Heaven Or Iowa?

In the movie, "Field of Dreams," Ray Kinsella builds a baseball field in the middle of his corn fields after hearing a voice that tells him, "If you build it, he will come." Soon deceased baseball players, raised from the dead as young men, come out of Ray's cornfields. One of the players is Ray's father, John Kinsella. While Ray and John are renewing their relationship, John asks  Ray, "Is this heaven?" Ray replies, "It's Iowa," and then asks John, "Is there a heaven?"  John says, "Oh yeah, it's the place dreams come true."

The book of Genesis says that God called the "expanse," heaven (Gen. 1:8). The writer of Ecclesiastes tells us that God is in heaven (Eccl. 5:2). Jesus said, heaven is the throne of God (Mat. 5:34). God the Father is in heaven (Mark 11:25-26). The Holy Spirit descended from heaven as a dove, and rested upon Jesus (John 1:32).  Jesus said, no one has ascended to heaven, except the Son of Man, the Bread of God, who has descended from heaven (John 3:13; 6:33, 38, 41). Therefore, if we want to know about heaven, we have one source of information, and that's from the one who has descended from heaven, Jesus.

In the Gospel of John, chapter 3, Jesus was having a conversation with Nicodemus, who was a Pharisee. The Pharisees rejected Jesus, and his testimony.  He told Nicodemus that a person had to be born again, or born of the spirit,  to see, and enter into the kingdom of  God (or kingdom of heaven). He then went on to say that being born of the spirit, has to do with believing in the Son of God, Jesus (John 3:1-21).

We have placed so much emphasis on heaven being a place that we go to after we die, and little  emphasis on the relationship that we have with God in Christ Jesus. Heaven is a metaphor for salvation and eternal life. It is a present, and future reality. It's a relationship that we have with God. We have been brought into this relationship in Christ, because of who he is, and because of what he has done. Jesus said, "This is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent" (John 17:3). It's necessary to believe in Jesus, to trust him, to "eat the bread of God," so that he lives within us, and so that we fully experience the life that he has already given us, for this is the will of the Father (John 6:40, 50-51). 

Jesus made these bold statements:

I am the Bread of Life (John 6:35). 

I am the Light of the World (John 8:12).

I am the Door (John 10:9). 

I am the Good Shepherd (John 10:11).

I am the Resurrection and the Life (John 11:25). 

I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life (John 14:6). 

I am the True Vine (John 15:1).

I am, the Alpha and the Omega, the First, and the Last, the Beginning, and the End (Rev. 22:13).

Jesus is our life! In him we experience heaven. Salvation is a person, Jesus. Just like Jesus said, "I am...". 

The apostle Paul said, "When Christ who is our life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory (Col. 3:4 my emphasis). When Christ is revealed, we will experience the fullness of heaven in our new, glorified bodies. We have borne the image of the man from earth [Adam], and we  will also bear the image of the heavenly man [Jesus] (1 Cor. 15:47-49). 

We are [already] seated with him in the heavenly realm (Eph. 2:5-6). We're seated with him, because we are one with him in his person.

The present heaven, and the present earth will both pass away (Luke 21:33).  But the good news is, Jesus is the pioneer of the new creation - the new earth, and new heaven (Isa. 65:17; Rev. 21:1-5).

Watch my latest video on heaven.