Acts 9:36-43: How Tabitha Did What She Could

INTRODUCTION

The story is told about a clerk in a hardware store named Eddie. Eddie was a slow-moving inefficient employee, and eventually he was let go.

A customer came into the story and noticed that Eddie was missing. He  asked, “Where’s Eddie. Is he sick.”

The owner said, “Nope. Eddie doesn’t work here any more.”

“Do you have anyone in mind for the vacancy?” asked the customer.

The answer he got was: “Nope, Eddie didn’t leave no vacancy.”

Some people, when they are gone, are hardly missed. Others leave a hole in the lives of those they leave behind that can never be filled.

The church has its heroes—people like St. Paul, St. Augustine, St. Francis, Mother Teresa, Martin Luther, John Wesley, and Billy Graham.

But far more important than those famous men and women of God are the multitudes of ordinary people who have quietly served God by serving others, without any special recognition for their efforts.

We read about some of these in the Bible—a man named Ebed-Melech, an Ethiopian who saved Jeremiah’s life when he was thrown into the cistern and left to die. I think of Euodia and Syntyche, who struggled side-by-side with Paul in the work of the gospel. I think of the little slave girl who saved her pagan master’s life by telling him about the Prophet Elisha, who could cure him of his leprosy.

All through the ages, it has been the insignificant people—who have had the biggest part in passing the faith down through the ages.

The mothers and fathers who were godly examples to their children both in words and in deeds—the Good Samaritans, who have done what they could, even sometimes when it was dangerous and costly.

Today I want to talk about a woman we read about in the book of Acts, a lady who made a place for herself in the lives of a few needy people and became an example for us all.

As I said, this woman was as far as we know was not unusually gifted, but something remarkable happened to her that got her story in the Bible.

Here it is, as related in Acts 9:36-42:

Now there was at Joppa a disciple named Tabitha, which means Dorcas or Gazelle. She was full of good works and acts of charity. In those days she fell sick and died; and when they had washed her, they laid her in an upper room. Since Lydda was near Joppa, the disciples, hearing that Peter was there, sent two men to him entreating him, “Please come to us without delay.”

So Peter rose and went with them. And when he had come, they took him to the upper room.

All the widows stood beside him weeping and showing coats and garments which Dorcas made while she was with them.

But Peter put them all outside and knelt down and prayed; then turning to the body, he said, “Tabitha rise.”

And she opened her eyes, and when she saw Peter, she sat up. And he gave her his hand and lifted her up.

Then calling the saints and widows he presented her alive.

And it became known throughout all Joppa, and many believed in the Lord.

In almost every church we’ve ever been a part of one of the women’s circles has been called the Dorcas Circle.

Here’s why.

I. This lady has three names in the Bible. “Dorcas” is the Greek translation of her name. “Tabitha” was the name she was called by in her own language. “Gazelle is what her name means in English. I’ll call her “Tabitha” because that’s what she was actually called by in her own language—Aramaic—the language Jesus spoke.

A. Tabitha was remarkable because—as we read in verse 36—“she was full of good works and acts of charity.”

Tabitha showed her faith by her kind deeds. One of the great commentators on the Bible (Matthew Henry) says this about Tabitha: “Tabitha was full of good works as a tree is full of fruit. Many are full of good words and barren of good works, but Tabitha was a great doer, no great talker.”

B. Tabitha was evidently a person greatly valued in the little community of Christians in Joppa, because when she died, the church sent two of their members to tell Peter.

I wonder how they came to have the faith that Peter could help them. I think this story indicates that miracles were more common in the early church than even the book of Acts suggests.

Still, I wonder that they thought Peter could raise her back to life. As far as we know Peter hadn’t ever raised a person from the dead. Where did he get the faith to think that he could pray this woman back to life?

II. We might think: Well, what’s so remarkable about a woman who made clothes for poor people?

A. I need to tell you that making clothes was a bigger deal in those days than it is now.

Yarn had to be spun by hand, a thread at a time.

Then the fabric had to be woven by hand.

Then the garment had to be stitched together by hand.

Clothes were very costly.

