first of all, to Matthew chapter four. Matthew chapter four, reading a single verse here. And while you're turning there, I want to comment, especially for those who maybe weren't with us, started what I hope will be a series of sermons on the subject of heaven. And so I want you to kind of be putting on your thinking cap here today. And I want to remind you we're in the midst of the summer. So once again, at least I and many of you won't be here next week. But hopefully after that we're going to be able to really settle in and in a focused way dig more deeply into the subject of heaven. I've kind of designed these two sermons to stand alone, a little bit on their own to be more introductory. But today we're really getting into some of the biblical nuts and bolts about what is heaven? How is the Bible describing heaven to us? And today, I'm going to make the argument that the Bible begins to teach us about heaven by analogy. I want you to think about how the word heaven is used here in this verse that we're going to read in just a moment. But then we're going to turn to the first chapter of the Bible. We're going to think about the matter of heaven as it's related in Genesis chapter 1. So, Matthew 4, and we're going to read just verse 17. But I want to point out here that back in verse 12 is when Jesus begins His public ministry. And it tells us that Jesus went from Nazareth to Capernaum by the sea in order to fulfill certain verses of the Bible. Here is where Jesus is establishing His headquarters so that prophecies of the Old Testament are fulfilled. We can read and study about that right here. But in verse 17, we have something very significant. These are the first words of the first sermon of the first Savior that ever saved Europe. In fact, the only Savior that will ever save Europe. Imagine thinking back to the first words of Dr. Martin Luther King or the first public speech of a great president or a great king or a great diplomat. What we have here today, the words are short. I want you to think about the significance in terms of framing all that Jesus is and all that Jesus is about. when he utters these first words of the First Sermon of his public ministry. That's what we have here. Matthew 4, verse 17. From that time, Jesus began to preach, to say, repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Alright, then turn with me. We're going to come back to that in weeks to come, but turn with me now to Genesis chapter 1. Genesis chapter 1. I'm going to read this entire passage today. I want to enlist the help of the You have to read it at home also. But children especially, Zach, Collin, I'm looking at you guys, back there in the back, okay? I want you guys to keep track. As I read, we have about 30 some verses to read here. But as we read, what I want you to do is I want you to listen for the word heaven. The N on the N for heavens. Both of those two words are what we're looking for today. I want you to keep track on your fingers how many times do you hear the word heavens or heaven. I bet most of the adults can't even tell you offhand how many times that word is used in this passage. Point out that this passage is highly stylized Even as it gives us an accurate account of how God created the heavens and the earth. How does it count? That was just a practice. Right? So, think with me about what God is communicating to us here in Genesis chapter 1. What's the word you're looking for? Heavens or heaven? Genesis 1 beginning at verse 1. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void. And darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light. And there was light. And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light day. darkness he called night. There was evening and there was morning, the first day. And God said, let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let sin separate the waters from the waters. And God made the expanse, and separated the waters that were under the expanse from the waters that were above the expanse, and it was so. And God called the expanse heaven. There was evening, and there was morning, the second day. And God said, Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear. So God called the dry land earth. The waters that were gathered together He called the seas. And God saw what was good. And God said, Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind, while the earth... And it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed according to their own kinds, and trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind. God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning the third day. And God said, let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let there be for signs and for seasons and for days and years. And let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth. And if so, then God made two great lights, the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night and the stars. God sent them in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth, to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good, and there was evening, and there was morning before the day. And God said, let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth and across the expanse of the heavens. So God created the great sea creatures, and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarm, according to their kinds, and every weak bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful and multiply. Fill the waters and the seas, and let the birds multiply the earth. There was evening and there was morning, the fifth day. God said, Let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kinds, livestock and creeping things, and beasts of the earth according to their kinds. And so, God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds, and the livestock according to their kinds, and everything that creeps on the ground according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. Then God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the heavens, that's another one, and over the livestock, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So God created man in His own image. In the image of God, He created him, male and female, He created them. And God blessed them, and God said to them, Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the heavens, and over every living thing that moves on the earth. And God said, Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the heavens, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food." And so, God sought everything that He had made, and behold, it was very good. There was healing. And it was more than six days. This is leading to Oxford. All right. Children, if you keep track, hold up for me objective. All right. Hold up all at the same time. How many times did you hear the word heaven or heavens? Hold your fingers up in the air. Come on. Hold them up high. Perfect score. We're back to you. All right. OK. It's a worthy time. So, I want you to notice that this is