Heb 10:15-17, And the Holy Spirit also bears witness to us; for after saying, "This is the covenant that I will make with them After those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws upon their heart, And upon their mind I will write them," He then says, "And their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more." 
	We have just concluded our series of messages dealing with the Biblical doctrine of hell. We are using Dr. Donnelly’s sermons and writings, with his expressed permission, as the framework of our considerations. Today, we begin our contemplation of heaven in the light of God’s Word. We are working diligently to keep everything in line with what the Bible teaches concerning these two great truths of God’s plan and creation. 
	While hell, and thinking about hell is anathema to most people, the thoughts of heaven and its deliberation is extremely popular. There are 100’s of books written on the subject. There are many movies concerning it. Popular ideologies and myths abound presented with an over-abundance of human imaginings and hope created around the life to come after death. The Egyptians built their pyramids, and embalmed their leaders with the idea that they would rise again in the after life. Maps were included in the tombs for their guidance. The Greeks and the Romans believed in a spirit world which the dead would enter. The Native Americans buried bows and arrows with the dead for use in the Happy Hunting grounds. The Vikings believed in Valhalla, a land of paradise. Many of the beliefs of the religions of today have great rewards in store for those who are martyred for religious causes. There is an almost universal belief in a place of reward and rest after death. 
	We should not be surprised at this since it is put into the heart of man by God. As we read in Eccl 3:11 He has also set eternity in their heart… Man knows that there is something to come after death because man has been instilled with an awareness of the here after. The issue, sadly, is that man tries to understand the life that is to come with his finite mind, when we are dealing with an infinite reality. Eph 4:17-19 This I say therefore, and affirm together with the Lord, that you walk no longer just as the Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart; and they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality, for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness. 
	Yet, despite the fact that there is such a pre-occupation with heaven and the here after, there is no true value of it in the hearts of people. It has no impact on the majority of people who profess to be going to heaven. It makes no lasting difference in their lives. There is no realistic change in their activities and conduct. Even within Christianity, there is very little of the true realization of how heaven and the reality of heaven should affect our lives now. As we will see, it is a topic that is generally ignored or neglected and that has very harmful consequences.
	Why is heaven neglected? One obvious reason is that we are too worried about the present world. We are bombarded with that which we can see and touch and hear and feel and smell. The daily realities of life are intimately surrounding us, close and tight, and making it difficult to see beyond them to the far greater and more important and far more glorious world to come. It is like holding a small coin between our fingers and using it to block out our vision of the sun. The proximity of the infinitely smaller object blots out our eye’s view of the infinitely greater. 	
	Another reason, at least in our western culture, is that we are too comfortable. We have very easy lives in comparison to those who came before us. We have every type of luxury known to man. We are a wealthy society, wherein even the vast majority of those we deem to be poor are wealthy in comparison to other cultures of our day and especially of our past history. We are soft. We are complacent. We are comfortable. We have put down roots and settled into our place within this society. We have no pilgrim spirit. We have lost the sense that we are to consider our time on this earth as merely a pilgrimage to our true home. We are settling for the comfort of this world and this worldly comfort makes heaven less attractive to us.
	And, for some, heaven may not even have great appeal. We talk about learning about Jesus for all of eternity. With our limited and finite minds, we wonder if that is all there is to do. We think of sitting in an eternal church service. We talk of walking streets of gold in all white robes. There are thoughts of no distinctiveness of being, no uniqueness, everything and every body the same, doing the same thing, never changing from eternity to eternity. Because we are so inundated with this world’s vision, we decide that we can wait and wait without any desire or longing to go to heaven at this point. 
	Or, on another level as Christians, we can be brainwashed into neglecting heaven. We look at the needs around us and we wonder what do we have to offer? We are told not to be so heavenly minded that we are of no earthly use. We want to be of earthly use. We want to help. We want to be relevant to the needs of those around us. We begin focusing on the things directly in our eyesight. We fail to see beyond the immediate to the basic and fundamental need of the people we are trying to help. They want something useful now, so we neglect the truth and the power and the glory of eternal heaven for the sake of band aids and clichéd advice.
	And for many Christians, the neglect of heaven stems from the idea that it seems too grand and too awesome for our minds to comprehend. It is too glorious and we feel that we are unable to understand or appreciate it. It goes far beyond our vocabulary and far beyond the finite measures of our brains. 1 Cor 2:9 but just as it is written, "Things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard,  And which have not entered the heart of man, All that God has prepared for those who love Him." 
	Next, we need to ask ourselves, Why does the subject of heaven matter? Why do we need to spend time dealing with something that seems to be too far distant, seems to be too incomprehensible, and seems to be too far removed from our hearts at this time? It does matter. It matters immensely. It matters intensely and overwhelmingly for the following reasons. 
	First, as we have considered previously, far too many people assume that they are going to heaven. They have a false assurance that they will be welcomed into heaven by the outstretched arms of Christ, Sadly, they will be rudely awakened to an awful reality. Their lives give no evidence of their ever having believed upon Jesus Christ, and yet they fully and absolutely believe that they are going to heaven. Many people are very flippant with regard to heaven and expect nothing less because they have lived a good life. They feel that they have earned and deserve their reward. They consider themselves with this false sense of entitlement. They are going to be devastated in the reward that they do receive. Their neglect of heaven will be a very lethal and eternally damning one. 
