Hebrews 11:8-16 Living for a Better Home

Intro

I don’t know about you, but I’ve never felt more out of place in this world.

As we witness riots and protests, hear political arguments where it seems like everyone on both sides are screaming from the top of their lungs “The End is Nigh!”,...

and as we live through this virus that has disrupted every aspect of our way of life it all just makes you wonder how much more broken can this world actually get.

And if you’re anything like me, you look at what is going on in the world and it just starts to feel heavy.

There’s this longing in us that wishes everything in our world would just be fixed and we could live with peace.

A longing for a better world. longing for a better home.

That longing inside each and every one of us, is a longing for heaven.

This world is not as it should be. It is broken, angry, immoral, and cursed.

But in Christ we have hope for a better home. We have hope for heaven where God will make all things new, and all things right.

Heaven is our true and better home.

This world is not for us.

God has saved us to live for him and his kingdom and calls us to make our way through this world as strangers and exiles bought by the blood of Christ.

The promise of heaven is meant to help us and encourage us to persevere in following Jesus. To hold fast to the gospel no matter what trouble we might face in this world.

But many Christians don’t live day in and day out with the hope of heaven in mind. And because of that they forget their hope of eternal life and risk falling away.

That was the plight of the people in the book of Hebrews, and in Hebrews 11:8-16, God shows us what it looks like to live by faith with our sights set on our eternal home and what difference that hope is supposed to make in our day to day life on earth.

What does it mean to live for our true and better home? Hebrews gives us the answer. And the first thing we need to do if we are going to live for eternity here on earth is believe that...

I. This World Is Not Our Home

Hebrews 11:8-9 By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going. 9 By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise.

When the Author brings Abraham in at this point in the Hall of Faith, he is the home run hitter. Abraham is the Father of the Jewish people and the pinnacle example for the Hebrews of what it looks like to live by faith.

And the Author goes all the way back to the very beginning of Abraham’s story to show the Hebrews that faith looks like following God wherever he leads us knowing God's destination is always better than anything this world has to offer.

Abraham’s destination was the Promised Land, and the Hebrews destination was Heaven.

Hebrews says, By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going.

This is a reference to Genesis 12.

Before God gave him a new name as part of his promise to make him the Father of many nations, Abraham was called Abram.

Abram was from a pagan nation and lived with his family in a place called Haran.

While there, Abram’s father died and the Lord came to Abram and said this...

Genesis 12:1-3 Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. 2 And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. 3 I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”

Abraham was to inherit a land where God would bless him, and make him into a great nation, and bless all the families on earth through him.

This blessing is of course the Lord Jesus Christ who descended from the line of Abraham.

And by faith, Abraham immediately obeyed the Lord and started packing his things. Genesis 12:4 says it this way. So Abram went, as the Lord had told him.

Now why is this such an incredible example of faith? To understand that you need to understand the culture of the ancient Near East.

The Mesopotamian world was a dangerous one.

There was no national government or law and order. It was a pagan world where might made right and the strongest clan or family in the land set the rules and answered to no one.

As a result, the only physical protection and semblance of peace you had came from living in a tightly knit community with your family and kin.

Out on the road, outside of your family’s settlement, you could be killed by marauders or robbed by thieves with no police or government or laws to protect you.

So when God came to Abraham he was saying, I want you to leave your country, your family, and everyone in your father's house to go to a land far away.

I want you to leave the safety of your home and follow me to a Land where I will bless you and bless all the nations through you.

And by faith, Hebrews says, Abraham obeyed, even though he didn’t even know where he was going.

God called Abraham out of the only world he had ever known to follow him to a land he had never even seen.

Then we read verse 9.

By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise.

By faith, Abraham followed God to a new home. And even though he lived in the Promised Land, he never saw the fulfillment of his inheritance.

Abraham lived his entire life in the land God had promised to him not as the rightful owner, but as a foreigner.

Thats what the word translated live means. It doesn’t mean that Abraham owned the land, he sojourned there.

