Tag: Revelation 21:4

What should be and what is will one day be made right in Christ

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TEXAS GOSPEL VOLUNTEER

There is a tension that most of us live with every day, even if we have never put it into words. We know that things are not the way they should be, in our own lives and in the world around us, and no matter how hard we try, we cannot make everything right. At the same time, we feel strongly that things ought to be better, that justice and peace and love should win out. Paul points to this tension and to its resolution in 1 Corinthians 15:28, looking ahead to the day when the Son himself will hand over all things to God the Father, so that God may be all in all.

The resurrection of Jesus is God’s answer to that tension. It is his promise that what is broken will be restored, that what is wrong will be made right, that the longing we carry for things to be as they should is not a longing that will go unanswered forever. Jesus is not just the one who saves us from what was. He is the one who is leading all of creation toward what will be. Restoration will be the final word, and God himself will be all in all.

and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.”

Revelation 21:4

What Revelation 21 promises about joy and memory in heaven

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JEFF TURNER

Revelation 21:4 says that in heaven there will be no more pain and that the former things have passed away, and this raises a heartfelt question for many believers: will we remember the suffering of this life, or the people we loved who did not come to faith? I believe the answer that scripture points toward is that heaven will be a place of complete and uninterrupted joy, with nothing present that could bring sorrow or weigh down the heart in any way.

That kind of total joy makes it difficult to imagine carrying grief or regret into eternity. It seems that the heartaches of this world, and even the memories of our own sins, will not follow us there. To remember the specific wrongs from which we have been forgiven would in some sense be to recycle sin in the mind, and that has no place in a sinless eternity. Believers will know the joy of forgiveness without being haunted by what they were forgiven from. Everything in heaven will serve to increase joy, and nothing will be allowed to diminish it.

For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us.

Romans 8:18