Many poor people would have had only the clothes they were wearing. When Jesus told his followers to “clothe” the naked, he meant it literally. A poor person might find it difficult to find even a rag with which to cover himself or herself.

One of the laws as found in Exodus 22:26 stipulated that if anyone gave his outer garment in pledge for a loan, it had to be given back when night came, “for”—as the law read—“it is his only covering, his cloak for his body: in what else can he sleep?”

Making clothes wasn’t Tabitha’s hobby. It was her “mission.”

B. In the ancient world—and in many places today—to be a widow was to be destitute.

People died young, and many women became widows at an early age.

There were few jobs with which a widow could support herself.

Many widows had no children old enough to provide for them.

One of the glories of the early church was its care for their poor, especially widows.

Widows made up the majority of the poor. We see this in Acts 6. One of the first ministries the infant church undertook was the care for its widows. Each of the new churches in the growing Christian movement must have been a magnet for the poor widows in its area.

There’s quite a bit about caring for widows in the Bible.

III. Let’s try to imagine the scene that greeted Peter as he entered that upstairs room.

A. Tabitha’s body is lying on a bed in the middle of the room, washed and prepared for burial.

Around the body of Tabitha the widows were standing and weeping, showing the clothes Tabitha had made for them.

I have pictured the widows holding these garments up in their hands for Peter to see, but the commentators tell us that the Greek verb indicated that they are wearing the clothes that they are calling to Peter’s attention.

B. We see Peter enter the room and shooing all the people from the room and then falling to his knees and praying.

This was a powerful prayer, and Peter needed to give it all his attention.

When he knew that God had heard his prayer, he stood up, turned to the body and said, “Tabitha, get up!”

“And she opened her eyes, and when she saw Peter, she sat up. And he took her by the hand and helped her up.”

Then Peter went to the door and called “the saints and widows.” And what a scene of rejoicing that must have been!

I like that term “saints and widows.” The saints are all of God’s believing people. The widows are God’s needy people. The saints and widows are the ones who get to see God working while the unbelieving world still doesn’t have a clue.

CONCLUSION

Those garments on the backs of those widows glorified God. They bore witness to his mercy and testified to the goodness of his people.

I can imagine that when Tabitha was sick a great chorus of prayer went up to God for her, and even after she died, the poor widows who loved her kept praying as they wept.

So when she came alive again, it wasn’t only Peter’s prayer that was being answered, but also the prayers of those who loved this good woman.

Tabitha did what she could. She saw a need and she considered her opportunities and her skills—and she opened her purse and bought cloth—or wove it herself—and went to work with her scissors and needle.

Let us give thanks for the Tabithas in our lives.

Some of you have been Tabithas. You’ve done what you could. I hope that you are still doing what you can.

Know that you are dear to God.

A church volunteer worker was making the rounds in a hospital, bringing cheer to patients and helping them in many little ways. A patient noticed by her tag that she was affiliated with a certain church. He asked, “Are you hired by the church to do this work?”

“O no,” she replied. “We are volunteers.”

The patient asked, “Why?”

The volunteer replied, “I love the Lord, and this is one way I can express it, by helping others.”

The patient was puzzled: “You mean, you do this for nothing?”

“Oh no,” the volunteer replied, “we do it for something—for the hope that we can bring comfort to you who are sick and share with you our Savior’s love and strength.”

The man was quiet for a few moments and then replied, “If the church really cares that much about us sick folks, maybe there is still hope for this old world of ours.”

Thinking about Tabitha reminds me of a great saying from Saint Augustine:

“What does love look like?

It has hands to help others.

It has feet to hasten to the poor and needy.

It has eyes to see misery and want.

It has ears to hear the sighs and sorrows of people.

That’s what love looks like.”

2 Timothy 4:6-8: A Life Well Spent

INTRODUCTION

The favorite topic for conversation at Village Place is stories from our past.

We love to reminiscence about the good times long ago.

Sometimes we even enjoy recalling struggles and difficulties and tribulations we have endured.

Someone said, “What’s bitter to experience is sweet to recall.”

