Randy Alcorn: Is Heaven A Real Place?

[adminpc]

**Will Heaven (the New Earth) Be an Actual Place?**
Randy Alcorn

Jesus told his disciples, “I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am” (John 14:3). He uses spatial terms to describe Heaven. The word where refers to a location. Likewise, the phrase “come back and take you” indicates movement and a physical destination.

If Heaven isn’t a place, in the full sense of the word, would Jesus have said it was? If we reduce Heaven to something less than or other than a place, we strip Christ’s words of their meaning.

We do not long for a non-body, non-Earth and non-culture, but for a new body, New Earth, and new culture, without sin and death. This is all part of longing for the resur- rection of the dead, which is at the heart and soul of the Christian faith (1 Corinthians 15).

Jesus said to his disciples, “At the renewal of all things, when the Son of Man sits on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel” (Matthew 19:28). He could have said “at the destruction of all things,” but he said “renewal” instead. “All things” means that this present earth is bursting with suggestions of what the New Earth will be like. What will be gone is not Earth and our bodies, but sin and death and the Curse!

Peter preached, “[Christ] must remain in heaven until the time comes for God to restore everything, as he promised long ago through his holy prophets” (Acts 3:21).

In Heaven, the full-length book, I cite dozens of passages where the prophets spoke of the coming restoration of the earth. This is why Peter said, “In keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, the home of righteousness” (2 Peter 3:13).