In other words, he lived there as a stranger and a foreigner.

In fact the only piece of land he ever owned in the land of Canaan was a grave he bought for his wife.

And even Abraham’s son and grandson, Isaac and Jacob, didn’t live to see the fulfillment of God’s promise.. They were nomads like Abraham living all the days of their life in tents.

But Abraham still followed God. And all the days of his life he lived by faith in God’s promises.

Now why does the Author start here with Abraham’s life?

What is he trying to get the Hebrews to see about Abraham’s faith that can give them a picture of what it looks like to live by faith in their own life?

Well, just like God called Abraham out of the only world he ever knew, God called the Hebrews out of the world in Christ.

God called the Hebrews to leave behind their old life of sin and dead religion, to leave behind their families who still followed Judaism, and by faith make their way to a better home. A heavenly home.

The Author wants the them to live with the same faith that Abraham had. To be willing to leave behind everything in this world to follow Christ to eternal life in heaven.

And in the mean time, until they receive the fullness of that promise, to live by faith in this world as sojourners and foreigners just like Abraham was a sojourner in the Promised Land.

Here is the principle, the Author wants us to learn from the life of Abraham. This world is not our home.

God has called us out of this world. He has called us to leave behind everything this world has to offer and follow him all the way heaven.

We are sojourners here. Foreigners whose true citizenship belongs in heaven with Christ through the life death and resurrection of the Son of God.

Colossians says God has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son.

Peter said that God called us out of darkness into his marvelous light.

And Jesus said that we are not of the world, just as he is not of the world.

God has called us out of the world.

In fact, our very name, “church” comes from the Greek word ekklesia which if you break it down semantically means the called out ones.

Just like Abraham, God has called us out of the world to live as foreigners and exiles in the world on our way to a better Promised Land. The Kingdom of Heaven.

So what does that look like to be called out of the World? What does it look like to be in the world but not of it?

Here’s what Paul says.

Romans 12:2 Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

So when Paul says don’t be conformed to this world, that word carries the idea of being pressed into a mold.

So what Paul is saying is, don’t be pressed into the mold of the world. Don’t look like and live like the world around you. You are sojourners.

Instead, be transformed that you may discern the will of God. This, of course, implies that we would be transformed to know God’s will and actually follow God’s will as it is revealed in his Word.

That is what it means to be in the world but not of it. We are called out of the world to live for God and his Kingdom.

Well how do we do that? How do we live as sojourners in the world? The answer is by submitting all of our lives to the Word of God.

Being separate from the world doesn’t mean we all need to pool our money together and buy a big compound out in the middle of nowhere.

It means that we live all of our lives in the culture according to the Law of a different kingdom. God’s Kingdom.

We don’t live our lives for the values and desires of the kingdom of this world.

Instead we live in this world with God’s Word as our highest authority. If the word of God says it, that’s what we are going to do.

Paul said it like this.

Ephesians 2:1-3 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— 3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.

This is the testimony of every Christian that has ever lived.

We all were once sons and daughters of disobedience following the course of this world and the prince of the power of the air, Satan himself.

But in Christ, we have been made alive. Notice Paul says we once walked, and we once lived. We were children of wrath like the rest of mankind.

But that’s not our identity anymore. 2 Corinthians 5:17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

We have been transformed from the inside out so that we no longer walk in lockstep with the world around us, but instead follow Jesus by faith.

We have been saved, called out from the world to be a holy people. Separate and distinct from the world to honor God by living according to his Word.

So like Abraham we are called out of the world to follow Christ on a pilgrimage to the heavenly Promised Land.

To live by faith and not by sight, that this world is not our home. That this world is not all that there is.

That now we are exiles and sojourners living in tents, homeless in this world, but that God has promised a true home and a better home for everyone who trusts in Christ.

That’s point number 2...

II. Heaven Is Our True Home

Hebrews 11:10-12 For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God. .

Abraham was able to live by faith, even when it looked like God’s promises weren’t working out, because he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God.