That’s not always true, but sometimes we do get satisfaction from recalling the times when we struggled against long odds, refused to give up, and proved to ourselves that we had the faith and courage to stick it out.

I don’t know what we old people would do without our memories.

A famous psychiatrist wrote in one of his books that he doesn’t envy young people. Young people have possibilities in the future; but instead of possibilities, we old people have realities in our past—the reality of work done and of love loved and of sufferings bravely suffered. He says, “Those sufferings are even the things of which I am most proud—though these are things which cannot inspire envy” (Viktor Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning, (pp125 and 151).

When I was a sophomore at the University of Kansas, my English professor assigned us to write an essay on the subject: “What Success Means to Me.”

I was a new Christian and had been reading Second Timothy and was impressed with the words St. Paul wrote in his last letter included in our Bible—a letter he wrote not long before he was executed for his faith.

When our professor asked us to write about success, I thought right away of these sentences in Second Timothy 4:6-8:

I am already on the point of being sacrificed;

the time of my departure has come.

I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness,

which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that Day,

and not only to me but also to all who have loved his appearing.

I. As we near the end of life, we see things more as they really are than we ever did before.

A. Probably, like all of us, Paul had regrets. He knew he was a sinner: he had failed miserably at times. In his first letter to Timothy, Paul referred to himself as the chief of sinners (1 Timothy 1:15).

I have regrets and you have regrets.

In one of his letters, Paul writes about his attitude toward his failures in the past. He writes, “One thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:13).

B. As we get old and look back on our lives we see the real value of things.

We have little desire to tell people about our business successes, or about the degrees we earned, or awards we’ve received.

We talk about how we survived the Great Depression.

We talk about the work we did and about the satisfaction we received from it.

A favorite topic of conversation for men my age is our experiences in the army or navy during World War 2 or Korea.

We talk about life on the farm. We talk about our school days.

We talk about our children and grandchildren.

These are the things in the past that we value.

II. Paul writes, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith…

A. Life was, for Paul, a struggle.

Do you remember the story of Paul’s conversion on the Road to Damascus in Acts 9?

Jesus told Paul to go into the city and he would be told what to do.

In the meantime God visited an old disciple named Ananias.

God sent Ananias to meet Paul. He said, “Go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the sons of Israel; for I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.”

So Paul’s life was full of hardship and suffering. He was stoned and left for dead; he was imprisoned several times. He was hated and scorned. Some of the Christians turned against him. Some turned away from the faith.

Paul had some kind of a physical disability he called his “thorn in the flesh.”

And now he was facing death. He says, “I am already on the point of being sacrificed.”

B. Now Paul was in prison awaiting his beheading. But he was not despondent.

But he looked back on his struggles with satisfaction: “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith…”

According to my commentary, Paul is not thinking of fighting in a war but of the struggle of an athletic contest. A favorite sport among the ancients was wrestling. The Christian life is like a wrestling match.

We wrestle against our innate selfishness—the natural desire to “look out for number one.”

We wrestle against our own sinful inclinations—especially the desire to take the easy way.

We wrestle against the false values of the world that are contrary to God’s values.

Jesus warned that the way of the Cross would involve costly obedience. If you want an easy life, don’t follow Jesus!

C. Life for Paul—and for you and me—has been a fight: the main thing is not to give up!

I read about a famous Christian who refused to have his biography written in the days of his fame and when he was still alive. He said, “I have seen too many people fall out on the last lap of the race.”

Many have faithfully gone to church all their lives—but near the end they drop out. They still consider themselves Christians, but going to church is a thing of their past. They still think they believe, but they don’t do anything about their faith!

But you have not dropped out. The fact that you are here indicates that you are still in the race.

One of our residents asked me if we had a Lutheran service. When I told her we were non-denominational, she wasn’t interested.

I should have said, “Well, you know, there won’t be any Lutherans in Heaven—nor any Baptists or Methodists or Catholics or Presbyterians either.

In heaven we will have shed our labels—we will just be Christians, and we will love each other.”