	Heaven matters, secondly, because there are so many false teachings about heaven. There are so very many deceptive and ludicrous lies and fantasies that are being peddled about it in the media, in movies, in music, in print, and misguidedly in churches. Quote, this hodge-podge of confusion and falsehood is deluding people, not all of whom, sadly, are outside the church. Their minds are being poisoned. ‘Nature abhors a vacuum”, and if truth is not taught, error will replace it. End quote. 
	Thirdly, heaven matters because it is one of our most powerful evangelistic weapons. In heaven, God offers to sinful mankind, to miserable and lost and pathetic and vial and corrupt human beings eternal paradise and joy and freedom and riches, if they will but believe in His Son, Jesus Christ. He opens the gates of heaven to the poor, undeserving wretches of humanity because and through of the great love wherewith He has loved us in giving His only begotten Son to die for us. Rom 5:8-11 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him. For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. And not only this, but we also exult in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation. 
	But the church is not proclaiming this awesome grace of God. It is not teaching the truth of heaven to the unconverted. Quote, the French novelist, Victor Hugo was inaccurate in his theology but accurate in his sentiment when he wrote, ‘I am the tadpole of an archangel.’ He believed, in other words, that human beings are destined for a greater and better future. Yet the evangelical church today is concentrating on helping people to become better tadpoles. Go to any Christian bookstore and see what so many of the books are about: not about God or heaven, not about the world to come. They are about becoming better tadpoles, making limited, temporary improvements in our life here and now. Is this all the Church can offer – ‘Christ can give you peace of mind; Christ can give you a better marriage; Christ can teach you how to train your children? People can find painkillers and parenting classes that will promise as much. What about the fact that Jesus Christ can bring you to glory forever? We are not telling people that and we are surprised when they are not interested in the gospel. We are not using one of the most wonderful truths which God has placed in His Word. End quote. 
	Lastly, if we neglect heaven and the teaching of heaven, we are neglecting our own spiritual health. We are poorer and weaker and more troubled than we should be as we sojourn on this earth. The truth of the doctrine of heaven is for the sake of God’s own people, His church. Heaven does have its rightful place as a most powerful and effective weapon of evangelism. But it is much more significant as God’s means of teaching His people how to live. Quote, He explains heaven in His Word primarily for His own children’s sake, to help and to comfort us, to encourage and to strengthen us, to make us more holy, to fill us with joy. The doctrine of heaven is revealed to shine light on your life and mine here and now, to enable us to be better people today and tomorrow. We cheat ourselves if we do not make use of this wonderful teaching. It is an immense blessing to know much more about heaven. And we can know. We do not need to be left in the dark. End quote.   
	Earlier I quoted 1 Cor 2:9 and stopped there. …but just as it is written, "Things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard,  And which have not entered the heart of man, All that God has prepared for those who love Him." This is what many people do in defense of their lack of concern about heaven. They misuse this verse as a means of stating that the things of heaven are too great for our comprehension. 
This is a very grave injustice to the Word and to the hearers of the Word as the Apostle Paul does not end his statement at this point, but continues through verse 16. For to us God revealed them through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God. For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of the man, which is in him? Even so the thoughts of God no one knows except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things freely given to us by God, which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words. But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised. But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised by no man. For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he should instruct Him? But we have the mind of Christ. 
	Yes, to the unaided and unconverted mind, heaven and the things of God are beyond any comprehension. But we are not of the unconverted if we have believed upon Jesus Christ. We now have the very mind of Christ, through the effective ministry and guidance of the Holy Spirit at work in us. He reveals the deep truths of God to us and He opens them in our hearts and in our minds. As we read His Word, He makes all spiritual truths known to us, in Christ Jesus. In Christ, we are able to comprehend heaven, albeit in a limited fashion at this time. It is through a glass darkly, but it is in a comprehensible manner none the less. 
We count on Him to open the truth of heaven as we proceed in our study and we count on Him to make known all that is in His heart for our being more and more conformed to His image. Heaven matters! We need to know about it! We need to be enabled to understand and to respond to God’s heart with regard to all that He wants to teach us about and through heaven. This we ask in Jesus Christ’s name, so be it. 
And the Holy Spirit also bears witness to us; for after saying, "This is the covenant that I will make with them After those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws upon their heart, And upon their mind I will write them," He then says, "And their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more." Amen.

This morning’s benediction reading is Ps 97:1-6 The Lord reigns; let the earth rejoice; Let the many islands be glad. Clouds and thick darkness surround Him; Righteousness and justice are the foundation of His throne. Fire goes before Him, And burns up His adversaries round about. His lightnings lit up the world; The earth saw and trembled. The mountains melted like wax at the presence of the Lord, At the presence of the Lord of the whole earth. The heavens declare His righteousness, And all the peoples have seen His glory. Amen.