No matter what his life and circumstances were on Earth, Abraham knew God had a better plan and a better promise.

Literally that sentence says he looked forward to the city that has the foundations. In other words, the only city that has foundations.

That means Abraham was looking forward to the eternal city. The New Jerusalem. Heaven itself.

That the Promised Land was just a shadow of what God had in store for his people.

Every other city built by man has come and gone. Ancient Egypt, Babylon, Greece, Rome, all that remains of those cities are ruins.

But God is building an eternal city. An unshakable kingdom that cannot be destroyed.

So Abraham was able to patiently live as an exile and sojourner in the land of Canaan because he knew that even if he possessed the land of Canaan in his time, it would not have been his ultimate inheritance.

Abraham knew the earthly Promise Land and all of its blessings just pointed to a better heavenly Promise Land where God himself was the architect and builder.

In other words, by faith, Abraham wasn’t living for this world staking all his hope and all of his joy in what he could see. He was living for a world he couldn’t see, the world God promised, the world to come.

The heavenly kingdom of eternal blessing.

And Abraham knew that no matter what his life looked like on earth, God would be faithful to bring him to his true home.

What gave Abraham this kind of confidence? How was he so sure that God would be faithful to keep his promise?

He was living in a tent. He had left everything behind, and from a worldly perspective it looked like he had gotten nothing in return.

What was the ground of his faith? It was the faithfulness of God. Abraham trusted God by faith because he knew God was faithful.

11 By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised.

Now this verse is a little be technical so we need to be careful how we interpret it.

This is still talking about Abraham’s faith.

When it says Sarah received power to conceive, in Greek it literally says received power to “lay down seed” which a woman doesn’t do in conceiving a baby. That’s the man’s role.

So what this verse means is, by Abraham’s faith, in conjunction with Sarah, [after all, it takes two to tango] Abraham received power to lay down seed so Sarah could conceive a son.

And when it says since she considered him faithful, that Greek verb translated as considered can mean she or he considered God faithful.

Here’s the point. Abraham endured in faith, even when it looked like God was failing to give him the land he had promised, because Abraham and Sarah had already seen God’s faithfulness in giving them their son Isaac.

Remember, along with the Land, God promised to make Abraham into a great nation, and for that to happen, he needed an heir.

But there was a slight problem. Sarah had been barren her entire life and by the time God promised to give them a son, she was well past the age to have any children.

Abraham wasn’t much better. The Bible says he was so old that he was as good as dead.

From a human perspective, it would be impossible for Abraham to become a great nation. But God was faithful to his promise.

Hebrews 11:12 Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.

Abraham persevered in faith, because he had already seen God do the impossible.

It didn’t matter if he lived in a tent the rest of his life. Abraham knew God would give him the Land just like he had promised, and if it wasn’t Abraham himself, he knew it would be his descendants.

Abraham knew no matter what happened on earth, God was going to bring Abraham into the Promised Land one way or another because God is faithful to his promises.

Continuing this train of thought, the Author says...

Hebrews 11:13-15These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth.

When it says these all died in faith, its referring to Israel’s patriarchs the Author had just mentioned. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

And the Author acknowledges that none of them received the things God promised. They only saw the fulfillment of God’s promises from a distance.

But they died in faith acknowledging that they were strangers and exiles on earth. That this world wasn’t their home.

Don’t miss what the author is saying here. He’s saying the reason why the patriarchs, the great heroes of the Hebrews and the Jewish people, persevered and died in faith even when it looked like nothing was working out was because they acknowledged that this world was not their home.

They were sojourners on their way to God’s better promised land.

14 For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. 15 If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one.

Here’s what the Author is saying. The reason why the Patriarchs were able to say that they were strangers and exiles in this world, is because they were seeking a homeland.

A heavenly homeland where God’s kingdom would reign in perfect righteousness.

If they still saw themselves as people of this world, they would have given up gone back home to Haran. But as it is, they desired a better country, that is a heavenly one.

