telescopes are turned heavenward, and they are seeking to find signs of intelligent life in the universe. Those radio telescopes bring all of that information, and it’s processed through a supercomputer at the University of California at Berkeley.
The problem is the supercomputer just doesn’t have the capacity to handle all the data, so the SETI organization has asked for help from Americans. You can go on the internet. You can download a program called SETI at Home. So far, 1.5 million Americans have done this, and they have offered their personal computers for the use of SETI. When you download SETI at Home, your personal computer is given a workload, a section of space, and your personal computer processes the data that has come in from the radio telescopes. It then uploads it back to Berkeley and to the computer there.
So far, over 1.5 million computers have joined with the supercomputers in California in this effort to seek intelligent life in the universe. Collectively, they’ve been able to process all of the information from all of the radio telescopes in the world. Do you know what they’ve found? Nothing. They have found absolutely nothing. There’s not one shred of evidence that there’s any intelligent life out there. There may be intelligent life out there, but there’s no evidence. Astronomers and scientists and astrophysicists are beginning to wonder, “IS there life in the universe?”
There’s a great desire to go and see the universe, but that’s not likely because it’s just all so vast. It’s not likely that we’ll even be able to see the closest star because the closest star is Proximus Centauri, and it’s 4.22 light years away. Then there’s Alpha Centauri, which is 4.35 light years away. Bernard’s Star is 5.98 light years away. These don’t sound like they’re very far away, just 4, 5 or 6 light years, but when you understand that light moves at 186,000 miles per second and it still takes 4 to 6 years to reach the nearest stars, you know that you’ve got a problem. You see, if you were to get on a space craft and travel at 25,000 miles per hour (which, by the way, is faster than any human being has ever gone in space), do you know how long it would take you to reach Proximus Centauri, the nearest star? It would take you 113,000 years! To be exact, 113,201 years to reach Proximus Centauri, the nearest star, 4.22 light years away! And so, I’ve concluded that in my life I’m not going to see any of it. It isn’t going to happen, and I promise you something else. It isn’t going to happen in your life. You’re not going to see any of it. Those nearest stars… Proximus Centauri is just one of a hundred billion stars within our galaxy, and our galaxy is only one of hundreds of billions of galaxies in the cosmos. You’re not going to see it through. Not in this life.
But I do believe that when you get home, in the life to come, you’re going to be able to see the works of God’s hands. God is not arbitrary. God is not capricious. He has a purpose behind everything He made and created, and you are part of that purpose. He has created a home for you, eternal in the heavens. The word heaven in the Bible is normally in the plural because the Greeks thought of three heavens, the first being the atmosphere of the earth, the second being the cosmos, the universe, and the third being the dwelling place of God, the heaven beyond the heavens. The Bible indicates that one day it’s all going to be part of heaven. The Bible describes heaven sometimes as a garden, the word “paradise.” Sometimes it describes it as a city, “the New Jerusalem.” Other times it describes it as the cosmos, a New Heavens and a New Earth. But it’s all a part of heaven, and it’s wonderous. It’s glorious. You can’t imagine what it’s going to be like. It’s going to be so wonderful when we get home.
In the year 1298, Marco Polo wrote a book. That book was called Description of the World, but it was really a description of China and the far East. Of course, Marco Polo went to China and he wrote this book about his experiences, about his fifteen thousand miles of traveling over 24 years, about his meeting with Kubla Khan, about the wonders he saw—from their incredible postal system to their incredible architectural wonders to the incredible natural wonders he saw. Incredible things. People didn’t believe him when he described the far East. And on his deathbed, in the year 1324, they asked him to recant all that he had said. They thought that it was myth. Marco Polo said on his deathbed, “I have not told half of what I sw.”
And are you not remined of the Apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians 12, who, after being taken into the third heaven, said he couldn’t describe it. In fact, he said that he heard things and saw things that no human being is permitted to describe—that no mortal person is permitted to describe. But of course, one day, we’ll set aside mortality and we’ll see it. We’ll see heaven. And I promise you when you see heaven you won’t be able to describe half of it. You won’t be able to describe a thousandths of it. It’s going to be so wonderful.
Well, as we close, I want to tell a little story about a bride and groom who were just married. It’s a true story, told by Cynthia Thomas, and she’s really talking about her brother, because her brother is the groom. And they were married, and they went to a hotel after their marriage and they had reserved the honeymoon suite. They were so excited when they arrived. They went up to the room. It looked beautiful. There was a sofa, a table, chairs, and the room looked great, but they couldn’t find a bed! No bed in the honeymoon suite? It doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Then they discovered the sofa had a hide-a-bed. They used that. It was lumpy, it was sagging, and they didn’t sleep well.
The next morning the groom went downstairs to complain that the honeymoon suite didn’t have a better bed than that. The guy behind the desk at the hotel said, “Well, did you open the door to the bedroom?” The groom was puzzled. He didn’t know there was a bedroom. He went back up to the room. He opened this door that he thought was the door to the closet. He opened it up, and there was this amazing bedroom. There were flowers. There was fresh fruit (not as fresh as it had been the night before). There was this great bed, just this great room, and they had missed out on it.
You know, there are a lot of people who kind of go through life like that, just missing out. Do you ever feel like you’re missing out? Maybe on a cool business deal? Maybe on some relationship? Maybe you just feel like you’re always missing out, but I can tell you this: You don’t need to miss out on heaven, and nothing compares to it because there’s a door that Christ is willing to open for you if you would but receive Him as Lord and Savior of life.
As we close this morning, I want to make sure that each of you had an opportunity to ask Jesus into your heart, that you might receive Him as Savior and Lord and recognize the fact that this world is no longer your home—that you might have it as your aim to please Him and that you might look forward to your heavenly dwelling, eternal in the heavens. Let’s close with a word of prayer.