Where Will Christians Really Spend Their Eternity?

James R. Aist

“And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am, you may be also.” (John 14:3)

I don’t know about you, but somehow I got the impression years ago that when we Christians die and go to heaven, our permanent residence will be in heaven with Jesus, not here on this earth. It would be as if our death would amount to a one-way ticket from earth to heaven, somewhere out in the vastness of the cosmos. Perhaps singing “This world is not my home, I’m just a passin’ through” may have had something to do with this perception. Or maybe it was “Won’t it be wonderful there” or “I’ll fly away“; hymns about being away from this earth and with Jesus in heaven (somewhere else) forever. And its true: when we die, we will go to be with Jesus in heaven forever. But, that’s only part of the story of our journey from earth to our final destination. The rest of the story is, arguably, even more glorious and exciting than the beginning. Let me explain.

This journey of mankind began, of course, when God created Adam and Eve and placed them into the Garden of Eden. God was with them there, and their future would have been life everlasting with God on the earth. But, through the temptation of Satan’s lies, sin entered in and brought with it a spiritual separation of mankind from God (i.e., spiritual death). And that’s the way it was for thousands of years; Satan appeared to have been successful in destroying God’s utopian plan for mankind on the earth. Now the only way for mankind to dwell forever with God was to believe in God (and His promised Messiah), die, vacate the earth and go to heaven, where God was.

There was just one problem, however: the “sin problem.” And Satan knew it. He thought he had succeeded in permanently separating mankind from God spiritually. But God had a solution to this sin problem all along. So, in the fulness of time, God sent His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, to die for our sins, so that we would not end up in hell, but have everlasting life with God in heaven. That’s fantastic, wouldn’t you say?

But wait. As things stand now, Satan still has succeeded in separating mankind from their rightful, God-given home; namely, planet earth. So here’s where it gets really exciting. When God gives the signal, Jesus will return to the earth with us and defeat Satan and all other evildoers. Then, He will set up His eternal kingdom where? Right here on a renewed planet earth, where it all started! From that time forward, God’s victory over Satan will be complete; we will have returned with Jesus to reclaim the earth as our permanent residence! So its really a round trip, you see. We win, and Satan loses!

(To read more of my articles with a biblical theme, click HERE)