We are being tested, but to what end?

In heaven will continue to have the ability to exercise free will. 

When God is present our ability to choose is immediately limited. However, freedom doesn’t cease, or you and I would no longer have individual personalities. In heaven, all the trials and temptations of this life will be gone, and we will be in the very presence of God. Certainly, that changes everything around us, but you and I will still be ourselves. I will remain distinct from other humans and distinct from God, a creature with a unique personality. That requires free will. Therefore, I will always be capable of choosing between loving God and loving myself.

“The minimum condition of self-consciousness and freedom then, would be that the creature should apprehend God and, therefore, itself as distinct from God. It is possible that such creatures exist, aware of God and themselves, but of no fellow creatures. If so, their freedom is simply that of making a single naked choice—of loving God more than the self or the self more than God.” (C. S. Lewis, Problem of Pain, p. 17)

Heaven, the final state of the saved, is earth renewed to be like Eden was. We will be in the presence of God, and that narrows the field of choices down to what Adam and Eve had in Eden: God’s will, or self will apart from God. God may—perhaps I should say confidently, God will—give us responsibility and leadership over some part of his kingdom, and that may also involve further freedom to choose within God’s will between one path and another. 

However, once we pass from this life the freedom to live apart from God is only available in hell. Does that scare you? “What if I sin?” you might ask. Or, “What if I rebel against God?” It should scare you if in heaven you remain the same as you are presently. However, this is bootcamp for the Kingdom, a time for preparation. Believers are moving toward the place where we really and truly believe in God so much that we always choose to do his will no matter what. This life’s trials and tests are meant to ensure we do not ever decide to turn away from God, as apostate Christians do on earth, and as some of the angels did long ago.

God created a magnificent angel called Lucifer, a cherub who had great honor, power and beauty, who may even have been above other angels, perhaps nearer to the throne of God than any other being. Lucifer had free will. He became carried away with the desire for greater glory and power. Then Lucifer conceived an evil plot to raise himself above the Most High God. He led other angels in rebellion in an attempt to usurp the reign of the Almighty in heaven. That sin brought forth death, separation from the source of life. Satan was cast out of heaven and the presence of the Living God. He began at the top with every advantage, but sinned and fell to the bottom, never to rise again.

Lucifer is now Satan, the enemy of God. The book of Revelation likens him to a dragon. 

“Then another portent appeared in heaven: a great red dragon, with seven heads and ten horns, and seven diadems on his heads. His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth.” (Revelation 12:3-4).

Satan and the angels who followed him were thrown down to earth, where they continue to wreak havoc because of their hatred for God.

“The devil has come down to you filled with wrath, for he knows that his time is short” (Revelation 12:12)

The Enemy is active in our world today, and he is seeking to destroy any and all who have faith in Jesus.

The believer is always faced with a test. Will I continue to believe in God or doubt his existence. Will I continue to trust my good and loving Father, in spite of the evil I see and the trouble I go through?  Will I obey God, or rebel like his Enemy?

You don’t have to become a satanist to show loyalty to the devil. In fact, you don’t even have to believe in his existence. Just believe the lies he propagates in the world. They are the same lies the Serpent told Eve in the Garden of Eden ages ago.

“Did God really say?” – Doubt the Bible. Doubt moral law. Reinterpret the Bible to support your narrative or agenda.

“You will be like God.” – Humanism. Pride. Believe in yourself. Self worship.

“You will not surely die.” – Universalism. No fear of God. Disbelief in judgment and hell.

If you choose God you will come to his Son, Jesus, for salvation from the destruction planned for this fallen world. 

And he testified with many other arguments and exhorted them, saying, “Save yourselves from this corrupt generation.” (Acts 2:40)

“But by the same word the present heavens and earth have been reserved for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the godless. But do not ignore this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like one day. The Lord is not slow about his promise, as some think of slowness, but is patient with you, not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a loud noise, and the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the earth and everything that is done on it will be disclosed.” (2 Peter 3:7-10).

God created a magnificent class of beings in his image called human. However, unlike Lucifer, we begin at the bottom, living in a fallen world that is inhabited and to a large degree ruled by Satan. The image of God in us is in need of restoration. Why is this? We begin at the bottom with a choice to believe and be perfected, so that we may rise to the top invincible, invulnerable to temptation, never to fall again!

Three realities will keep us from the satanic sin of self-will in heaven.

1. We Will Always Be Aware of Hell.

There is some debate among God loving, Bible believers as to whether hell, which is made for Satan and his fallen angelic army, will ultimately annihilate humans who are sent there, or if there will be an eternal state of torment for unbelievers. The book of Revelation states, “the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever” (14:11), so even if those who reject God are not eternally tormented there, we will never forget their final end. However, Satan will experience eternal torment, which those in heaven will also be aware of.

