Most people do not find it irrational or unrealistic to believe that there is or will one day be a world – a reality – a realm – a state of being in which life will be significantly more interesting, more exciting, more fulfilling than this life. We long for a world where human flourishing and individual happiness are no longer hindered by the physical, social and emotional afflictions of this present world that rob us of true and lasting peace, prosperity and joy.
Most religions promise such a world, where upon our death we are transported to a world, a realm where such longings are fulfilled for those who meet the entrance requirements put forth by that religion. Others believe that everyone will enter a similarly glorious afterlife upon their death.
However, in our increasingly secular and materialistic world, the vast majority of people believe mankind’s great hope for an exciting, fulfilling and glorious future is not found in the sweet by and by, but in the mind, ingenuity and inventions of a fallen mankind.
In our pride we have deceived ourselves into believing that through our own ever-expanding wisdom and knowledge, through the strength and goodness of the “human spirit “, we can one day transform this world into the peaceful paradise that all men long for it to be. We place great faith and hope in our technology for our comfort, safety and entertainment, and in our scientific and medical discoveries to prolong and improve the quality of our life. Our modern geopolitical philosophies envision a unified world (a one world government if you will) of peaceful coexistence of all cultures, religions and ethnic groups, striving together for the common good.
Our sociological and psychological theories suggest that man is inherently good and will one day conquer all that we judge to be evil, all that interferes with our happiness and wellbeing in this world and thus live happily ever after in a world free of pain, sorrow and suffering – from crime, war and injustice.
Men and women gifted with great imaginations write books and make movies portraying utopian futuristic worlds and civilizations filled with superhuman beings, involved in extraordinary, exciting and meaningful adventures in exotic and glorious other worlds. All of this is meant to not only excite our imaginations and entertain our minds, but to instill hope in the potential of man to bring to pass a great and glorious future for ourselves through our own wisdom, intellect and ingenuity, independent of and in opposition to God.
And what does the Bible say in response to this cosmic fairy tale? It tells us that God laughs (Psalm 2:1-6). He laughs not that He is amused, but derisively, mockingly, that little, finite, rebellious, mortal man, whom God has already knocked off our proverbial high horse at Babel (Genesis 11:1-9), would continue our efforts at achieving human flourishing and individual happiness in opposition to Him, efforts that have failed miserably over thousands of years.
And we are further told in Psalm 2:5, that God responds to these efforts in His wrath, in divine judgement, giving us over daily to the natural consequences of such pride and foolishness. These consequences are experienced in all of the pain, sorrow, conflict, misery and death that pervades this present temporal world (Romans 1:18-32) (Amos 3:6). God reveals in the New Testament books of Revelation and 2 Peter, an end to this world and a horrific final judgement that will result in this world being destroyed, and all who have given their allegiance to its God-opposing ways, suffering His wrath and judgement forever (Revelation 6:16-17) (Revelation 14:9-11) (2 Peter 3:10-12).
However, we who love Jesus Christ, who have repented of our sin and rebellion, trusted in His saving work on the cross and gladly submitted to His Lordship, having been thus delivered from this judgement, have the promise of a whole new world. It is a world described in 2 Peter 3:13 as a new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells, meaning it will be a world in which all (and more) that our holy and righteous God intended in the beginning for man to fully enjoy in Him, one another and in all of His good creation will be restored. We will be conformed perfectly in the totality of our being to the glorious image of the one true and eternal Son of God, the man Jesus Christ, a supernatural transformation that begins in this world, and is completed when we see Him in the next (2 Corinthians 5:17-18) (2 Corinthians 3:18) (1 John 3:1-3) (Philippians 3:20-21) (Romans 8:18-23).
This new heavens and new earth, described more fully in Revelation Chapters 21 and 22, is the consummation and full establishment of the Kingdom of God or Kingdom of Heaven, which we become citizens of while in this world, and which we enter into upon our physical death (Mark 1:14-15) (Romans 14:17) (Philippians 3:20) (Luke 10:20).
So, the question I want to address in my next post or two, is how we are then to live our lives in this world as citizens of that world, that kingdom, until the day we die or the day in which King Jesus comes to put an end to the sin and insanity of this present evil world, and call His people to fully enter His eternal Kingdom, the kingdom that was prepared for us before the foundation of this world (Matthew 25:31-34) (1 Thessalonians 4:13-18).
Grace and Peace ×
Even so,
come, LORD JESUS !
Indeed.