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Christ the King Sunday

Sermon ~ “Heaven”

2 Cor. 4:17-18; Revelation 22:1

 

As we consider the destination of faith in heaven, the place where Christ our King shall lead us, let’s consider two texts from sacred Scriptures.  First, 2nd Corinthians 4:17-18: “For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.  So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen.  For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”  Reading from Revelation 22:1 “Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb.” These are Your words, Heavenly Father, sanctify us for heaven in Your Word, for Your Word is everlasting Truth.  Amen.

 

Last week our topic was the doctrine of hell.  Today we look to the destination of our faith--heaven.  It seemed right to preach on heaven, since we have spoken of its counterpart.  Yet, I have a caution to state at the outset...  A proviso...  A qualification.

 

C.S. Lewis wrote a book dealing with conversations between two demons as they sought to corrupt and soul and secure it for hell.  His book was entitled The

Screwtape Letters.  After it was written, people thought that Lewis should write a book about angels as they tried to guide and protect a Christian... you know, to balance off his other work dealing with demons.

 

Lewis replied, in effect, that although he could in his depravity imagine how demons might talk and seek to seduce a Christian into hell, he could not imagine how angels talked!  Their’s was a speech to lofty and holy to be captured by the pen of a fallen creature. Thinking along the same lines, from the bitterness and cruel tragedies that I have witnessed in this world–from the terrible tortures that I have heard men do to other men, I can imagine hell.

 

But the glory of heaven is so beyond my experience and the experience of any human being, that it will not easily give way to my descriptions.  So be warned, I am far better to preach the doctrine of hell than of the glories of heaven.

 

Heaven, in the Hebrew is gal-gal and means literally “rolling cloud.”  How it came to be, we are uncertain.  But I can imagine an ancient Hebrew walking within a scorching desert, feet blistered, limbs scratched and sunburned, thirsty and hungry.  He looks up, there he sees a cloud floating pure and untouched by all the misery of this planet, he longs to be that cloud–free, full of moisture, high above the problems of

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