Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” (Revelation 21:1-4)

Beloved,

Over the course of the 135 years of Major League baseball history, with more than 300,000 games played, there have been only 23 official perfect games.  The probability of a perfect game is less than .0001%. It is an incredibly rare thing to watch a perfect game in action. As the game goes on, the heightened expectation and excitement can be felt in the air. Whether in bowling or baseball, everyone desires to experience perfection, but rarely do they have the chance.

Perfection is rarely experienced in sports, but impossible to experience in our earthly lives. We only see glimpses of moral perfection and eternal beauty.  We have the great privilege to know God personally on earth, but that relationship, as great as it is now, is still only a shadow. “For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.” (1 Cor. 13:2) God has promised to make all things new and restore us to the perfect relationship humanity had in the garden. We will no longer desire for perfection, but will experience it firsthand.

The promise purchased for us through faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ will be finally realized as we walk free from sin in a perfect relationship with the Triune God.  Our anticipation and excitement should grow as our hearts long for eternity. The greatest gift we will experience in heaven is God Himself.  We will be His people and He will be our God. And we get to experience this great gift in our fully renewed and restored bodies in the heavenly city of our King, the New Jerusalem.

If we do not look forward to heaven, then we do not understand it. I remember singing Billy Joel’s Only the Good Die Young as a teenager and thinking he so was right, only to have my eyes opened to the gospel and see how wrong he (and I) was when I sang, “They say there’s a heaven for those who will wait /Some say it’s better but I say it ain’t / I’d rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints / The sinners are much more fun.” 

There is a heaven for those who will wait, some say it’s better, and I can’t wait.  Beloved, long for heaven, it will be very much worth the wait.  God has promised us a perfect place with perfect bodies living in perfect relationships experiencing the perfect pleasures of a perfect life in the presence of a perfect God.