The best part of heaven – share it!
“And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage one another with these words.” (1 Thessalonians 4:17b-18)
“A life lost far too soon.”
“Grandpa is smiling down on us from heaven.”
“Mom now has her angel wings and is watching over us from heaven.”
Have you ever noticed that we tend to look at heaven and people going to heaven from an earthly perspective? (Even if many of those perceptions are not always real or accurate.) Now I realize that is the perspective we currently have, so it is only natural.
Our Bible verse for this week is one of the handful of passages in the Bible which seek to help us understand how God wants us to view and think about heaven.
The first thing which God conveys through Paul in these words is that the greatest thing about heaven is that we will be with God and in the presence of God forever, “And so we will be with the Lord forever.”Being with God forever is probably not the thing at the top of many people’s list as far as the greatest thing about heaven. So often you hear people talk about how they will be able to enjoy their favorite activity in perfection or some other such idea from an earthly perspective.
Consider for a moment what it really means to be with God and in the presence of God forever. That means we will not be in the reach of the devil or having to deal with the effects of sin like we have to do every moment of every day of our lives. Gone will be all the pains, sorrows and difficulties of this life. Instead we will perfectly know exactly what is going on in our lives. We will have joy that will never end – ponder that for a moment and try to comprehend it!
There is also a great comfort and peace for us in that simple phrase “ And so we will be with the Lord forever” It assures us that at the death of a family member, friend or someone else we know who was a believer in Jesus, we have the full confidence where they are and what they are experiencing. They are not in limbo somewhere. They are with Jesus and they will continue to be with Jesus forever experiencing that unending joy. And, we will get to join them someday and eternally experience everything we mentioned above.
Paul tells us that once we understand everything that it means to “be with the Lord forever,”we are then to “ encourage one another.”The wonderful things we discussed above are not something we are to just look forward to ourselves. We are to share with others what God tells us heaven will be like and use this good news to “encourage one another.”
Let me help you understand what that looks like practically. Instead of going through the line at a visitation or funeral and simply muttering “My sympathies,” you can share with your family member, friend or coworker the peace and hope that you have in Jesus and how it can be theirs. You can also live that hope and help people see and understand by the way you act that death is not the end, but the gateway to something so much better than what we have now. After all, as Christians, heaven is our end goal and destination!
Now you know what the best part of heaven is. Do everything you can to share it until you get to experience it!