In other words, they refused to go back, because they were seeking God’s Kingdom and trusting God’s promise to bring them into his eternal city no matter what.

Now remember. To see the impact of what the Author is saying you need to remember who he’s writing to.

The Hebrews, are Christians that have been called out of the world. To live all of their lives as the holy people of God.

But persecution against them, is making many of the Hebrews doubt their faith and consider going back to Judaism.

So what the Author is saying is the reason why you even consider going back to your old way of life is because you have forgotten your true home.

The Patriarchs, our Fathers, trusted God even when it didn’t look like he could be trusted.

In the same way, you Hebrews, need to trust God in the midst of your suffering and persevere by faith.

You need to remember that this world is not your home, and start living for, desiring, looking forward to a better country, that is a heavenly one.

Here’s the principle. Christians must love and long for God’s heavenly Kingdom, not the World.

When the Bible talks about the World. It doesn’t just mean the earth.

The World is the evil system operated by God’s enemy, Satan himself.

The Bible says that Satan is the God of this world and he uses his influence to determine the values, priorities, and works that enslave people to their sin and blind them from the light of the gospel.

Things of the world include false religion, errant and destructive philosophies about the meaning of life and how to be a good person, crime, immorality, sexual freedom, materialism and things like these.

Basically, when you think of the world, think of everything unbelievers value, promote, live for, and hold dear. That is the world.

And even though the world is antithetical to God and his kingdom, even though the world is antithetical to everything that God has saved us from, it is still easy for Christians to struggle with worldliness.

Worldliness is a heart attitude that loves the world.

It is what happens when people desire and value the same things the world does. Its an inward longing to live just like the world.

To have our cake and eat it too.

Or like Paul said earlier, to be conformed to the pattern of this world.

Worldly Christians have one foot in God’s kingdom and one foot in the world.

On the one hand they want the blessing of eternal life, but on the other hand they want the quote “blessings” of the world.

This is how you get churches that support women pastors and homosexuality.

They want to have Jesus but still be accepted by the very World God has called them out of.

Now before you start patting yourself on the back, thinking to yourself thank goodness, I’m not worldly, you need to ask yourself. What are your values? What are you living for?

Would your life look totally at home in a city full of non Christians? Are you dominated and enslaved to the same things the world loves?

Do you worship money? Now you might think to yourself, “Of course I don’t worship money, I’m at church aren’t I?”

But let me ask it this way. Is your hope in your bank account? Do you feel secure when your online banking has at least that amount in it and do you feel anxious if it slips below that line?

Do you argue about money in your marriage? Do you think that all your life would be fixed if you just had that house or made that income?

Living for money is a worldly life.

What about your sexuality?

Do you feel uncomfortable about what the Bible says concerning sex and gender?

Are your thoughts dominated by lusts and sexual desires?

Are you completely comfortable with hooking up outside of marriage or cohabitation?

Let me put it this way: Would your sexual desires and actions be considered normal by any unbeliever? Then you’ve bought into the world and its values.

Or maybe look at it from the other side of the coin. If worldliness reflects the priorities of the world, do the values and practices of your life reflect the priorities of the world or of God and his kingdom?

Are you seeking to grow in Christ? Is all of your free time spent in hobbies or watching TV? Is there any effort on your part to make the best use of the time to grow in Christ?

What about your marriage? Is it characterized by selfishness, bitterness, quarrels, and pride? Are actually seeking and working to not just have a good marriage but a godly one?

Are you raising your children in the Lord? Are you discipling them to love Jesus, or are you showing them the values of the world by choosing sports and tournaments over church?

Do you love the fellowship of other believers, and do what you can to see others grow in Christ even if it takes a sacrifice on your part?

Is the character and priority of your life one that loves God and loves others?

Christians must love and long for God’s heavenly kingdom, not this World.

1 John 2:15-17 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. 17 And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.

Two things I want to point out to you from this passage.

One is, if we love the world, John says the love of the Father is not in us. That of course is because the world is everything that is against God. The world hates God and what nothing to do with him.