Of course, going to church is only a small part of living for God—of keeping the faith. But it is still important to get to church—even if it’s a humble little service with an amateur preacher and weak singing.

It is important that we believers meet together to encourage one another.

It is important that we bear witness that we take our stand with those who love Jesus.

D. St. Bernard of Clairvaux, a saint of the Middle Ages wrote a beautiful hymn to Jesus. It ends this way:

“What language can I borrow

To thank thee dearest Friend

For this Thy dying sorrow,

Thy pity without end?

O make me Thine for ever,

And should I fainting be,

Lord, let me never, never

Outlive my love for Thee.”

CONCLUSION

I believe that you love God. You have served him as you were able.

You can take heart from these words of St. Paul.

You can look forward, as St. Paul, did to meeting Jesus and knowing that your work was not in vain.

Whether you’ve been successful or not…whether anyone has noticed your efforts or not…God noticed. God takes note of faithfulness.

This is also our encouragement to keep on to the end.

Our life is not yet over.

There is more of the fight to be fought.

There is more of the race to be run.

God still has things for you to do.

But in the end, we will finish the race and we will receive our “crown of righteousness”—our Lord’s words: “Well done, good and faithful servant; enter into the joy of your Lord”—and that’s something to look forward to.

“Little things are little things, but faithfulness in little things is something great.”

Genesis 5:21-24: What Does It Mean to “Walk with God”?

INTRODUCTION

You know what a pleasure it was to take a walk with your best friend.

You were sorry when you got to your destination because of the pleasure you had with each other on your journey.

My sister, Mary Lyn, used to walk home from school with her friend, Mary Jane. Mary Jane lived about half way between our house and school. They would get so involved in their conversation that often Mary Jane would continue past her house until they got to our house. But they were so engrossed in their conversation that Mary Lyn would head back with Mary Jane to her house, so that they could finish whatever they were talking about. When they got back to Mary Jane’s house, they would part and Mary Lyn would come on home alone.

Several times in the Bible we read about how one or another of the Bible characters “walked with God.”

The first time we read this is in Genesis 5:21-24:

“When Enoch had lived 65 years, he became the father of Methuselah. Enoch walked with God after the birth of Methuselah three hundred years, and had other sons and daughters. Thus all the days of Enoch were 365 years. Enoch walked with God; and he was not for God took him.”

I. Enoch’s story is way back in the beginning of the Bible, just after the story of Cain and Abel.

A. Six generations after Adam we come to this little story of Enoch.

All we know of Enoch is that he was the father of Methuselah, he had other sons and daughters, he lived for 365 years, he walked with God, and “he was not because God took him.”

B. We wonder: What did Enoch know about God? And how did he find it out?

Enoch had no Bible. He lived long before Abraham and Moses. Of course, he never heard of Jesus.

Enoch didn’t know that Jesus would die for his sins and be raised from the dead.

He didn’t know what the New Testament tells us about heaven.

But Enoch knew that there was a God, and he knew that God was his friend.

And people saw something in Enoch’s life that so impressed them that they said, “Enoch walks with God.”

And then one day Enoch disappeared from the face of the earth, and people were convinced that God had taken him.

And the memory of this obscure man was kept alive and passed down for hundreds of years until it was written in Genesis, the first book in the Bible in those four verses I just read.

II. So what does it mean to “walk with God”?

A. Life is a journey. Our day-to-day life is our walk through life.

Every day we walk a little farther, and finally we get to our destination.

Some people walk their journey through life more of less by themselves.

Some people have many companions on their journey.

If we are Christians we aim to make our journey with Jesus at our side.

B. To “walk with God” is to walk through my life with Jesus as my companion—a relationship of love and obedience and faithfulness and trust.

To walk with Jesus is to know that we are never alone.

In the Twenty-third Psalm we repeat: “Yea, though I go through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, thou art with me…”

It is easier for us than it was for Enoch because we know God in Jesus Christ.

We can picture the man, Jesus. Enoch just had to imagine God, but he knew he was there, and he loved him and trusted him all the way.

Jesus said to his disciples: “Lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the world.”