“and the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.” (Revelation 20:10, ESV)

Hell is insurmountable and inescapable. No one will get out. Hell is indefatigable and eternal. Since this is true, any who rebel in heaven could still be destroyed there.

“And if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than with two hands to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life lame than with two feet to be thrown into hell. And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell, ‘where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched’” (Mark 9:43-48, ESV).

2. The Memory of This Life Will Keep Us From Sin and Rebellion.

After all that we’ve been through and overcome, who would want to return to sin and rebellion? When I compare my new life in heaven to my former life on earth I will not want to do anything to ruin heaven by returning to the old life “like a dog to its vomit, or a pig to the slop” (2 Peter 2:22).

When I was very young I lived on the south side of Phoenix, Arizona where there were many date palm trees. I really liked eating their fruit. Then I ate too many dates and got sick. I vomited repeatedly and the flavor of dates became inextricably associated with being sick. That was a very long time ago, but I still don’t eat dates! Another example: when I was a teenager I caught the flu. The last meal I ate before I began vomiting regularly was a concoction that Jack in the Box called Frings! French fries and onion rings together. The taste of that fried delight coming back up repeatedly kept me from enjoying onion rings for decades afterward.

There is a behavior modification protocol known as flooding, which purposefully applies an excess amount or number of stimuli to create an adverse reaction in an effort to extinguish an unwanted behavior. My date eating behavior stopped after eating too many of them over a brief period. In a bygone era, a parent who caught their child smoking might employ this strategy by sending the kid into the bathroom to smoke an entire pack of cigarettes. The result is that the child would become sick and hopefully never want to smoke again. Think of that as a metaphor for this life. Why would I return like a dog to its vomit or a pig to the mud?

Our preparation in the present world ensures that we will not exercise our free will to oppose God in heaven as Satan did. Our struggles and our suffering here ensure that we will not take God’s goodness for granted or rebel like the angels all those ages ago. Our wandering in the wilderness here will serve as a protection in heaven. We will always remember the consequences of sin and the emptiness of life without God. 

3. We Will Be Transformed

The lifelong sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit will ensure that we will be changed people. The only part of you and I that will survive death and judgment is the part that is like Jesus. Anything in us that is unlike Christ will be destroyed in the fire of God’s great Judgment. Maybe that sounds harsh, but I assure you it is the greatest blessing of Judgment Day.

“For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw—each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire. Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple” (1 Corinthians 3:11-17, ESV).

We will not be innocent like Adam and Eve were. We will be better; we will be sanctified and perfected. We will be transformed. All of this preparation is not just training the old to become new. We have been reborn and are being trained as children are to grow up, to become what we are meant to be. 

“If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old is passed away; all things have become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17).

The old person, the natural, fleshly man, is crucified.

“For I have been crucified with Christ and no longer do I live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Galatians 2:20).

My old nature, though still felt, has been rendered powerless.

“knowing this that the old self was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be done away with that we might no longer be slaves to sin.” (Romans 6:6)

Now I must seek my identity in the risen Christ, and look to the things that are beyond this world for hope and inspiration.

“If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are one earth. For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God” (Colossians 3:1-3).

Each time I am confronted with my old habits and desires, I recognize that they no longer characterize me. I take them off like filthy rags, and I put on my new identity, which is found by looking to Jesus.

“put off your old self, which belongs to your former way of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.” (Ephesians 4:22–24)

That is who I truly am, and I will continue to confess that. One day I will behold him, face to face, in all of his glory, and, amazingly, I will be like him…

“Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure.” (1 John 3:2–3, ESV)

So, the real test for you now is: Do You Believe This for yourself? Do you have Christ living within you? Test yourself! If you believe, how does it show?

“Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!”  (2 Corinthians 13:5, ESV)

If you pass the test, if today you will trust God and overcome sin, self and Satan, then you will be prepared to live with God in heaven for eternity. 

Will you remain in Christ? Will you endure to the end and be saved?

1. Hope is the vaccine for sadness. Peace is the antidote to fear.
2. Peace results not the absence of conflict but from the presence of God who provides comfort and confidence, even and especially in challenging times (Phil. 4:6-7).
   • Where is your mind focused? Your thinking determines your feelings and the direction of your life.
   • Keep your mind focused on the Lord’s presence within and you will stay in perfect peace. “You will keep in perfect peace him whose mind is steadfast, because he trusts in you.” (Isaiah 26:3, NIV84) “He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.” (Psalm 91:1, NIV84)
   • LIsten to the LORD and receive His promise of peace. Turning or returning to foolish behavior and ungodly lifestyle choices results in frustration and fear. “I will listen to what God the Lord will say; he promises peace to his people, his saints— but let them not return to folly.” (Psalm 85:8, NIV84)
3. One day Jesus will return to reign over a renewed earth and establish universal peace (Isa. 11).
4. Until Christ returns children of God are called to be peacemakers (Matt. 5:9)
5. Stand for justice and truth, but speak with love (Matt. 5:6, Eph. 4:15).
   “Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ.” (Ephesians 4:15, NIV)
6. Share the Good News with everyone who will pay attention to you (2 Cor. 5:17-21)
   “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” (2 Corinthians 5:17–21, NIV84)