If that’s true, why would Christians want any part of it?

It must be because the love of the Father is not in them.

Two, the world is passing away. This speaks to the foolishness of living for something that is there one minute and gone the next.

Jesus said it is foolishness to lay up treasures for ourself on earth where moth and rust destroy.

Instead he calls us to lay up for ourselves eternal treasures that will never pass away. Because where our treasure is, there our heart will be also.

What that means is our treasure needs to be in heaven with God. To have our hearts set on God and his Kingdom so that we will live our lives for him instead of this world.

This world is not our home. It is passing away. Our true home is God’s heavenly Kingdom. The City that has the eternal foundations.

Christians cannot live for this world.

Just like the Hebrews, we can be tempted to go back to our old way of life before Christ. To follow course of this world.

But Christians must set our eyes on the world to come. We must live for God’s will and for God’s priorities instead of the priorities and will of the world.

We must be conformed to the image of Christ instead of the pattern of this world.

As Jesus said Matthew 16:25-26 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. 26 For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?

This world has nothing to offer us.

From Abraham, we learn that living by faith means living with an eternal perspective. To not just live for here and now, but to live for God’s kingdom trusting in God’s promises.

To do that, we first need to believe that God really has called us out of the world. That he has set us apart to be holy and dedicated to him.

And second, we need to see heaven as our true home. To live as citizens of Christ’s kingdom and not love and long for the world we left behind when God saved us.

And finally, if we are going to live for heaven, if we are going to live with eternity in mind, we need to see heaven as our better home.

That’s point number 3...

III. Heaven Is Our Better Home

Hebrews 11:6 Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.

This is the great promise for all of God’s people. In all the covenants God made with Israel, and in the New Covenant God made with all those in Christ, God promises to be our God and that we would be his people.

Here the Author is encouraging the Hebrews to hold fast to their faith in Christ.

If they want God to be their God and enter into God’s heavenly Promise Land, then they need to keep following Jesus because he is the only way they will enter the city God has prepared for them.

As we’ve said before, this city is the New Jerusalem. The great city of the new heaven and new earth.

The dwelling place of God with his people.

In other words, this city is heaven itself. And God has prepared this city for everyone who repents of their sin and places their faith in Jesus Christ and his life, death, and resurrection.

During this sermon, we’ve talked about being called out of the world and not loving the world.

We’ve talked about our need to live with eternity in mind so that we can persevere and faithfully follow Christ.

With the end of this sermon, I want to show you what God has prepared for you and the joy we have to look forward to in Christ.

I want to show you what the Bible says heaven will be like.

Now in saying that, I’m not going to be able to tell you everything. Not only because I don’t have time, but because I literally can’t.

Heaven is so amazing, so incredible, so glorious, that human words can’t even begin to capture all God has prepared for us.

Talking about heaven, Paul said there are things that cannot be told and which man may not utter (2 Cor 12:2-4).

So in one sense we cannot know everything we want to know about heaven. But what God has revealed to us in his word paints heaven as a place of eternal joy, rest, and blessedness.

Turn in your Bibles to Revelation 21.

Revelation 21:1-7 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.

What people don’t often know is that heaven is not some far away place.

Right now, when believers die they go to what Jesus called Paradise.

Paul said to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord so when you die, you will go to heaven.

But that is not the final heaven. Remember, Heaven is just the term we use to describe God’s dwelling place.

The true heaven, the New Jerusalem, the eternal state, is on earth where we as believers will be resurrected like the Lord was resurrected to live in the new heavens and the new earth, worshiping God for eternity.

God renews and restores this heaven and this earth. He cleanses it from all the brokenness our sin has wrought, and he makes for us a new heaven and new earth where the new Jerusalem will be.

As Paul said Romans 8 Creation is groaning and longing to be redeemed from the curse of the Fall.

And when it says that the sea will be no more, the sea in Apocalyptic literature is symbolism chaos, evil, and terror.