C. To walk with Jesus is to ask every day: “Jesus, what do you want me to do?”

To walk with Jesus is to love what he loves—and God loves people—all people.

To walk with Jesus is to be ready to serve—to encourage, to pray, to give, to listen.

To walk with God is to be generous in our judgments—instead of criticizing, to affirm people’s worth, to honor people.

To walk with Jesus is to be always thanking God.

To walk with God is to trust God instead of worrying about the things we can’t change.

To walk with God is to be sensitive to our sins, to be always repenting, to be always letting God cleanse us from sin.

To walk with Jesus is to offer my troubles and pains to God—to ask God to use my troubles and pains to make me a better, more understanding person, more tenderhearted—to get me ready for glory.

To walk with God is to “walk by faith, not by sight.” I don’t have to understand. I can live with questions. I only need to know what it is my duty to do.

D. To walk with God is to look ever toward the goal.

Walking with God isn’t just a stroll.

When we walk with God we are going somewhere—somewhere exciting—somewhere glorious. For the believer, the best is yet to come.

III. Then we read: “And he was not, for God took him.”

A. According to the tradition recorded in Hebrews 11:5: “By faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death; and he was not found, because God had taken him.”

Someone said that maybe Enoch was walking with God one day, and it was getting late, so God said to Enoch: “We’re nearer my house than yours, so why don’t you just come home with me tonight?”

B. Unless the Lord comes before we die—which is unlikely—we’ll exit  this world through that door called “death.”

So I pray that God will give me courage and confidence, so that when that day comes I can exit with grace.

This is what I pray for, because I want my homecoming to be a witness that God is real to me.

Archeologists found a crudely-carved little tombstone in Asia Minor (modern Turkey) from the fourth century after Christ, and on it are carved these words: “Here sleeps the blessed Chione, who has found Jerusalem, for she prayer much.”

Not another word is known about Chione, who was probably only a poor, peasant woman. But how lovely that someone was so impressed with the way Chione lived for God that he was sure she had reached the New Jerusalem. And so he carved those words of remembrance on her stone.

CONCLUSION

In Lloyd C. Douglas’s novel The Robe, Marcellus asked Justus, “Where do you think Jesus went?”

Justus replied, “I don’t know, my friend, I only know that he is alive. And I am always expecting to see him. Sometimes I feel aware of him, as if he were close by. “Justice smiled faintly, his eyes wet with tears. “It keeps you honest,” he went on. “You have no temptation to cheat anyone, or lie to anyone, or hurt anyone—when, for all you know, Jesus is standing beside you.”

“I’m afraid I should feel very uncomfortable,” remarked Marcellus, “being perpetually watched by some invisible presence.”

“Not if that presence helped you defend yourself against yourself, Marcellus. It is a great satisfaction to have someone standing by—to keep you at your best.”

I would add: “It is a great satisfaction to know that you have an all-powerful, loving Friend to walk with you through thick and thin and at the end to bring you to Glory.

In Psalm 73 the psalmist writes about a crisis of faith.

He seems to say, “Where are you, God? Why is life so unfair?”

Then he goes to the Temple. He goes into the sanctuary, and he understands.

He says to God:

Nevertheless I am always with you.

You hold me by my right hand.

You will guide me with your counsel

and afterward receive me into glory.

My flesh and heart may fail,

but God is the strength of my heart and my portion for ever.”

Mark 12:27: How Jesus Made the Case for the Resurrection

INTRODUCTION

Recently there have been several best-selling books of testimonies of people who claim to have died and experienced the joys of heaven.

Some people are impressed by these stories. Some people scoff at them.

You’ve heard of the recent best seller Heaven Is for Real. It is the story a little boy told his father, a pastor, about an experience the child had had in Heaven during a time when he was very ill. He saw people, including his grandfather, with halos around their heads and flying around with little wings. This story was even made into a movie.

A pastor, Don Piper, wrote a book entitled Ninety Minutes in Heaven. As Piper was driving back from a church conference a truck plowed into his car and killed him. Another minister, driving by, saw the body, and even though he knew that Piper was dead, he prayed for him, and Piper revived. The book is mostly about Piper’s painful recovery. The story is convincing to many. But skeptics are doubtful.

