Pastor Rick's Daily Hope

Pastor Rick Warren: Hello everybody, this is Pastor Rick's Daily Hope with Rick Warren. I'm really glad you're here. Today we're continuing our series from Psalm 23 called Living in the Goodness of God. It's all about how God's goodness meets you right where you are and brings hope even in difficult seasons.

In this message today, you'll hear part two called Heaven, God's eternal goodness to you.

Pastor Rick Warren: Now, the next question I want us to look at is how is heaven different from Earth? Of course, it's very, very different. As I shared with you in the previous message, look at this verse on your outline. First Corinthians 2:9 says this.

No eye has ever seen, and no ear has ever heard, and no mind has ever even imagined what God has prepared for those who love him. So you think of the coolest thing you could experience in life, the most pleasurable, the most beautiful, the most tasty, the most incredibly enriching experience in life, and God says heaven is better than that.

Nobody has even imagined how cool, how great, how beautiful, how amazing, how pleasurable it's going to be to live in heaven. The reason why most people do not want to go to heaven is because as I said, everything you've learned about heaven is wrong.

Every movie generally makes heaven totally white. Why would a God who invented color make heaven all white?

Okay. And you got fog at your feet about a foot deep. Okay. So you can't see your feet. You're walking around in fog the whole time, totally white, wearing a white robe. You may have wings, which is not what you're going to have. You're not going to be an angel in heaven. We talked about that last week. And you're playing a harp. That would be hell to me.

If that's what heaven is like, I would say, no, thank you, God. I think I'd rather just stay here with the surf and the sunsets. Because this is a broken world, but it's still pretty beautiful. Heaven is in no way going to be like anything you've ever seen on a movie. The Bible says you can't even imagine.

So I can't really explain it because we do not have the capacity. But what I can do, it's actually easier to tell you what's not going to be in heaven. And that is a big deal because when you know what's not going to be in heaven, that makes it a cool place too.

You see, you know what's here on Earth. And there's a lot of stuff here on Earth that you do not like. And it's not going to be in heaven. Now, there's a lot of verses on this in the Bible. Let me just show you a couple. John, who is one of the 12 people who followed Jesus originally, the disciples, when he's an old man, God gives him a glimpse of heaven. And he writes a book, it's the last book in the Bible called The Revelation, not Revelations, not plural, it's The Book of the Revelation, it's a single vision.

And let me just show you a couple of examples of that. In Revelation 21, verses 22 to verse 27, John mentions nine things that are not going to be in heaven. Look at this. Here what it says. In verse chapter 21, Revelation. He says, there's no temple there. In heaven, there's no temple. Why?

Do not need it. God's everywhere in heaven. Why would we need a special building to go and meet and pray with him? Anybody can talk to him anytime. He's all over. There's no temple in heaven. The Bible says, there's no sun or moon in heaven. They're unnecessary because God's glory shines bright and lights up everything. So he's the powerhouse. There's no sun, no moon in heaven.

Then it says, there are no shut gates in heaven. Why? No crime. There's no need to, nobody has to shut a gate. Nobody has to lock anything. There are no keys in heaven.

Why? Because nobody locks anything in heaven. Why? Because nobody commits crimes in heaven. So he says, there's no gates. Gates are built for protection. You do not need any protection in heaven. You do not need a key. Nothing is locked in heaven because there's no sin there. There's no no no shut gates.

Then it says, and there's no night there. In heaven, there's no night. You do not need it. Why? Well, you do not get tired in heaven for one thing. You do not get tired. And second, God's glory, his brightness, shines for, everywhere.

Then it says, there's nothing impure or unclean in heaven. So everything is pure. You've got pure water, you've got pure air, your body is pure, everything is pure, everything is clean. For some of you, that would be heaven. Nothing dirty in heaven.

Now, some people say, I do not care if it's dirty or not. I do not mind dirt. But some of you, you're kind of neatniks and there's nothing unclean in heaven. Everything's clean there, it's pure, it's clean. There's no immorality in heaven, which is why some people probably do not want to go to heaven.

Okay. Because there's no immorality in heaven. All right. But here's a big one, no shame in heaven. Can you imagine living for the rest of your life with not ever feeling shame?

How great that would be. No guilt, no regrets, no shame. The Bible says that heaven is a shame-free zone, that that emotion is not even existent in heaven. No one ever feels ashamed of anything. Nobody ever feels inferior in anything. Nobody ever feels insecure in anything. Nobody ever feels shame of any kind in heaven. That's going to be the environment living in the love of God. There's no shame in heaven.

