Why Should We Want to Go to Heaven?

People may regard this question as daft. Some may regard it as a form of escapism, a reluctance to accept that the reality of life on earth is all that there is, with no future after we die. In contrast, others would respond by asking, who would not want to go to heaven? I suppose it depends on what we imagine heaven to be. After all, if someone asks us, Do you want to go to such a place?, we might think, ‘Well, it depends on which locations in that place the questioner has in mind, and also how long he expects me to be there.’ So how can we find out about heaven? The Bible claims to tell us. I want to suggest four biblical reasons about wanting to be in heaven and we can ask ourselves if we like them. If we do, we will get there; but if we don’t like them, maybe we should assess ourselves about our destiny. But we can begin by making a few comments about is meant by heaven. 

What is meant by heaven?

There are different ways of answering that question. For example, we use the word to describe the place where God reigns from. There he has his throne and his heavenly court. It is the place that Jesus ascended to after his resurrection. Moreover, it is the location where the souls of believers go when they die, as Jesus indicated to the penitent thief when he assured him that he would be in Paradise later that day. It is the Father’s house to which his children are being gathered. It is the place that Paul experienced when he said that he was caught up to the third heaven and saw incredible things. No doubt, heaven in this sense is a wonderful place, even as Paul informed the Philippians when wrote that to be with Christ is far better. Heaven is the place of our citizenship, where our names are recorded.

 

Yet heaven is more than that in the Bible. Heaven, in the ways that we have been describing it, is not permanent. Rather it is going to change. In what ways? Jesus is going to leave it at his second coming. The souls of believers are going to leave it at that time and be reunited with their bodies at the resurrection. Around that time, Jesus will create the new heavens and new earth. Paul reminded the Romans that in some way the creation that is currently groaning would be released from its bondage to corruption and brought into the liberty of the glory of the children of God. It is to be the dwelling place of God and his people, a universe of glory without defect for ever. This is the heaven we should anticipate in ultimate terms. 

 

We should want to go to heaven to be with Jesus

There are many reasons for wanting to be with Jesus. One of them is his amazing person – he is God and man. Even in this life we like to be with interesting people because of their gifts and accomplishments. But none of them are as interesting as Jesus. All of them together as not as interesting as Jesus. What can be said about him?

The apostle John, as we know, spent three years with Jesus. John provided a summary of that experience when he wrote, ‘We beheld his glory.’ Glory means ‘what is best about a person’, or what is unique about a person provided the uniqueness is good. John saw the compassion of Jesus, the faithfulness of Jesus, the love of Jesus, the goodness of Jesus, the purity of Jesus, and the consistency of Jesus. He heard the words of Jesus as he taught or as he prayed or as he interacted in other ways. What John saw overwhelmed him with astonishment, and in his first letter, he tells us that he could not forget what he saw and heard (1 John 1:1-4). Although sixty years had passed, he still felt the power of what he had experienced. And in that same letter, he says that he was looking forward to seeing Jesus (1 John 3:1-3). The apostle anticipated being with Jesus and watching him and hearing him forever. What John had experienced of Jesus made him want to know more. Previous experience of Jesus makes people desire heaven.

 

A second reason for wanting to be with Jesus comes from gratitude. After all, if it was not for Jesus, no humans would be in heaven. Even in this life, if a person rescued us from danger, we would want to meet that person and thank him or her. How much more with regard to the one who went to Calvary for us, who was willing to undergo the judgement of God in our place? It is striking that among the first thoughts of the converted criminal at Calvary was that he wanted to be with Jesus in heaven. He had been a believer for a few minutes, and that is what he desired. The apostle John and the converted criminal shared that desire, and so do all of God’s people. They have no concept of heaven without Jesus being there. Heaven is not primarily the absence of things, rather it is about the presence of Jesus.

 

We should want to go to heaven to be with Christians

Heaven is a community. In a sense, it always has been about community. God is the highest community because he exists in three persons – the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Moreover, there is the community of the holy angels who exist together even although there are myriads of them. And in heaven there will be the community of the church, the redeemed composed of a number so large that no one can count them. Why should we want to be with them?

 

An obvious reason is that they are the family of God. Each of them has been adopted by the heavenly Father into an eternal relationship of sonship. Connected to their adoption is the fact that all of them are heirs of the heavenly inheritance designed for them to share together. The experience of heaven will be with those who have been made like Jesus. Such an experience of society is far beyond the most enjoyable experience known on earth.

