I used to believe that the next life would be a purely spiritual existence. I thought that when I died, I would go to heaven and have a spiritual body and live in a spiritual world, and that death was an escape from all that was physical and corrupt. I saw our bodies and world as only temporary. As I have studied the Bible more, I have come to realize that the next life will actually be a restoration of heaven, earth, our bodies, and relationships as they were originally created to be (Isa. 65:17-19; 2 Peter 3:10-13; Heb. 11:16; 13:14; Rev. 3:12; Rev. 21:1-22:5). The new earth is described in the book of Revelation as a physical place with rivers, and trees that yield crops of fruit, and cities, and streets (Rev. 22:1-2). This is very similar to the Garden of Eden described in Genesis (Gen. 1:29; 2:9-10).
God’s Kingdom was vandalized and nothing in this world is working according to the way it was designed to work. But God promised to one day redeem things back to the way they were supposed to be. He promised to send a Savior who would restore the Kingdom and bring back peace, justice, and righteousness (Isa. 9:6-7).
The Gospel is the announcement that God is now fulfilling the promise He made to restore everything back to the way that it was created to be. With the Birth of Christ, the Kingdom of God arrived! Jesus came into the world to make all things right. The Kingdom of God has come into the world, and we can be a part of it. Anyone who chooses to follow Jesus as their Lord and Savior becomes part of the new Kingdom. We do this by turning to Jesus alone as our Source of Life. We become children of God, and we join Him in restoring all of creation back to what it was originally intended to be.
The fact that the future Kingdom will be physical, has serious implications in the way I live my life today. I used to think “Why recycle, we can’t save the planet, its going to burn anyway?” Yes, it is going to burn, but if the future Kingdom is physical, that means that the physical world has value. Same for our bodies, we might think, “I’m going to die anyway so why take care of my body?” But if we will have physical bodies in the future, then our bodies have value and physical life is valuable.
The physical world and our physical bodies matter. Following God is not just about our spiritual lives. Part of joining God in restoring the world, is to recognize the dignity of all human beings made in the image of God, restore justice to the oppressed and marginalized, care for the diseased and dying, provide community for the isolated and lonely, cultivate the natural creation through science, art, and gardening, and share spiritual joy with those alienated from God. This is how we live out the Good News of the future Kingdom. This is the beginning of the Kingdom now.
In the book The Road to Missional, Michael Frost said,
“If mission is the alerting of people to the reign of God through Christ, our mandate is to do whatever is required in the circumstances to both demonstrate and announce that kingship. We feed the hungry because in the world to come there will be no such thing as starvation. We share Christ because in the world to come there will be no such thing as unbelief. Both are the fashioning of foretastes of that world to come, none more or less valid or important than the other.” (Michael Frost, The Road to Missional, quoted in Dwell p.79)
“Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away” (Rev. 21:3-4).