And the Bible says, there's no deceit in heaven. Everybody tells the truth. You can't tell a lie. There's no possibility for a lie in heaven because Jesus said, I am the truth. And his followers walk in truth. There are no lies, no deceit in heaven. So somebody tells you something in heaven, you know it's truth because there's no lying in heaven. Nothing's there.

And then it says, only people whose names are written in the Lamb's Book of Life are there. That means it's reserved. It's reserved for God's children. Everybody is created by God. And everybody is loved by God. But not everybody is a child of God. You have to ask to get in God's family. How did you get in your family?

There's only two ways to get into a family: be born into it or be adopted into it. And both of those terms are used in the Bible. It's called being born again into the family of God and being adopted into the family of God. When you stepped across the line and put your faith in Christ, you were adopted into the family of God and you were born again into the family of God. Both of those metaphors are true in your life.

And so he says the people who are in the Lamb's Book of Life, they, they're there. Now, how is heaven different? Well, as I said, it's the stuff that's not there. Let me show you another verse. In the same chapter, Revelation 21:4, it gives us three or four other things that won't be in heaven.

It says, God will wipe away all tears from their eyes. There's no tears in heaven. And there shall be no more death in heaven. There will be no more sorrow in heaven. There will be no more crying in heaven. And there will be no more pain in heaven. All of that has gone forever. Wow. I'm in.

I'm in. I want to be in a place for eternity where there's no more pain, no more sorrow, no more death, no more crying. That is the goodness of God. Why is there's pain and death and sorrow and crying here? Because we do not follow God the way we should here.

We follow our own things, we hurt each other, we hurt ourselves by making dumb decisions. You get hurt unintentionally and intentionally. You get hurt by other people's decisions, then there is sorrow, there is death. The wages of sin is death here. But when Christ has paid for all your sins, there's no more death. Nobody's ever going to die in heaven.

There will never be a funeral in heaven. There's no sorrow, there's no grief in heaven, because there's no loss in heaven. There's no crying in heaven. This is the place you want to be for eternity.

This is the place. And if you've lived a life of chronic pain, and some of you have lived in chronic pain for years, or maybe your entire life, heaven's going to be a great relief to you, because there's no pain. No pain in heaven.

Now, this is all through scripture. I want to encourage you to do your own study on this. If you were to look up the phrase no more, and look up the phrase no longer, and study that through the Bible, you would find a list of many, many, many things that are not going to be in heaven.

The Bible actually says no gloom in heaven, says no terrorist in heaven. Yeah, says it. A lot of other things that it says that won't be there in heaven because it's a perfect place.

So, we know that God has planned a beautiful place for us forever. Now, you know, last week, I gave you a gratitude list and I did a thing called from A to Z, God's goodness to me. And I just took letters and I said, here's 26 different ways God has been good to you.

This week I made another gratitude list. And what it is, things I'm grateful won't be in heaven. So, I just thought I'd read them to you. From A to Z. Things I'm glad and grateful won't be in heaven. A. Accidents, aches, anxiety, acne, and ants.

Won't be in heaven. B. Bullies, broken hearts, bad hair days. None in heaven. Baldness. I'll throw that one in too. Okay. C. In heaven, no cancer, no crime, no car trouble, no cavities, no cellulite.

D. No dead ends in heaven, no delays, no dirty dishes, no diapers, no dementia. Everybody's going to be sharp in heaven. E. No earthquakes or errors, no failures, no garbage, no hunger, no irritations, insecurities, injustice, or indigestion.

None of that will be in heaven. No, J. No June gloom in heaven. No keys to misplace, because you do not need any keys where nothing is locked. L. No lawyers in heaven.

Now, I'm not picking on lawyers, but the Bible says there won't be any preachers in heaven either. Because they're not going to need them. And there won't be any police in heaven. And a lot of us are going to have to get new careers. In fact, the only career that we actually know will continue for certain, will be worship leaders.

Because we're going to worship in heaven. So, if you're a worship leader, you got job security. But if you're a nurse, start looking for another job, because we do not need any nurses in heaven because there are no hospitals in heaven. Okay. M. No misunderstandings or miscommunication or mosquitoes.

Can't you imagine being able to have a conversation with somebody of the opposite sex in heaven and they actually understood you? That would be heaven. Oh, but I thought you meant. You're going to get it right off the bat. There will be no miscommunication, no misunderstandings, which means no conflict.

Okay. N. Nose hair. None in heaven. Old age. P. There will be no prejudice in heaven, no political campaigns. That would be worth it just to go to heaven for that one. Okay. No political campaigns. Man, I'm ready to go now for that one.

No quarrels, or racist, no racism, no refugee camps, no receding hair lines. S. This is a big one. No sales calls.