 

There will be personal reasons for desiring to be with them. We will find out who prayed for us, perhaps once or twice, or maybe regularly for years. There will be those who prayed for us before we were born as they looked ahead to their descendants. We will rejoin those whom we knew personally in the vale of tears, which is how the Bible describes this life. Many gave us a beautiful example about how to live for Jesus, although all of them had flaws. But in heaven, they will not have any defects. No one there will have any flaws, and it will be wonderful to see them perfected.

 

No doubt, there are other motives such as meeting the missionaries who inspired us, the authors who God used to direct us about living the Christian life, the composers of devotional books who warmed our hearts and led us to think of Jesus, the martyrs who challenged us about our level of commitment to his cause. There are the believers mentioned in the Bible; some are mentioned once, others are mentioned on numerous occasions.

 

The fact of the matter is that we will be glad to see them all. Heaven will be a community full of love, a community composed of millions and millions, each glad that all the others are there.

 

We should want to go to heaven because it is holy

The concept of holiness gets a bad press today. Not even Christians are as enthusiastic about it as previous generations used to be. Many people would regard it as depressing, lacklustre, and sombre. Yet the Bible has a great emphasis on holiness as something to be admired and anticipated. 

As far as admiration is concerned, we know that God is holy. There are many ways of describing God and we are not to use them in a competitive manner. We are told that he is love. That description is attractive because it indicates warmth and pleasantness about God. Who would want to be in a place where the Sovereign did not have love? So it is good to know that the Lord is love. But what about holiness? Is that idea attractive to us.

 

Holiness points to purity and perfection. In other words, holiness is ideal, something about which nothing better can be said. To say that God is holy is to say that his perfections are such that nothing better can exist than him. It means that God is consistent and content with himself. He knows that it is impossible for something greater to exist. He will always be God, the unchangeable One, the One who is infinitely above all others.

 

It is very different with us. We are imperfect, inconsistent, and discontented. Every day we live on earth proves that to be the case. Will there be a time when such negative features will no longer define us? Yes, in heaven, because there we will be perfect in holiness. Imagine being in a gathering where nothing negative will be said because nothing negative can be said. Negative thoughts will not arise within us because we will be pure in heart. There will be nothing around us or in us to stimulate sinful thoughts and actions. At our creaturely level, we will be consistent and content because we will live fully for God and do so forever.

 

Should we not desire such a quality of life? We will not attain to the holiness of God – he will always be infinitely superior to us. We can see that from the response of the holy seraphim in Isaiah 6. But if we are God’s people, we will in heaven be fully holy as creatures of God, as holy as finite beings can be. There will be no sin, no trace of sin, in us. Each of us will say that the last thing we would want to see there is the old us. But an important feature of glory is the delight in holiness that will be in the hearts of the residents forever. Do we long for holiness? Recall McCheyne’s prayer, ‘Lord, make me as holy as a pardoned sinner can be!’ He had in mind life in this world, but there is a sense in which his words express what should be our desires for eternity.

 

We should want to go to heaven to enjoy our inheritance

What is our inheritance? In a sense, it is God, as the first answer of our catechism tells us. We are to enjoy him forever. But God reveals himself in actions and in places; those actions will take place in the eternal inheritance of his people. How would we describe an inheritance? Here are four suggestions: an inheritance in this life is a gift, a place with potential, a place where a useful purpose can be engaged in, a place to honour the person who gave it to us, although usually that person is not around. It will be different in heaven. God will be there, and the four features of an inheritance will be found in heaven.

 

In Matthew 25, Jesus described the Day of Judgement in his parable of the sheep and the goats. His invitation to the righteous will be for them in inherit the kingdom prepared for them by the Father from the foundation of the world. Their receiving it will be the outcome of his loving plan and he will have ensured that it will be the place where they can honour him and fulfil the intentions he has for them. In this life we constantly fail, but there will be no failures in that inheritance. Everything good will be attained by the heirs of glory. Of course, we do not really know what life there will be like, which is one reason for wanting to go there. It is inevitable that everything in it will be connected to discovering more about God and his wisdom, power, love, and goodness.

 

We are told that eventually the dwelling place of God will be with men. In himself, God does not need a dwelling place. But in his great grace, he has planned to live among his people throughout the eternal ages. And it will be a life of discovery of the good things he has in store for his church.

 

Four good reasons for wanting to go to heaven. There are others, of course. Another is that we don’t want to go to a lost eternity. Another is that we were made to worship God intelligently and fully. But today we can think about the four we have considered: to be with Jesus, to be with his people, to be holy and to receive our inheritance.