actually more important, at least, heaven is talked about more than the days of creation. Ten times in Genesis chapter 1, the Bible talks about heaven. But it's not talking each time about what we usually think of when we think about heaven. Alright? So before we begin this morning, I want to take a poll now. I guess I'm in participation mode today. But I want you, now everyone, to raise your hand. I'd like to take a poll. How many of you have ever built your own house? Now, before you raise your hand, I want to clarify. You bought the land. You dug the foundation. Not you, necessarily, yourself, but at least you paid to have the house built. If you have built your own house, raise your hand. Okay, more than I expected, alright. So let me keep going for a second. Look around. This is interesting because you all have a particular insight today. Thank you. Put your hands down. As we begin to think about the subject of heaven, most of us have moved in to our houses. Our houses pre-existed, at least our living in them. will be there presumably long after miracle. I want to argue today that from this passage, that is how we need to think about heaven. Heaven is not eternal. Heaven is something God created. We learned this in the first verse of the first chapter of the Bible. Heaven is not eternal. The way God is eternal. It's more like God went camping and set up His own tent. And now He dwells in that tent. Think today about the creation of heaven. The doctrine of heaven is framed at creation. We ought to feel small as we think ever higher and ever deeper than we ever have before about our universe. Notice, it's not saying there will be birds in the eternal state. Now that may be true or may not be true, but that's not what our pastor was talking about today. I want you to think about the hiddenness of heaven and the hiddenness of God. This should not make us skeptical, but it should make us humble. The Eternal God set up His own dwelling place. In other words, God Himself inhabits the third heaven. If you're not familiar with this term, I'm not going to read it right now, but I would encourage you to look at 2 Corinthians 12-2 there that I've included in your notes today. If you're not familiar with this idea of the first, second, and third heaven, that's really what we're developing today. And you can see a little diagram of that on the sermon notes on the back of the bulletin today. A burden that we think about, the relationship between the very notion of space and time and reality. How does that relate to God? So let's start at the beginning. Point number one, heaven is expressly at hand. Heaven expressly at hand. We started in our first sermon here thinking about Jesus' exhortation to store up treasures in heaven, for neither moth nor rust destroy, for thieves do not break in this field. Jesus told us where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. And Jesus wants our hearts to be in heaven. The kingdom of heaven is at hand, Jesus announces in the first words of his first sermon of his public ministry. Heaven exists. It is close to you. In fact, it is at hand. Now, I won't make you do this part. What I did, I want you to know, I did this in my office this morning. I got out first to take the measure. That was a little more embarrassing. I dropped it on the floor. I decided it was better to use a ruler to measure how far is the furthest distance that my hand gets from my face. OK? And I measured it from straight out. I measured it from straight out. I measured it in front of me. as far as I can reach behind me, didn't change almost exactly 27 inches from the tip of my finger to my face. The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. I think taking Jesus' words in the plain sense of their meaning means that according to the Bible, Heaven is within 27 inches of you right now. In fact, I will argue further. According to Genesis chapter 1, heaven is inside of you. What is he doing right now? You're breathing. Heaven is so close to you. And heaven is something you never, ever see. Heaven is referred to 743 times in the Bible. Interestingly, in the Old Testament Hebrew, the word is always in the plural. Even here in verse 8, Genesis 1 verse 8, God called the expanse heaven. This word is also in the plural. I'm actually not sure why they did it this way. I think I know why. But all the other times here in this passage, it is in the plural. And in fact, every time I research this, every time, it is used in the Old Testament. The Hebrew word, which we're focusing on today, is the word shamayim. And that I am on the end, shamayim, means it is plural. The Greek New Testament, the word grados, meaning heaven, occurs in both the singular and the plural. The Apostle Peter taught about heaven in Acts 3. I don't have this on your notes, but you may want to jot it down. Acts 3, verses 19 through 21. In the first sermon by the first apostle, in the moments after Pentecost, heaven was the topic of discussion, among other things. Friends, you need to come to grips with the fact that if you're a Christian, then the Bible is telling you all the time about heaven if you have eyes to see. Heaven is everywhere in the Bible. But my burden today is that the doctrine of heaven is not some academic or ministerial idea. I don't even like to talk about the idea of heaven. I like to talk about heaven with a capital H, because heaven is a place, as real as Topeka with a capital T, or Winslow Court with a capital W, and a capital C, because the court is real too. A noun is a person, or a place, or a thing. It's something of substance. And to say that God created the heavens is to tell us something about God. God alone is eternal. When I was a kid, I found out, it was actually when I was quite young, but I was not a baby, but I have no memory of my parents buying our first tent. This was a tent that I fell in love with because our family did some of the most amazing camping And I, as I grew older and a little bit stronger, my dad started letting me help set up a tent. And that was really something. I was amazed because I was helping my dad set up a tent. had my kids help me set up the tent that I, help my dad set up the tent, and we began to watch the tent begin to tear, and the tent began to fall down, and the poles began to bend, and other things happened as the tent got really, really old. And that tent is no longer. When I was thinking about the experience, and I would encourage you to think about the experience. Think about that. Not as a building, Think of heaven not as something constructed. Think of heaven as something that is set up. We know that heaven is not eternal. It says it in Genesis 1 verse 1. The heavens are created just like the earth is created. It's quite simply the place where God dwells. And so again, now I want to help you to think about, when we say the word heaven, definitely we need to immediately go into, well, what heaven are we talking about? There's the sky, the birds fly in the sky, in the air. I actually like