Tuesday, December 2, 2008

And I saw A New Heaven And A New Earth. For The First Heaven And The First Earth Had Gone Away, and there was no more sea. Rev. 21:1.

According to this text, the new earth will be quite different from the world we know. But how can we be sure the earth will survive the end in a meaningful form? THe studies of science are certainly not encouraging. They suggest that the universe is headed either for collapse and fiery meltdown or expansion and a big freeze. Neither options sounds attractive to me. But why worry about that? Long before the universe could come to an end, scientistis anticipate a solar explosion that would leave no trace of earth.

So what hope is there that a new heaven and a new earth might replace the old ones? Scientist-theologian John Polkinghorne believes that we have only one source for such hope-the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He points out that we are not the first generation in which people questioned the promises of God. Jesus faced skeptics too.

Like many in our time, the Sadducees did not believe in an afterlife. They tried to trap Jesus with an ingenious story about a woman who became the wife of seven brothers, one after the other(Matt. 22:23-26). Each had died without children, leaving to the next the duty of marrying his widow. So, said the Sadduccees, "Whose wife wil lshe be at the resurrection, considering she was married to all seven?"(see Matt. 22:28). In other words, if any kind of life exists after death, how could God untangle a relational mess like this?

The challenge did not catch Jesus off guard. Cutting right through their smoke screen, He reminded them of what God said to Moses at the burning bush: "Have you not read what God said to you, 'I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob'? He is not the God of the dead but of the living"(verses 31, 32, NIV).Jesus' argument may be puzzling at first, but it is a powerful one. The patriarchs mattered to God when they were alive. Would they not still concern Him after their deaths? Would God simply discard them after they had ceased to exist? Wouldn't He rather retain their identities in His heart he could make them alive again?

Our best hope for the future, therefore, is not in science or human ingenuity-it is in divine faithfulness. God put together this world and the life in it. If He did it once, He can do it again. To know Him is to trust Him. If He has promised a resurrection, He will be faithful to carry out what he vowed. The resurrection of Jesus reinforces the Old Testament promise(Isa. 26:19). Because God raised Jesus from the dead, we know that He will do the same for the followers of Jesus as well(1Cor. 15:20-23). His faithfulness is our best hope.

Lord, You are the faithful God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. You have proved faithful in the little things of my life. I will trust You to be faithful when the end comes.

We are to give in sincerity, not to make a show of our good deeds, but from pity and love to the suffering ones. Sincerity of purpose, real kindness of heart, is the motive that Heaven values. The soul that is sincere in its love, wholehearted in its devotion, God regards as more precious than the golden wedge of Ophir(TFMB 81).