“And God saw all that he had made, and it was very good.” (Genesis 1:31)

Today we spend much of our time staring at screens marveling at our own magnificence. We are inveterate humanists. “Man is the measure of all things.” Is it any wonder atheism is on the rise? For thousands of years humans stared at the stars and were convinced that heaven and earth was created by God (or gods). We have removed ourselves from the beauty and grandeur of nature, and surrounded ourselves with human artifices. I would encourage you to go outside; leave your mobile device behind; turn off your technology; take off your headphones. Immerse yourself in nature by taking a walk in the forest, or by the lake. Get away from the city lights and stare at the awe inspiring night sky.  

“The heavens declare the glory of God; the sky displays his handiwork”  (Psalm 19:1).

God speaks through his creation. The question is: are you paying attention? There is order and complexity evident everywhere from the smallest wildflowers to the Grand Tetons, from moss growing on the slick rocks of Slide Rock in Sedona, Arizona to the giant blue whales swimming in the Pacific Ocean. Design is evident everywhere, from the human eye to the giraffe’s neck, from your immune system to the bacterial and viral infections  it is marshaled to fight. Design evinces a Designer.

The universe was created, and the Creator had a purpose in mind when he made it: people. Human beings are seen as the crown of God’s creation in the Genesis account. We are the only creatures made in God’s own image.

“God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” (Genesis 1:27, NASB95)

Mediocrity

 It was once believed that earth was at the center of the cosmos, until scientists observed that there is no center, nor edges, in the universe. In fact, earth is not at the center of the Milky Way Galaxy, not even in our own little solar system. Copernicus is usually credited with the discovery that we occupy a heliocentric (solar) system. This led scientists to posit the so-called Copernican Principle. Some call it the principle of mediocrity: earth is not special; it is an unremarkable planet revolving around a small star at the edge of one galaxy among some two hundred billion estimated to exist in the universe. Looking at things from that perspective could certainly persuade someone to regard us as insignificant creatures. Couple that with the conclusion of evolution— life appeared spontaneously and evolved randomly over  millions of years to finally result in human beings—and you may well feel like the teacher in the Bible’s book of Ecclesiastes, who said, “‘Absolute futility,’ says the Teacher. ‘Absolute futility. Everything is futile.’” (Ecclesiastes 1:2, CSB) The Teacher believed in the existence of God, but it doesn’t appear he had a any relationship with the Creator, other than a distant reverence and a wise willingness to keep his commands.

However, the principle of mediocrity is not hard science, but a matter of perspective which betrays the bias of underlying assumptions like naturalism and atheism. There is design evident in the universe. It is finely tuned, astonishingly so. What is “fine tuning,” and why does it matter so much? Depending upon how it is evaluated, and which cosmologist is doing the calculation, there are as many as 93 fine tuning parameters essential for our complex-life sustaining planet to have come about. Let’s look at two of these parameters.

Gravity

First, I want to give credit to Astronomer Dr. Hugh Ross for the following information. The gravitational constant represents the relative strength of gravity. If the constant moved one direction, then gravity would be stronger, the other and it would be weaker. If gravity were even slightly stronger, matter would clump together too tightly, and stars would be too hot and burn out too quickly. If gravity were weaker, matter would not clump together enough, and stars would be far too cool. The result of this would be a lack of heavy elements necessary to form planets, since those elements come from the furnace of stars. To understand how delicate the fine tuning of the Gravitational Constant is, let’s look at an example given by Lee Strobel in the film Case for a Creator. Strobel asks us to imagine a ruler marked with one inch increments, which is then stretched all the way across the known universe. The Gravitational Constant could be marked anywhere on this imaginary ruler, but for life to exist anywhere in the universe it can only be in one precise one inch location. Move the Gravitational Constant even one inch in either direction and you and I wouldn’t exist. Is it just a coincidence that gravity is so perfectly balanced for life? Remember, this is only one fine tuning parameter of 93 essential for you and I to exist.  Let’s look at one more.

Size of the Universe

At the beginning of this chapter I encouraged you to get away from the city  lights and look at the stars in the sky. It is a magnificent sight, but it could also make you feel insignificant. Have you ever wondered why the universe is so big? This involves two parameters: 1) the total mass of the universe, and 2) the amount of empty space in the universe. Both of these must be fine tuned with infinitesimal precision in order for complex, intelligent life to exist anywhere, ever.

