1 Peter 1:3-5, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. 
	As we continue our Biblical consideration of heaven, using Dr. Donnelly’s studies as our framework, we come once again to the very center of any and every contemplation of heaven - Jesus Christ. God, the Father, according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead… 
	Redemption in, of, and through, Jesus Christ, as we have often seen, is at the very heart of God’s glory in heaven. He is the central figure, the glorified one. As we recently quoted, This is overwhelming, breathtaking. It makes us want to fall on our knees in astonished worship. The glory of the glories in the new heaven and new earth will be the love of God to sinners in Christ Jesus. The frailest, most insignificant believer will one day move angels and the redeemed to everlasting praise for God’s grace and mercy. We will look at one another and adore God our Saviour for His matchless kindness. And it will all be in Christ, all because of the Lamb of God Who has taken away the sin of the world. End quote.
	What a realm of glory that will be! There will be the resplendent beauty of our Lord Jesus Christ, who loved you and loved me enough to sacrifice Himself for our salvation. It will be a time of utter and unhindered worship and adoration which our human minds are incapable of comprehending. Consider - those who are married - the inexpressible joy that we give God for our spouses. Parents, think of the inestimable joy that God brings into our homes through the birth of our children. Consider well, the joy that true friendships and loving relationships have brought our hearts over the years. Think of the utter release of tears and delight on that day that we responded to God’s call in our lives through the work of His Holy Spirit as we were born again. The greatest joys of this earth, as glorious and full as they were and are will be nothing in the light of the glory and the grace and the majesty and the adulation that will be ours as we honor God – as we bow in complete humbleness before the Lamb Who was slain.
	Quote. What is almost as wonderful is to reflect on our status in Christ, the astounding heights of blessings to which He will lift us. In heaven, we will see the Lord Our Saviour, exalted high over all. But that supremacy, that awesome loftiness, will not remove Him from us. He will not become One Who is distant, ineffably remote. Remember our covenant theology, our union with Christ. We are ‘in Him’, and in His exaltation we too are exalted. End quote.  	  
	We need to think on this all the more, day after day. We are in Christ forevermore. He is the One Who holds us, not we holding onto Him. We will always be with Him, wherever He is. As we read in Eph 2:4-7, But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places, in Christ Jesus, in order that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 
We do not often readily recognize this truth in our lives at this time. There are very many times in which our sight is removed from our high calling. We do not always appreciate the spiritual position that is ours in Jesus Christ. This reality of glory is through absolutely no worthiness of ourselves. It is singly because we are joined to Him, in Him, and in and through His grace. Whether we see it or not, whether we acknowledge this truth or ignore it, the fact remains that because of our being joined to Christ, we are even now seated with Him in the spiritual realm. That reality will be in full evidence in heaven.
	Christ, Himself tells us this in Rev 3:21. 'He who overcomes, I will grant to him to sit down with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne. This is no small and insignificant aspect of our salvation. This is the means by which God will be glorified in us. Not through any goodness that we possess. Not through any inherent value that we bring to Him. It is because of His work in and for us. He loved us, and in the working of His mighty and glorious grace and mercy, we have been joined to His only begotten Son, our covenant head, our source and being of life. Thus, where He is, we are. We partake of all the goodness of God because, in Christ, we are heirs as His children. Rom 8:16-19 The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him. 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. For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. 
	This union with Christ, this being seated with Him in the heavenlies is not something that we need to ever fear losing. This is so because it is not set in our deeds nor in our accomplishments, but in Him, in Christ Jesus. It will never be taken from us. As the Apostle Paul writes so forcefully in Rom 8:38+39. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. 
He later encourages Timothy with the absolute assurance that all is centered in Christ and in His power and in His hands and not in our own weak and trembling human efforts. 2 Tim 1:8-12 Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, or of me His prisoner; but join with me in suffering for the gospel according to the power of God, who has saved us, and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was granted us in Christ Jesus from all eternity, but now has been revealed by the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death, and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel, for which I was appointed a preacher and an apostle and a teacher. For this reason I also suffer these things, but I am not ashamed; for I know whom I have believed and I am convinced that He is able to guard what I have entrusted to Him until that day. The glory that we will present in heaven and of which we will fully partake is of Christ as our Head, as our husband, as our life. It is secure and eternal because its very basis is set in Him, Alone. 
One aspect that is worth pondering is that our union with Christ reveals the tremendous reality of Romans 8:28. And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. As we have been dealing with Heaven and hell, there have been some questions as to why God designed everything as He did. Wouldn’t it have been far better if Adam and Eve had never sinned? They listened to the lie of the serpent. Gen 3:5 "For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." 
As a result, mankind was plunged into death under the curse. But the serpent spoke truer than he could have imagined, as the course of history will reveal. We will never be as God. We will ever be His creation, below Him in every aspect of our being. 
Yet, we are made in His image. Gen 1:27, And God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. We are a spiritual being in Christ Jesus. We do have the Holy Spirit indwelling us and guiding us and teaching us and giving us life. We are joined in a vital union with Christ Jesus, and learning to live in conformity with His life flowing through us unto others. There is a godliness that characterizes our lives and beings. Not a god-likeness, but a living forth as unto God, with God as the center and course of our desires and purpose for living and loving. 
	Quote. That is why Augustine could dare to say of the disobedience of Adam and Eve, ‘O happy sin!’ He meant that in Christ the tribes of Adam boast more blessings than their father lost. Believers are raised to greater heights than if man had never sinned, for God has come down to earth, has become one of us and has taken us unto Himself. End Quote.
	Have you ever pondered this heavenly truth? God took that, which was corrupted by sin and He has turned it into a glorious reality of His love in His only Begotten Son. If Adam and Eve had never sinned, we would never be enabled to partake of the glory that awaits us in heaven. This is definitely not an argument for sin in our lives, heaven forbid such a deceitful lie. As the Apostle Paul states in Rom 6:1-7, when faced with this argument, What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace might increase? May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it? Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death? Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, that our body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin; for he who has died is freed from sin. 
	But the fact remains that because we fell in Adam, in his sin and corruption, being placed under the curse, we needed redemption. We needed salvation. We needed something far greater than ourselves by which to come into life. We were dead in sin and trespass. God had to do something, something which had been in His heart from before eternity. He loved us unto Himself through Jesus Christ. 
In Christ, we received our salvation. In Christ, we received our adoption into the very family of God. In Christ, we received our inheritance of eternal life. In Christ, we received our sanctification. In Christ, we received our glorification. And, it is in Christ, that we will ever find our eternal relationship of love with the Father. He will be glorified in us, because we are in Christ. 
Quote. Jesus Christ is at the heart of heaven’s glory. We are only at the fringes of grasping what is involved in our being raised and exalted in Him. But of this we can be sure: in heaven, He will be – and will remain – more close and more precious to us than ever. End quote. So be it.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. Amen. 

This morning’s benediction reading is this morning’s passage, 1 Peter 1:3-5. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. Amen.