So God is saying in his new heaven and new earth there will be no chaos, no evil, no terror, no brokenness.

2 And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

This is the city Abraham was looking forward to.

And just a little later in Revelation 21 The Bible says that the City is a perfect cube about 1400 miles long, wide, and tall.

Now that sounds a little weird. What kind of city is a cube. But remember that the holy of holies of the Temple was also a cube.

So God is saying that the New Jerusalem is the place where God’s glory will dwell in the midst of his people like it did in the holy of holies of the temple.

This has been the hope ever since Adam and Eve left the Garden of Eden. That we would live with God again and worship him for his glory like he created us to.

3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. 4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

To understand what makes heaven so great, you need to remember what makes this world so horrible.

Our world is broken. There is war, disease, tyranny, violence, racism, abuse, poverty, death, injustice, famine, cancer, all kinds of evil that bring suffering and pain in this world.

But in heaven, where God is, there will be no sin, there will be no curse, there will be no death, and therefore there will be no tears, no mourning, no crying, no pain anymore.

Life will finally be be as it should be. There will be perfect peace. Perfect justice.

Life will be what it was meant to be in the Garden of Eden where God said it was “very good.”

5 And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.” 6 And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment.

In heaven, all the thirst and longings of our soul will be satisfied in Christ.

There will be no regret. There will be no loneliness or sadness. There will be no loss or disappointment.

That is to say we will never be thirsty again.

We will be complete. Whole. Right. Lacking nothing because we will have the fullness of Christ himself.

7 The one who conquers will have this heritage, and I will be his God and he will be my son.

The one who conquers means the one who overcomes or perseveres in Christ to the end.And this is the heritage for the one who perseveres.

God will be our God and we will be his people.

We will have unbroken fellowship with God himself. There will be nothing separating us from the God who created us to find all our life in worshiping him.

This is the real glory of heaven. God himself will be there.

Heaven isn’t just a place where everything is good and right and perfect. We could have all those things but without God it would not be heaven.

The reason why believers look forward to spending eternity in heaven, the reason we never have to worry about being bored even after tens of thousands of years is because we will see finally God face to face, we will know his infinite glory and worship him for who he truly is.

1 Corinthians 13:12 For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.

God created us to worship him by enjoying and treasuring all that he is.

That is what glorifying God means.

And in heaven we will get to do that for eternity plumbing infinite depths of joy in the glory of all that God is for us in Christ.

Now that doesn’t mean heaven will be one long church service, though we will worship God together.

I believe the Bible says we will work, have lives, and fellowship with other believers, but all of those things will be experienced perfectly in heaven.

Everything we will do will glorify God and his goodness for saving us in Jesus Christ.

The simplest way I can say it is heaven will be everything our life is now, but without any effects of the curse.

We will live forever in the city of Eden, the new Jerusalem, worshiping God for all that he’s worth.

As Revelation 22:3-5 says

Revelation 22:3-5 No longer will there be anything accursed, but the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and his servants will worship him. 4 They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. 5 And night will be no more. They will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will reign forever and ever.

Conclusion

This is our true and better home. Why would we settle for living for the things of this world that are passing away when God has prepared for us an eternal city.

A place where all the brokenness and sin of this world are nothing more than a memory.

This is the hope that can keep us going as sojourners. This is the hope that can keep us persevering by faith knowing we have a better home and eternal one.

What I’m asking you today is to live for that Kingdom. Don’t live for here and now. Live for eternity.l

Live all of your days on earth for Christ knowing that if you persevere, God will make all your sojournings in this world worth it and bring you into his heavenly rest, into a land flowing with milk and honey.

I can think of no better application of the doctrine of heaven than what Paul said in Colossians 3.

Colossians 3:1-5; 9-10 If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. 3 For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. 5 Put to death therefore what is earthly in you... seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices 10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.

Let’s Pray

Scripture Reading

John 14:1-6 Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. 2 In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. 4 And you know the way to where I am going.” 5 Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” 6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.