Understanding Resurrection: Jesus' Teachings on Eternal Life

There came to him some Sadducees, those who deny that there is a resurrection. They asked him a question saying, "Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man's brother dies, having a wife but no children, the man must take the widow and raise up offspring for his brother. Now, there were seven brothers. The first took a wife and died without children and the second and the third took her and likewise all seven left no children and died. Afterward, the woman also died. In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife will the woman be? For the seven had her as a wife." [00:16:54]

Jesus said to them, "The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage, but those who are considered worthy to attain to that age and to the resurrection from the dead, neither marry nor are given in marriage, for they can not die anymore for they are equal to angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection. The dead are raised, even Moses showed in the passage about the bush where he calls the Lord the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. Now, he's not God of the dead, but of the living, for all live to him." [00:60:14]

Again, anytime we talk about Heaven, I have people inevitably come to me with all kinds of questions as if I'd already been there and knew all the details of what to expect. They'll come with questions like this, "Will we know each other in the afterlife? If we do know each other, how is recognition possible? In the resurrection, how old will I be? Will I be as old as I am now or even older? Will I maintain an appearance in the resurrection of something like when I was 25 years old, which I prefer to imagine? What about infants? When we know them in the resurrection, will they have been grown to adulthood and again, if so, how will we recognize them?" [00:43:35]

These are difficult questions and when people ask me, I have to tell them, "I don't know. Where God has ceases his divine revelation, I will cease from inquiry." As Calvin said, when you got a question like this, you just be quiet, shut up, and think about it. We don't have all the answers to what life in the resurrected state will be. John himself says, "Beloved, what manner of love is this that we should be called the sons of God, and yet we are. But we do not know yet what will we be like, only that we will be like him, for we will see him as he is." [00:50:02]

Paul's teaching about the resurrection in 1 Corinthians 15, he talks about that which is sewn perishable will be raised unperishable. That which is sewn in corruption will be raised in incorruption, sewn in mortality will be raised in immortality. We don't get a comprehensive picture of what that will all look like. Another question is, "Will people in Heaven be able to look down on those who are still on Earth and know what's going on in their lives? If so, will they be subjected to pain and anguish by what they watch taking place before their heavenly gaze?" [00:54:44]

I remember hearing a sermon that was particularly wicked in a seminary chapel when I was a student. I walked out to the parking lot with my mentor, Dr. John Gerstner, and I said to Dr. Gerstner, I said, "John Calvin would have rolled over in his grave if he would have listened to that sermon." Gerstner looked at me and actually stopped in mid stride, turned around and looked at me. He said, "What? Don't you know that nothing could possibly disturb the felicity that John Calvin enjoys at this very moment." I said, "Yes, sir. I stand corrected." [00:58:03]

We're now in that state where we look into the glass darkly. We know in part that once we make the transition, our knowledge will be so much greater when we arrive in that place. I'll tell you this. If I know anything about the resurrected state, it's going to be, not infinitely, but almost infinitely better than what we enjoy in this state. Paul wrote to the Philippians where he said, "For me to live as Christ and to die is gain." In one sense, I have to leave it at that point, simply saying this we know for sure. When we enter into Heaven, we will lose nothing of substance or of value. What we will experience is only gain. [01:05:51]

Think of this. Whatever is there and isn't there, one thing we know will not be there in Heaven is sin. Everything that profanes human relationships will be gone. No sin. No deceit. No death. No sickness. No sorrow. How that falls out in the resurrection, I don't know. I trust God at his word that whatever we experience in Heaven will be wonderful and will be nothing but gain. An answer to this question, Jesus said, "The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage. But those who are considered worthy to attain that age in the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor or are given in marriage." [01:14:02]

At first glance, that would suggest that we are not in a state of marriage in Heaven. Whatever state we'll be in, as I said again, will be better than anything we can imagine now. "For they can not die anymore because they are equal to the angels and they're sons of God, being sons of the resurrection." He goes on to say there that we will be like the angels. We will not be angels. Don't get that idea that when we die, we spring wings and suddenly live in angelic existence. Others mean by this that angels are sexless. We don't know that. We don't know whether they're genderless. I assume that we've been created male and female and in our redemption, we will remain male and female. Maleness and femaleness will move to a completely different level, a level that is greater, a level that is more wonderful. [01:16:09]

What Jesus is saying, there will be no need anymore to fill the Earth and multiply by propagation because death will be no more and we won't have to have children in Heaven in order to populate the place. All of the population of Heaven will be there by God's grace for eternity. Again, I have to say to you, some people ask me right in the minister's quarters beforehand, "Will there be sex in Heaven?" They ask me that, being younger men that they are, I said, "What's that?" I don't suffer fools lightly with those kinds of questions. In any case, what Jesus promises is glory. [01:24:31]

Notice that in this text Jesus silenced the Sadducees. Even the scribes who had failed already to try to trap him complimented him by saying at the end of the text, "Teacher, you have spoken well," for they no longer dared to ask another question. Jesus said, "You've been asking me all these questions. You've been trying to trap me in every conceivable way, now let me ask you a question." Now he turns his attention to his question. He said to them, "How can they say that the Christ, the Messiah, is David's son? For David himself says in the book of Psalms, 'The Lord said to my Lord, "Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool."' David thus calls him Lord, so how is he his son?" [01:18:34]

In his exaltation, Jesus ascends to Heaven and he sits at the right hand of God where he is appointed by the Father to rule over all of the Earth, to be the King of kings and to be the Lord of lords, to be Adonai, David's Lord, Caesar's Lord, your Lord, my Lord. Having given him the name that transcends all titles, Adonai, Kurios, so that every time we even hear the name of Jesus, the appropriate response is to be on our knees in absence before the one whom God has placed at his right hand and has exalted him with such majesty and that that does not detract from the glory of God, the Father, but it is to the glory of God, the Father, that we confess that Christ is Lord. [01:35:37]