Dr MJ du Plessis Reformed Church Bellville Date: 7 November 2005 (evening)

Our help is in the Name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.
Beloved, grace and peace be to you from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ, through the mighty working of God the Holy Spirit.
Amen.

Psalm of praise: 138:3, 4
Prayer
Scripture hymn 1-1:6, 7
Scripture reading: Revelation 22
Scripture text: Revelation 22:5; Catechism Lord’s Day 22

And there will be no night there – no need for lamps or sun – for the Lord God will shine on them. And they will reign forever and ever. (Revelation 22:5 NLT)

And they (his servants) will reign forever and ever!

The two most sacred places on earth must certainly have been the Garden in Eden and Jerusalem.

However, both were affected by sin and eventually passed.
The Paradise on earth perished as a result of man’s sins.
The Jerusalem on earth was eventually destroyed because it rejected Christ.

By the grace of God He re-create these two into one – a paradise city where his chosen people will live forever with God.

These two places are combined into a new unit – the kingdom of heaven.
In this place we will live forever blissfully.

We focus on two matters:
1. When we die our souls are with the Lord instantly.
2. Our bodies will also be taken up into God’s glory.

1. When we die our souls are with the Lord instantly.

Revelation 21 describes the final destination of the chosen people: the New Jerusalem. This is a city without a son or a moon, for the glory of God is its light. The Revelation 22 follows with a description of the re-instated paradise with rivers as bright as crystal and the tree of life that bears fruit every month throughout the year.

Here lives a multitude of people – an uncountable number.
They are the saints who were redeemed through the blood of Jesus Christ, and who will raise from the dead through the power of God for eternal life.

The Lord works according to a fixed method to take us there.

The moment we die our soul is taken to Him.
In Luke 16:22 we read how the angels carried Lazarus to the bosom of Abraham when he died.

This is to tell us that we cannot enter the Lord’s eternal kingdom by ourselves.
The Lord takes us there trough his power.
The moment we die on earth, we are in heaven.

Our souls are not going to be kept in some indistinct and indefinable place until the Second Coming.

They will be in this place we’ve read about – instantly.
In other words: At once we’ll be with Christ our Head.
We cannot say how it happens. Psalm 73:24 just reads:

You will keep on guiding me with your counsel, leading me to a glorious destiny. (Psalms 73:24 NLT)

When we die and the Lord takes us to Him, we’ll be where Jesus Christ is.

Paul says in Philippians 1:23 that he desires to depart and be with Christ.
This certainly means that Paul will be with the Lord Jesus the moment when he dies.

There certainly are exceptions too.

We read about Enoch and Elijah who did not die.

The Lord took them up and they did not see death.

Those who still live when the Lord appears on the clouds will also not see death.
In 1 Corinthians 15 we read that the Lord will change them in a moment and they will be perfect similar to those who receive their bodies from the earth.

This is so comforting for us who believe, because no matter what death is still frightening and we are all wondering what is going to happen to us when we die:

However, we can await death comforted by the fact that our eternal resurrection is based on the grace of God through the redemptive sacrifice of Jesus Christ.
Revelation 22 clearly says that He will take us to the place with living water and abundance and immeasurable bliss.

2. Our bodies will also be taken up into God’s glory.

We receive such an abundance of the Lord’s grace – He also reveals to us what is going to happen to our bodies.

As we grow older we experience deterioration of our bodies as a result of illness and pain, and when we die our bodies decompose entirely.
What we see seems to be total destruction.

This is what the devil wants us to see.

He wants us to think that life ends in decomposition, because he is trying to break down our trust in the Lord’s omnipotence and our trust in our resurrection.

When we think about what the Bible says we realise that it does not say that the Lord elected souls.

He elected people.
Jesus also did not die for souls.
He died for the salvation of sinners – hence for people.
Man is body and soul.

The Lord created man with a body and soul, and He called man as such to believe and redeemed him for eternal life.

The Son of God redemptive sacrifice was for our body and soul to be glorified for eternal life.

The Holy Spirit does not dwell in souls. He dwells in people.

He guides us in our faith in order to enable us to also use our bodies as weapons to maintain God’s justice.
He guides us in our faith so that in this life our bodies will reflect God’s purity and glory before the eyes of the unbelievers (and of course the angels of Satan!).
This body will also rise from the dead.

In 1 Corinthians 15:19 we read that we would of all men most to be pitied if we did not believe that we would rise from the dead.

Also in 1 Corinthians 15 the Lord says that we will rise from the dead at his command – as Christ was the first who rose from the dead, we will follow Him at his Second Coming.
Of course our body will not be the same as the body we have now, because our bodies will be glorified and be without the sins that taint our present bodies.
In some way the Lord will change our bodies. Exactly what our bodies will look like we don’t know, but in 1 Corinthians 15:43 the Lord reveals that the new body will be different from the present body.

These glorified bodies will be perfect. Philippians 3:20-21 describes the new body as follows:

But we are citizens of heaven, where the Lord Jesus Christ lives. And we are eagerly waiting for him to return as our Savior. He will take these weak mortal bodies of ours and change them into glorious bodies like his own, using the same mighty power that he will use to conquer everything, everywhere. (Philippians 3:20-21 NLT)

You must never have any doubts about this or wonder whether it could possibly happen. It certainly will, because the Lord made Paul write down the following in 1 Corinthians 6:14:

And God will raise our bodies from the dead by his marvelous power, just as he raised our Lord from the dead. (1 Corinthians 6:14 NLT)

Jesus Himself also said it. See John 6:39:

And this is the will of God, that I should not lose even one of those he has given me, but that I should raise them to eternal life at the last day. (John 6:39 NLT)

Listen carefully to the point that Jesus makes in this text:: He protects us and He raises us at the last day. This is of course the day of his Second Coming.

This is the keystone of our faith, because it presents a vision far beyond our plans for our future on earth.

It also frees us from fear to die.
The Lord will also change everything that is perishable, such as social and government systems and all those kinds of things, because He gives us a new earth with a new city and perfect life, in which we will grow like the tree of life and bear fruit throughout the year – with body and soul.

Let’s read together what we confess about al this in Catechism Lord’s Day 22:

57. Q. What comfort does the resurrection of the body offer you?
A. Not only shall my soul after this life immediately be taken up to Christ, my Head,[1] but also this my flesh, raised by the power of Christ, shall be reunited with my soul and made like Christ's glorious body.[2]
[1] Luke 16:22; 23:43; Phil. 1:21-23. [2] Job 19:25, 26; I Cor. 15:20, 42-46, 54; Phil. 3:21; I John 3:2.

58. Q. What comfort do you receive from the article about the life everlasting?
A. Since I now already feel in my heart the beginning of eternal joy, [1] I shall after this life possess perfect blessedness, such as no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived – a blessedness in which to praise God forever.[2]
[1] John 17:3; Rom. 14:17; II Cor. 5:2, 3. [2] John 17:24; I Cor. 2:9.

Amen.

Closing prayer
Closing hymn: Psalm 119:62

The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.
Amen.

Dr MJ du Plessis
Reformed Church Bellville
Date: 6 November 2005 (evening)