My Heaven lesson from Sunday

Has anyone ever been to Disney World? 

At this point I ended up asking two boys and two girls to describe Disney World.

Does anybody doubt that these two people are telling the truth?  If you’ve been to Disney World, do you believe this person has as well?  Is there anyone here who does not believe that Disney World exists?

We believe in places like Disney World, even if we have never been.  We believe because we’ve seen photos and heard stories from friends.

Has anyone ever been to Heaven?  Have you seen pictures or talked to anyone who has been there?

Heaven is a real place.  The Bible tells us that it is real, but how do we know?  We’ve never been there.  No one alive has been there.  How can we trust that when we die, that we will see Heaven?

If you are a Christian, then you do know someone who has been there.  He’s there now, and he is preparing a place for all who believe in him.  Not only does Jesus live there, but he is the king and our creator.  We can believe heaven is real because we believe the truth about Jesus rising from the dead.

My mother had a baby girl when I was three who lived less than a month.  I knew and thought about death at a young age.  When I was about 7, my mother had mentioned something about heaven when we were watching a movie in Sunday School.  I asked if it was real, and she said yes.  So I believed so that I could see my sister someday.  I also believed in Jesus so I could go there.  When I was about 6th grade I began to believe in Jesus because I loved Jesus and it brought me through many friendship heartbreaks in school.  It also kept me going when my mother passed away 8 years ago.  Even though I am still sad, I have hope.

1 Corinthians 15:12-22

¹² Now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? ¹³ But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. ¹⁴ And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. ¹⁵ We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised. ¹⁶ For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. ¹⁷ And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. ¹⁸ Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. ¹⁹ If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.
²⁰ But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. ²¹ For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. ²² For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.

Paul had written to a group of believers who doubted that people would rise from the dead.  Paul assured them that the dead will rise again.  We can believe this because we know Jesus rose from the grave.  Because Jesus lives, we know that we can live again.  And when God raised Jesus from the dead, he gave us the ultimate proof of the existence of heaven and himself that could be seen and touched by people.

All people, whether they believed in Jesus or not, will rise from the dead, and the ones who believed will live with Jesus not in heaven, but on the new earth when Jesus returns.  Those who did not give their lives to Jesus will suffer in hell forever.

As for now, Jesus is preparing a place called Heaven for believers who die.  There is no sin there; nobody will ever disobey God.  Also, there is no sickness or dying.  It is the very good creation that God made before Adam and Eve sinned.

Not everybody will be in heaven, but I hope that all the people in this room will be.  If you happily believe in the Lord Jesus and that he came and died and rose from the dead, then you will live with him forever when you die.  If you would like to know more about Jesus and how you can believe in him, you can always talk to me or Mr. Mike or Erica or Amy or any adult leader, and we will be glad to talk and pray with you.

Do you know one of the best things about heaven?  If you believe, then God has sent you his Holy Spirit to live in you.  You have access to Jesus, and you experience heaven now and don’t have to wait until you die.  No, you can’t see your dead relatives yet or live in a sin-free world, but you still have heaven now and must work to make this world more like heaven until the day you die or whenever Christ comes back.

Some people refuse to believe in heaven because they cannot see it.  You cannot find it on a map.  You can’t sail to it beyond the stars like they do in Star Trek.  How can we trust that Heaven is real?

Have you heard of air?  Can you see it?  How do you know it is real?

 

You can’t see air, but you can see what it does.  It makes bubbles in the water.  You can feel it move if the wind is blowing.  It can destroy houses if it becomes a tornado or a hurricane.

 

Why don’t people believe?

How can we know about heaven?  Romans 1:18-23

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. 19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. 20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. 21 For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools, 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.

This passage says that God will judge people who refuse to believe in him because God has made it obvious that he exists through creation.  Mountains, oceans, stars, and people with their complex biological systems could not have come from nothing.  God made everything and made it for his glory, and the reason we don’t see him now is because Adam and Eve sinned and we have all been born in sin.  Sin separates us from God because we will die if we come to our perfect Lord on our own.  People refuse to believe in heaven because they love themselves and their sins and want to do what they want to do and not what God wants to do. 

Thank the Lord that sent Jesus as a baby who grew to be a man that lived the only perfect life ever.  Because of that, only he could die for our sins and live again.  And it is only through Jesus’s blood that we can come to God and not die in our sins.  You must believe in this to be saved from hell.  And when you believe, you will have the Holy Spirit who will change you so that you do not love your sin anymore and will want to obey God more.  Once again, I will be glad to pray with you and so will Mr. Mike or Mark or any other adult leader.

 

God’s not in the sky

In 1997, a band called Zilch wrote this song.  I would like to play it for you.

 

I thought about it for a while, and let in questions for the asking,

She asked if God was just a slob like us,

Maybe something there is lacking.

My God's not it the sky; he's here with you and I,

Just ask me if I die; my God's not in the sky.

Let me tell you all my thoughts on God, 'cause I just met with him this morning,

He gives me peace, so I can wear a smile while others drown in melancholy, bitter, sadness - all this man is.