Once again, I credit the following information and examples to Dr. Hugh Ross. The mass of the universe is so critical that if at the beginning there had been even the mass of one dime added or subtracted from it, the balance of the observable universe would have been thrown off and no physical life would now be possible. One thin dime. That seems pretty insignificant on its own, but that tiny dime matters.

Ever wonder why there’s so much space in space? Why is the universe so vast, so spread out? Since the amount of matter in the universe cannot be more or less than it is, we turn to another fine tuning parameter the Rate of Cosmic Expansion. The universe has been expanding since the Big Bang event, and that expansion has had to be precise for life to exist. In fact, the rate of expansion cannot differ by one part in ten to the 60^th power—that’s a ten with 60 zeroes after it! If the rate of expansion slowed by even that incomprehensibly small fraction, there would be less space, and the universe would have collapsed back on itself before stars formed. Planets form after, and as a result of, stars. People come last, so you wouldn’t be grappling with the difficult questions we’re seeking to answer if the Rate of Cosmic Expansion were different because none of us would exist. Yet here we are.

Gravity is perfect. The amount of matter is perfect. The amount of space in the universe is perfect. There are 90 more parameters. When you look at this it definitely seems like there’s intelligence and power behind the existence of the universe. 

“As we survey all the evidence, the thought insistently arises that some supernatural agency—or, rather, Agency—must be involved. Is it possible that suddenly, without intending to, we have stumbled upon scientific proof of the existence of a Supreme Being? Was it God who stepped in and so providentially crafted the cosmos for our benefit?”  George Greenstein, astrophysicist

Finally, let’s turn to our own little “insignificant” planet. According to scientists who subscribe to the Copernican Principle of mediocrity, there are probably millions of planets like ours, and the universe must be teeming with life. The underlying assumption of these scientists is that the universe and life has come about as a result of random natural and material processes. Science doesn’t look to God because science is a method of discovering how the natural world works. It is a grave error to presume that this means there is nothing beyond the natural world. In fact, as we are observing, the existence and order of the cosmos points to a Creator beyond the material universe, who powerfully brought it into existence and crafted it carefully.

In the book Privileged Planet, astro-biologist Guillermo Gonzales lists multiple factors necessary for a planet in our universe to support complex life. So, what is necessary for a planet to be “insignificant” like ours? It must have liquid water, be terrestrial (have land), have the proper ratio of liquid water and continents, have carbon, have an oxygen rich atmosphere, have a magnetic field, plate tectonics, must be orbiting a main sequence G2 dwarf star (yes, that’s our little sun!),  have a moderate rate of rotation, be protected by gas giant planets (yep, that’s our Saturn and Jupiter!), be within a galactic habitable zone (most of the galaxy is quite dangerous), be in a circumstellar habitable zone (most of the solar system is too hot or too cold for life), must be orbited by a large moon (yea, moon!). So, after reading through those (if you did!), what do you think the likelihood would be for the existence of other complex-life supporting planets like our “unremarkable” earth? Gonzales’s conclusion is, Not Very Likely At All.

“Given the recent trends in the planetary sciences, perhaps we should begin to view Earth and its immediate surroundings not as a carbon copy of systems bound to arise whenever stars and planets form, but as a finely tuned, interdependent system that together nurtures a strange little oasis.”  (Jay Richards and Guillermo Gonzales, Privileged Planet)

Human thinking has been wrong. It doesn’t matter where our planet stands in relation to a physical center. In a universe like ours that is relative and irrelevant. What is relevant is the why of our existence. Science cannot answer that question. In fact, some scientists eschew it altogether. Richard Dawkins calls is a stupid question. Yet it is the fundamental question of every searching human mind. Why? 

“Though man is not the physical center of the universe, he appears to be at the center of its purpose.” (Augros & Stanciu in The New Story of Science as quoted in Case for a Creator)

“And yet as we stand gazing at the heavens beyond our little oasis, we gaze not into a meaningless abyss but int a wondrous arena… a universe so skillfully crafted for life and discovery that it seems to whisper of an extra-terrestrial intelligence immeasurably more vast, more ancient, and more magnificent than anything we’ve been willing to expect or imagine.” (Guillermo Gonzales and Jay Richards, Privileged Planet)

Why is a question for which only God can provide a satisfactory answer, but he has given us the curiosity and capability to seek, and when we seek God we will find him if we seek him with all of our hearts. God’s first book is the creation, written long before the Bible. It is incomplete as a source for revealing the Creator’s personal attributes. However, the cosmos clearly points to the existence of a supernatural, powerful intelligence who brought it all into existence. I would encourage you to read the book of Creation it daily.