Your Origin And Destiny

Time in Heaven displays comforting similarities to Time on Earth.

What might the Time spans be called in Heaven? On Earth we have hours, days, weeks and months etc, but what might they have in Heaven?

Heaven certainly has “hours”:

“There was silence in Heaven for about half an hour” (Revelation 8:1).

Scripture also teaches us that both “day” and “night” are descriptors used in and about Heaven.

*In Matthew 26:29, Jesus commented on the wine he and his disciples were drinking at their last meal together; “I tell you, I will not drink from this fruit of the vine (wine) from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in My Father’s Kingdom”. Not only is Jesus pinpointing a future event to be shared with his disciples, but describes it as occurring at a unit of Time called a “day”.

*The Book of Revelation gives us some of our best illumination of Heaven. It was written by the Apostle John, who was taken on a visit to Heaven in the first century, and who described what he saw there. In Revelation 4:8 John tells us that “day and night they never stop saying ‘Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was, and is, and is to come’”.

Time, and how it passes, is pivotally important to us humans; it shapes how we plan and perceive things.

Heaven, where God is domiciled, existed before the world was formed. Since we carry God’s image, we should function best in an environment with certain chosen similarities to Heaven.

Our days in this world are thereby preparing us for living within heavenly days later.

It is helpful while studying scripture to keep in mind that Heaven today will be different to the New Heaven of the future. Heaven at any point in Time is God’s dwelling place. Consider Apostle John’s vision of the future “New Heaven” described in Revelation 21: 1-3

Then I saw “a New Heaven and a New Earth,” for the first Heaven and the first Earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the New Jerusalem, coming down out of Heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.

In Revelation 21:22-25 it teaches that in the future New Heaven, in a wonderful city called the New Jerusalem that will come down from the present Heaven, and in a fresh Cosmos identified as the New Heavens, there will be no need for the sun because instead God will supply its light.

Please always remember that Heaven today is different to what the New Heaven will be like in the distant future—after Judgement.

Even in the idyllic conditions that will exist in the New Jerusalem after Judgement, there will be the passing of Time—despite there being no need for a sun to shine, because God the Father and Jesus will supply all the light needed.. Consider Revelation 22:2, “On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month”. This shows that this stupendous city of the future will operate with “months”—this should help us adapt to being there. Perhaps there will be twelve-month years there similar to ours on our planet? Perhaps. Certainly, Time and its measurement will continue.

Nevertheless, the measurement of Time in Heaven nowadays. and other afterlife locations in the future, may not be related to a sun or to light or dark, even if the use of terms such as “day” and “night” may be retained for measuring Time—perhaps retained because these terms could give us comfort in that we understand them?

The continuing use of corresponding terminology for the passing of Time in every age and Venue to come in the afterlife is a further example of God’s love, who makes plans for us that we can anticipate even now with the expectation that we will belong and feel “at home”. This feeling of being “at home” in the afterlife is very commonly reported by NDErs, often to their great surprise and even wonderment.

In addition, we are promised (1Corinthians 15:53,54) that we will eventually have immortal physical bodies, and there are certain heart-warming and interesting activities described in Heaven that we will enjoy. Activities require Time.

The existence of Time in Heaven nowadays enables it to be an active and vibrant place.

The Bible retains a number of descriptive terms about Heaven that are readily understood from our lives on Earth, such as “speaking”, “singing”, “drinking”, “rooms”, “rivers”, “glass”, “light”, “feasting”, “throwing out”, “worshipping”, and much besides.