17 May GOOD NEWS: Will we be married in Heaven with our pets and babies?
- The whole world is afraid of death. Bad news = bad health
- If this is all there is, I better pack it in and if I don’t have a lot of regrets
- If this is all there is, there is nothing to look forward to & if I get sick or die it’s hopeless
- If there is FAR MORE after this life then I pack in living, and it gets only better after
- 1. reuniting of realms 2. resurrection dead 3. redemption creation 4. reunion people
As people look forward to Heaven, they wonder about what was Heavenly in life??
- Will our pets in the Kingdom of Heaven?
- Jesus Christ honors animals be being called the Lamb of God, and Lion of Judah
- Jesus rides a white horse
- Noahic Covenant
- God spared the animals Gen 6
- God included animals in His covenant Gen.9 “every living creature that is with you, the birds, the livestock, and every beast of the earth
Animals will be in Heaven
Isaiah 11:6-8 The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, and the calf and the lion and the fattened calf together; and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze; their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play over the hole of the cobra, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder’s den.
- Today we have wild and domesticated animals.
- Kingdom Heaven – our dominion means all animals domesticated.
Options
- new animals of the same kind as earth
- exact same animals risen from the earth
- extinct animals continued from the earth (Flinstones)
- new kinds of animals created for heaven
Animals will praise God in Heaven
Psalm 148:10-13 Beasts and all livestock, creeping things and flying birds! Kings of the earth and all peoples, princes and all rulers of the earth! Young men and maidens together,
old men and children! Let them praise the name of the Lord, for his name alone is exalted;
his majesty is above earth and heaven.
- Not a human soul, but not a plant.
- A living being that can communicate (whale, dolphin) & relate
Lion King, Garfield, Dr. Doolittle, Babe, Jungle Book, Paddington, Scooby Doo, Stuart Little, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Yogi Bear, Alvin & Chipmunks, Antz, Bambi, Nemo, Dory, A Bugs Life, Charlotte’s Web, Chicken Little, Curious George, Ice Age, Mickey Mouse, Kung Fu Panda, Marmaduke, Dumbo, Nemo, Narnia, All Dogs Go to Heaven
- Will we be married in the Kingdom of Heaven?
Argument For
– Mormonism – eternal polygamy & procreation
- Adam was perfect person in a perfect place w/a perfect relationship w/God
- Everything good except “not good to be alone”
- God made marriage to reflect the Trinity & make them “one”
- Heaven picks up where Genesis 3 left off
Argument Against
- Eternal marriage & procreation would lead to a population problem eventually (Star Trek)
- Heaven relationship w/God & others perfect & deep enough meet all relational needs
- Marriage is a sign pointing to our relationship with God
- In Heaven, we will know our spouse and the friendship will continue in some new fashion
Romans 7:2 a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage.
Matthew 22:23–33 Sadducees came to him, who say that there is no resurrection, and they asked him a question, saying, “Teacher, Moses said, ‘If a man dies having no children, his brother must marry the widow and raise up offspring for his brother.’ Now there were seven brothers among us. The first married and died, and having no offspring left his wife to his brother. So too the second and third, down to the seventh. After them all, the woman died. In the resurrection, therefore, of the seven, whose wife will she be?…But Jesus answered them, “You are wrong, because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God. For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. And as for the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was said to you by God: ‘I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is not God of the dead, but of the living.” And when the crowd heard it, they were astonished at his teaching.
- (FOR) The language is of getting married, not being married
- (AGAINST) No indication angels marry
= All our relationships will be perfect. Husband lost wife, rough marriage, perfect!
- Will babies be born in the Kingdom of Heaven?
- Our miscarriage
- Pastor – 1. miscarriage 2. abortion 3. stillborn 4. died infancy (early church 1 week)
- One of my first funerals
- Counseling couple 20+ miscarriages
Babies in Heaven? 6 Options
- All babies are sinners who go to Hell
- All babies are elect by God and go to Heaven
- God chooses some babies for Heaven, but not all
- All babies are innocent until they reach the age of accountability
- All babies baptized into a covenant family go to Heaven
- God decides who goes to Heaven and Hell
3 Reasons for Hope from the Bible
- We are sinners from our mother’s womb
Psalm 51:5 (NLT) For I was born a sinner—yes, from the moment my mother conceived me.
- God knows us and is intimately involved with us from our mother’s womb
Psalm 139:13-16 (NLT) You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it. You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. You saw me before I was born.
- God can and does save people from their mother’s womb
Psalm 22:9-10 (NKJV) You are He who took Me out of the womb; You made Me trust while on My mother’s breasts. I was cast upon You from birth. From My mother’s womb
- Isaiah (Isa. 49:1–7) Jeremiah (Jer. 1:4–5), Luke 1:15, John Baptizer “filled w/HS from mother’s womb”
Reasons for Hope from Jesus
- God became a baby in His mother’s womb
- God knows and loves children whether they are unborn or born
- Greek brephos/child in Luke/Acts
- Jesus said Heaven was for kids
Luke 18:15–17 “Now were bringing even infants to him that he might touch them. And when the disciples saw it, they rebuked them. But Jesus called them to him, saying, ‘Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God. Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.’”
God is a Father who Lost a Son
2 Samuel 12:15–23
“And the LORD afflicted the child that Uriah’s wife bore to David, and he became sick. David therefore sought God on behalf of the child. And David fasted and went in and lay all night on the ground. And the elders of his house stood beside him, to raise him from the ground, but he would not, nor did he eat food with them. On the seventh day the child died. And the servants of David were afraid to tell him that the child was dead, for they said, “Behold, while the child was yet alive, we spoke to him, and he did not listen to us. How then can we say to him the child is dead? He may do himself some harm.” But when David saw that his servants were whispering together, David understood that the child was dead. And David said to his servants, “Is the child dead?” They said, “He is dead.” Then David arose from the earth and washed and anointed himself and changed his clothes. And he went into the house of the LORD and worshiped. He then went to his own house. And when he asked, they set food before him, and he ate. Then his servants said to him, “What is this thing that you have done? You fasted and wept for the child while he was alive; but when the child died, you arose and ate food.” He said, “While the child was still alive, I fasted and wept, for I said, ‘Who knows whether the LORD will be gracious to me, that the child may live?’ But now he is dead. Why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he will not return to me.”
= Our culture is now hypocritically pro-life like never before
- God – Father
- Jesus – Son
- Salvation – Adoption
- I am a father whose “son” died. I worship a Father whose child died. I trust Him to deal with me & my child. I worship a Son who died for me, and I believe Him for my son
Charles Spurgeon (1834–1892), “I cannot conceive it possible of him [Jesus] as the loving and tender one, that when he shall sit to judge all nations, he should put the little ones on the left hand, and should banish them for ever from his presence.”