Then there is the book by the neurosurgeon, Dr. Eben Alexander, Proof of Heaven, a book that has created quite a stir. I checked it out from the library. It is pretty technical. I didn’t finish it. I didn’t need that book to convince me of the reality of the world to come.

My favorite story about heaven is in a fascinating book, A Window to Heaven, by Dr. Diane Komp, a pediatric oncologist, a member of the faculty of Yale Medical School. Dr. Komp took care of children who were dying of leukemia back in the days when there was little that could be done to prolong the lives victims of that disease.

Dr. Komp was an agnostic but became a Christian because of the testimony of dying children she cared for. Here is one of her stories:

She was treating a little girl named Anna. Anna had gone in and out of remission many times, and at the age of seven was facing her death. Dr. Komp, along with the child’s parents, was at Anna’s bedside.

Here it is in the doctor’s words: “Before she died, Anna mustered the final energy to sit up in her hospital bed and say: ‘The angels—they’re so beautiful! Mommy, can you see them? Do you hear their singing? I’ve never heard such beautiful singing!’ Then little Anna lay back on her pillow and died.”

Dr. Komp remarks, “Anna’s parents reacted as if they had been given the most precious gift in the world. Together we contemplated a spiritual mystery that transcended our understanding and experience. For weeks to follow, the thought that stuck in my head was: Have I found a reliable witness?”

In the end Dr. Komp decided she had found a reliable witness, and became a convinced believer and has written several books about faith.

I honestly don’t know what to think of some of these stories. I remember the story in the gospels of how Jesus raised a 12-year-old girl from the dead. We don’t know what that girl had experienced while she was dead, but Jesus told her parents, “Don’t tell anyone” (Mark 5:43).

Jesus also raised his friend Lazarus who had been dead four days. But the gospels don’t record any testimony from Lazarus about his a visit to heaven (John 11).

Jesus himself was raised from the dead, nothing is recorded in the New Testament about his experience in heaven.

St. Paul tells of a time when he was caught up into the third heaven and saw things too wonderful to be told. But he tells us is that he was given a thorn in the flesh—a messenger of Satan—to keep him from boasting (2 Corinthians 12).

Stories about visits to Heaven are to be helpful for some people, but faith for most of us comes in other ways than testimonies of out-of-the-body experiences.

Our faith doesn’t rest on our belief in heaven.

Many people believe in heaven who have no saving faith in Christ.

Our faith rests in Jesus, and it is he we need to trust, and it is he to whom we must commit our lives in faith and obedience, in love and in service.

When we experience Jesus in our own lives, then we know it’s true.

This is the way it’s been all through history. We come to faith through a personal experience with Jesus Christ. And we live by faith, not by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7).

I. Here is how Jesus made the case for the resurrection:

A. In Jesus’s day most Jews believed in the Resurrection, but some didn’t. They were the party of the Sadducees.

In Mark 12:18-27 we read of some Sadducees who came to Jesus with a question they considered a real “stumper”:

The Sadducees—who say there is no resurrection—came to him; and they asked him a question, saying, “Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies and leaves a wife, but leaves no child, the man must take the wife, and raise up children for his brother. There were seven brothers; the first took a wife, and when he died left no children; and the second took her, and died, leaving no children; and the third likewise; and the seven left no children. Last of all, the woman also died. In the resurrection whose wife will she be? For the seven had her as wife.”

This is sort of like if someone would tell a story about a missionary who was killed, cooked and eaten by a cannibal. Now suppose the cannibal later became a Christian: “How could God raise up both the missionary and the cannibal, since part of the cannibal’s body had belonged to the missionary?”

Here is how Jesus answered the Sadducees’ question:

Jesus said to them, “Is not this why you are wrong that you know neither the scriptures nor the power of God? For when they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. And as for the dead being raised, have you not read in the book of Moses, in the passage about the bush, how God said to Moses, ‘I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is not God of the dead but of the living: you are quite wrong.”