My God's not it the sky; he's here with you and I,

Just ask me if I die; my God's not in the sky, yeah,

My God's not it the sky; he's here with you and I,

Just ask me if I die; my God's not in the sky.

And I know you feel the need to know for sure,

You want to find him; he will find you.

My God's not it the sky; he's here with you and I,

Just ask me if I die; my God's not in the sky, oh yeah,

My God's not it the sky; he's here with you and I,

Just ask me if I die; my God's not in the sky.

 

At the same time, there was a song called “One of Us” by a lady who does not love Jesus who asked, “What if God was one of us, a slob like one of us?”  It’s a very insulting song.  She totally missed the point of Jesus.  He was God, and he was completely human and was one of us.  Through the Spirit, he is still among us.  And that way, heaven is not in the sky but all around us.  We aren’t in it, but we experience it every day if we are Christians.  We can praise God every day that he did not leave us to die in our sins but sent Jesus to save us.

 
 

Mark: belief and what "Christ" means

Mark 8:22-38
In this, Jesus heals a blind man near Bethsaida.  Then he asks his disciples who they think he is. Peter says that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God.  Jesus praises him.  Then he tells them that he is going to suffer, die on a cross, and rise again in three days.  Peter rebukes him, and then Jesus calls him Satan and reiterates that the Christ is called to die for the sins of the his people and that his followers must also be willing to die.

When Jesus heals the blind man near Bethsaida, it's weird because he has to do it twice.  Commentators speculate that this is because Bethsaida is one of the towns that Jesus denounced as having no faith.  If he had preached to Sodom and Gomorrah, they would have repented faster than Bethsaida.  But just because Jesus or his disciples shake the dust off of their feet at a town does not mean that they give up on individuals in that town.  This man came to Jesus, and he healed his blindness partially.  The man could see people as trees walking.  Then Jesus healed him the rest of the way, and he could see clearly.  It makes me wonder if Jesus was testing his faith much like he tested that Syro-Phoenecian woman from the previous episode.

Next, he gives his disciples the ultimate test.  Who do people say he is?  Many say he was a good prophet, Elijah reincarnate, or even a good preacher.  Who do the duh-sciples say he is?  Impulsive Peter blurts out what everyone is thinking, which is why everyone loves him.  Jesus is the Christ, God the Son, sent to earth to save his people.  In Matthew, Jesus praises what he says and says that the church is built on the rock.  Jesus renames Simon "Peter", which means "rock".  Jesus did not say that the church was built on Peter, but on what Peter said.  The church is made of people who believe that Jesus is Christ.

But that is not the focus of Mark.  Mark focuses on who Jesus is and what that means.  That is why he skips Jesus's praise and goes to Jesus saying that he will die on a cross and then be raised from the dead three days later.  This did not agree with what his followers thought Messiah meant.  The Messiah would free Israel from Roman occupation and make them independent again.  But Jesus had in mind the real problem, the sin of all humanity.  People cannot pay for their sins, and even in an independent Israel, they are still going to die.  And God made both Jews and non-Jews in his image.  Jesus came to die for the sins of his chosen church made of people from all nations.

And that is why on this last week before Christmas break, I'm singing music mixed with both Christmas and crucifixion songs.  I still did not tell people my logic behind picking my music this year, since talking doesn't come easily to me, but I still followed a theme and at least got to talk about it here.  I'll continue more in the new year.

Mark: God's dogs and our self-satisfaction

Mark 7:24-8;21

Just had another debate with the Pharisees about uncleanness.  Now he encounters a Gentile woman who needs her demon-possessed daughter healed.  The Jewish people considered non-Jewish people to be "dogs".  Dogs were not the beloved pets that they are now.  They were dirty scavengers to be avoided.  That is how the Jews saw non-Jews.

And Jesus himself truly did come to Israel first because that was his first nation called under his name.  Although his message was to all kinds of people, he first wanted his nation to hear it while he walked the earth.  This is why when the woman comes, he essentially calls her a dog.  But either he says it with a warm smile on his face or she is desperate enough to see her daughter healed.  She keeps asking and says that even the dogs are getting the crumbs from the main table.  Jesus is focusing on just the Jews, but the rest of the world is watching and getting some of the message.  Jesus gladly heals her.

He then goes on to heal the deaf and dumb man from the same region near Phoenicia and he feeds 4000 people who are mostly Gentile.  Just like with the 5000, the disciples forgot what Jesus could do, but he still graciously multiplied his bread so that all could eat.   Then, Jesus and his disciples go sailing along and Jesus says do beware the leaven of the Pharisees.  The duh-sciples, as they are called by us (which is unfair because we make the same mistakes), still thought he was talking about them forgetting about the bread.  No, Jesus was warning them not to be so self-satisfied.  God chose Israel as his nation and he chose all believers as his people, but he did not have to do so. His grace is a gift and not earned.  He forgives sin because he wants to.  He is a savior by nature.  We must extend the same grace to all people.