That would be rest. That would be peace of mind. Not having somebody call you and try to take a survey. T. No traffic, and most of all, no taxes in heaven. Okay. W. No worry, or wars, or weeds. Not to pull any weeds in heaven. X, Y, Z, I do not write it down, you can make those up yourself.

But the bottom line is, we know that heaven is going to, what is going to be great, for what will not be there, as well as the stuff that we do not understand will be there because we're not capable of understanding those dimensions. As I mentioned last week, we live in a world that is three-dimensional. But Einstein proved that there are many other dimensions that we do not even understand. And there's a time-space continuum and the way things warp and other dimensions that we're just barely beginning to understand.

So God can be multidimensional in ways we're not even aware of in, in heaven. All right? So that's an important thing. Now, what are we going to do in heaven? That's a big one. That's a big question, because a lot of people are like, you know, when people write put on tombstones, they write RIP. Rest in peace.

In heaven. Okay. Okay, yeah. Well, I'd like to rest, maybe for a few weeks. But do I want to rest for all of eternity? No. You're not going to rest for all of eternity in heaven. God did not create you just for a permanent retirement to veg out and do nothing.

So, there will be interesting things to do. And let me give you, first place, what are we going to do in heaven? Well, a lot of the stuff you can do here on Earth, you're going to be able to do in heaven. You'll be able to eat in heaven, but not gain weight. You're going to you're going to be able to sleep in heaven, you're going to be you party in heaven.

You can obviously breathe, you can talk, you can fellowship. There's a lot of stuff you do now. You can relax in heaven, you can pray, you can sing. We know that God created you on Earth for five purposes. And all and four of those five, you're going to do in heaven.

You're going to worship God. You're going to love him and worship him. You're going to fellowship with other believers. That's all that's going to be there. You're going to serve God with your giftedness. You're going to grow. You're not going to stay the same in heaven. The only thing you're not going to do in heaven is talk to unbelievers about the Lord, your mission, your witness, your evangelism.

Why? Because there are not any there. Have you ever thought about this? That there are only two things that you can't do in heaven that you can do on Earth. Only two.

Everything else you can do in heaven that you're doing here on Earth. In heaven, you can't sin. There's no sin in heaven. You won't be able to do that. And second, you can't witness to an unbeliever, tell somebody the good news about Christ's love and forgiveness. Because they're they're not any there.

So, if God leaves you here on Earth, have you ever thought about why does God leave me here on Earth? Once I step across the line, once I become a believer, why doesn't God just kill me and take me instantly to heaven? Because it's a whole lot cooler there than here.

Why does God leave me in a place of sorrow, suffering, sadness, sickness, you know, stress, problems, pressures, troubles, temptations, stress, and all of the other things that happen in life. Why doesn't God just if he knows I'm I'm I'm in the family, my name's in the Book of Life. Why didn't he just take me?

Well, as I said, there are only two things you can't do in heaven. Now, he could leave you here for those two things. One, he could leave you here so you could sin. I do not think so. Or he could just leave you here to tell other people about him.

Which of those two do you think God left you here to do? He wants you to pass it on. The only reason you're going to heaven is because somebody told you. Have you told anybody? Is anybody going to heaven because of you? Have you shared the good news with anybody else?

If you have no intention of ever telling anybody the good news how to get to heaven, or even how to come to church and find out about it, why didn't God just take you on now? And so you spare you all the suffering and the sorrow and the sadness and the, you know, and the sickness and all of that kind of stuff.

So, he leaves you here to tell others.

Pastor Rick Warren: Hey, thanks so much for listening to today's show. Rick wants to encourage you with a closing thought. God has five purposes for your life. He wants you to know and love him. That's called worship. He wants you to belong to his family. That's called fellowship. He wants you to grow in him. That's called discipleship. He wants you to serve him with your gifts and talents. That's your ministry. And he wants you to share the good news with other people. That's your mission.

Now, today, as we close, I want to talk to you about the third purpose, discipleship, or personal growth. How do we grow? Well, we grow through the nourishment of God's word. It's how we get to know God. To know God's word is to know God's will. God's word is the source of God's will.

And God's ultimate goal for your life is for you to become like Jesus Christ. To do that, you have to fill your life with the word of Jesus Christ. Second Timothy 3:17 says, Through the word, we're put together and shaped for the tasks that God asked for us.

I remember in the Old Testament, the Bible says that Job treasured God's word more than his daily bread. That's how I want you to treat God's word. That's how you grow in discipleship. Get into his word every day. Study it, memorize it, meditate on it, apply it, never take it for granted. God's word is as essential to your soul as food is to your body. So, get into the word today. God bless you. Be sure to join us next time as we look into God's word for our daily hope. This program is sponsored by Pastor Rick's Daily Hope and your generous financial support.