B. You remember the story: Moses was herding the sheep belonging to his father-in-law, and he saw a bush burning but not burning up, so, we read, “he turned aside this great sight, why the bush didn’t burn up.”

Then God began to speak to him out of the bush:

I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.”

C. So what is the point Jesus is making?

Jesus is saying that if God is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, he loved them. He was their friend. They were his people.

If God is God, he doesn’t enter into a relationship with people he loves and then just throw them away.

Jesus is telling the Sadducees that of course these people who God had loved and who belonged to him are alive somewhere, somehow, and in God’s keeping.

This interpretation may have surprised the person who wrote the story in Exodus, because in ancient Israel of the Old Testament there is little evidence of a belief in a glorious afterlife. In fact, many of the Old Testament were quite gloomy about what they might experience after their death.

Our Lord makes the case that when God takes hold of a person and draws that person to himself, he’s not going to ever let him or her go.

II. But, although Jesus’s answer to the Sadducees assures us that there is a resurrection for us who are God’s children, we still have questions. And that is why books like the ones I mentioned at the first are so popular. So what do we know for sure about heaven, except that there is such a place?

A. We can discard the silly idea that heaven is up in the sky somewhere, where people sit on clouds and play harps.

“Heaven” and “sky” are the same word in Greek and Hebrew, but “heaven” as God’s home is a metaphor. It simply means somewhere above anything we can imagine—a world beyond this one.

The Bible never tells us that our souls are immortal. That was a Greek idea.

The New Testament promises a resurrection from the dead for those who belong to Jesus.

The New Testament tells us about resurrection and eternal life in a “Better Country” in the age to come.

B. Jesus promised the believing thief who hung beside him on the cross: “Today, you will be with me in Paradise.

“Paradise” is the word for a beautiful pleasure garden. I can imagine flowers and trees laden with fruit, birds singing, sparkling streams and pools, and green grass.

C. Jesus also compared the Kingdom of Heaven to a banquet at which all believers from all times and places will sit down together.

He said, “I tell you, many will come from east and west and sit at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 8:11 & Luke 13:28).

D. In the last two chapters in the Bible, John, the writer of Revelation, tells about his vision of the Holy City, the New Jerusalem, coming down from heaven from God as a bride adorned for her husband.

He tells us that God will dwell there with his people and he will wipe away every tear from there eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more…for God will make all things new.

We read about “the River of the Water of Life that flows from the throne of God, bright as crystal—as it flows through the middle of the street of the city.

“And on either side the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month.

“And his servants shall worship him and we will see his face, and his name shall be on our foreheads, and we will reign with him for ever and ever.”

People ask, “Will we know our loved ones in heaven?” Of course we will, because all of God’s children will share the joy of the Lord together. We will not only know our loved ones, we will have thousands and thousands of new friends.

E. Most of what we read about the world to come is in metaphor. We read of golden streets, as clear as glass. The prophet is trying to describe something indescribable.

We read of people praising the Lord with golden harps in their hands and waving palm branches. These metaphors are not intended to be taken literally but to suggest a scene of great joy and gladness and beauty.

What else we will do besides worship, we aren’t told, but surely we won’t be bored. We will be beautiful—shining like stars for brightness—dressed in our spotless robes. We will sing and dance and play games together, and share stories. I believe we will enjoy ever new experiences. No one will be bored—ever.

But the best thing about our future life will be that we will be with our Savior. Our greatest joy will be praising him with the saints and angels.

It will be better than we can imagine. That is why it’s called a “blessed hope”—“the hope of glory”—and entering into the joy of the Lord.

CONCLUSION

When you get discouraged and perplexed, think about your future.

Imagine yourself in the New Jerusalem, with the saints and angels, praising the Lord, and enjoying the company of all God’s children.

Imagine yourself forever young and vigorous, never bored, full of joy but always looking forward to the next new and exciting chapter of your life.

We will all be cleansed of our faults and become the people we are meant to be and have longed to be ever since we knew we were God’s children.

But especially imagine seeing your Savior, the Lord of Glory face to face! You will see him. You will live with him forever. And you will be satisfied.

This is what we have to look forward to.