Our Eternal Home – Part 2

Dr. Charles Stanley delivers a powerful message on the inevitable reality of eternity and the necessity of preparing for heaven now. The Bible states that everyone will die and spend eternity in one of two places: the Lake of Fire or heaven. Preparation for the Lake of Fire requires doing nothing at all, but entering heaven requires deliberate steps of preparation.

Stanley draws on Revelation 21 to describe heaven as the holy city, the New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, “made ready as a bride adorned for her husband”. He notes that our finite minds cannot fully comprehend heaven. His focus is not on describing heaven but on how to prepare to get there.

I. What Believers Will Do in Heaven

Stanley outlines four specific activities the Bible says believers will engage in for all eternity:

1. Praise and Worship God

Throughout the book of Revelation, praise and worship are central activities. The living creatures and the 24 elders continually give glory, honor, and thanks to God, casting their crowns before the throne.

The massive assembly of angels, living creatures, and elders will say with a loud voice, “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing”. Worship involves personal involvement—a “godded feeling”—thinking about, praising, adoring, and loving God.

• Preparation: If believers are going to spend eternity praising and worshiping God, they must learn how while down here and “get started with getting on to worship the living holy God”.

2. Shine Forth as the Sun

Jesus spoke of the final judgment and separation of the righteous and the unrighteous. Those who commit lawlessness will be cast into the furnace of fire where there is “weeping and nashing of teeth”. Conversely, the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the Kingdom of their Father.

• The Purpose of Salvation: God saved believers not merely to keep them out of torment, but to glorify and magnify Himself.
• The Radiance of God: When Christ is received, the Holy Spirit indwells the believer. In heaven, believers will shine forth with all the radiance, beauty, glory, and majesty of the living God forever, unhindered. God will present them as “expressions of my eternal grace,” shining “like stars on a moonless night” or “like the sun at noonday”.
• Preparation: Believers must “get busy down here reflecting the Lord Jesus Christ both in our character our conversation and our conduct in our lifestyle“. Enough of the Lord should be coming through us that others know they have met someone “far more important than we” inside.

3. Serve Him

Contrary to the belief that heaven is merely a place of retirement and rest, the Bible states that believers, God’s bondservants, shall serve Him. Revelation 22:1-3 describes the river of the water of life flowing from the throne and notes that “his bond servants shall serve him”.

• The Unscriptural Attitude: Stanley strongly warns against the attitude that a person can be “smugly saved” and live their life without serving God in any fashion now, planning only to start serving after they get to heaven. Such a mindset is “unscriptural,” “ungodly,” “unbiblical,” and “theologically erroneous”.
• Created for Good Works: Believers are God’s “workmanship created in Christ Jesus for the purpose of good works”. Service is an expression of love, devotion, and adoration to the Lord. Stanley cautions that those who go to church, listen to sermons, give a little money, and “do nothing in the name of Jesus Christ until the next Sunday” are “not preparing for heaven”.
• Disobedience: Refusing to serve God down here is considered sin and disobedience in the eyes of God.