the word air better, because air is around us. Air is what we breathe. The Bible calls this the heavens. We can call it oxygen, we can use the old word ether, but heaven is near to us. It's not in another place, but heaven is the sky or air, it is space, and it is the dwelling place of God. God promises in a way that we don't fully understand that He will come again and will dwell forever in the midst of His people. In fact, if we think of the third heaven or the highest heaven as the place where God dwells, then when God moves, I think heaven moves with Him. You don't stay in your tent forever. You eventually pack up your tent and you either move to another campsite or you go home. God promises that He will dwell forever in the midst of His people. You will see Him face to face. There will no longer be any separation between the Creator and His personal created beings. Friends, God's plan is coming to pass. God's plan is that His people will be with Him in Heaven forever. This leads us to the second point. Now, I want to really zero in on Genesis chapter 1. Heaven expounded at creation. I want you to think about, as we're going to be, over the course of these sermons, looking through the Bible, looking at various systematic doctrinal presentations of Heaven in Scripture, that this is like the picture frame. Today, we need to see that as we open our Bibles, we have a highly stylized account of creation. There are seven days, with evening and morning. God says ten times in the text. Heaven is also mentioned ten times. By the way, I think Bible verses are referring to the sky or to the air. And there's a really big deal made in the creation account of the birds flying in the heavens. I think the Hebrews were fascinated. How did they do that? In fact, I was so fascinated this week, I worked hard, Elizabeth Reed and I, I wanted to bring one of these. All right, we hung a lot, didn't we? And so we had them hanging from the beam over here now in the entryway that I want you to think about. The mystery of flight. The birds flying in the heavens. How did you do that? If you flap your arms, I bet you have at some point in your life, like, could I do that? I'll never forget the time that my son, sorry, son, I forgot to share this. But I remember the time that my son was standing up on the back of a chair that we had, it's now in our living room, but in our old house, it was up on the second floor, balcony. And he had on his Superman cape, And he was looking out over the great room below. And all I could do was shout, Peter, don't jump! Because Peter has a very active imagination. And Peter was thinking, as I thought, many times as a young person, I wonder, maybe I could fly. Well, don't try. Jesus actually says, get behind me, Satan. Well, Satan tries to get him to fly. I want you to think about what does it mean to be created in the image of God? To live with the Kingdom of Heaven at hand. By the way, I think ultimately what that passage means is that the Kingdom is very near to them because Jesus is the one who's going to reach it. Wherever Jesus is, that's where Heaven is. Heaven is created in the very first verse of the first book of the Bible. In verse 1, heaven is not defined, but notice that it is contrasted dramatically with the earth. There is a heaven where God is now. God created His dwelling place, and then God created our dwelling place, all in the first verse of the Bible. But now I want to move on. Now we're down to verse 6. In verse 6 God turns his hand to making, I'll point out that's the word now being used, making or crafting a heaven on the earth. It's a heaven that comes all the way down to the ground. It's called heaven, verse 8. Some translations say sky. God calls this space between the waters that are under the expanse and the waters that are above the expanse, we would call these lakes or streams and clouds, and in between these is heaven, number one. And it's called heaven in verse 8. God called this heaven. So friends, God is teaching us something here about how to think about heaven. Heaven is not the earth. Heaven is ethereal. The earth is firm. But we live with God in the place that He's created and someday we'll go to heaven and be with Him. It's between the walls. between the waters on the earth and the clouds in the sky. Then look over at verse 20. And now we see God filling what He formed on the second day. Sorry, the first day. The first day, He called the expanse heaven. And now, in verse 20, God said, let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures. And let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the heavens. So the expanse is that space between the waters on the earth and the waters above. And that expanse is what the Bible is calling heaven. Or the expanse of the heavens. Do you see how this is working? Now, let's build on top of that. Now go down to verse 14. And God said, let there be lights. Now, the word lights is then used five times here. I don't have time to go into this, but if you want a really interesting study, there's a special Hebrew word here translating lights or light. The only other place where this word is used is in connection with the golden lamp stand. in the holy place. And as the priest came in to the holy place, there on his left was the golden lamp stand. And because the tabernacle was facing east, that was to the south. And you know what direction the seven visible lights are? If you're facing west, because the tabernacle is facing east, you'll be to the south. And if you can simply lift your eyes, Above the golden lampstand there are the sun, the moon, and the five visible planets. The planet, the elliptic of our solar system. It's fascinating. That's not what this sermon is about, but I wanted to share it with you. But verse 17, God sent them, that is, the sun and the moon, in the expanse of the heavens to give light on the earth. to rule over the day and over the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. God saw it with the good that there was evening and there was morning before the day." This is using our terminology of God for today. God turns His attention to making the things in the second heaven, what we modern folks would call space. He makes the sun and the moon and sets them in the expanse of the heavens to give light to the earth. So the heavens are primarily other than the earth. Birds fly in the heavens. The sun and the moon and the stars move through the heavens. And perhaps the greatest understatement in the Bible, in verse 16, Do you know there are somewhere between 100 billion and 200 billion stars in our galaxy? Nobody made a galaxy. Our star is actually one of the smaller, that includes the stars in our galaxy. And our galaxy is one of hundreds of billions, we don't even know how many. We thought we had an idea, and then they put up James Webb. And we found out, oh wait, there's way more galaxies that we couldn't even see. Saw the YouTube video called Physics is Broken. Because now we have to completely redo a whole bunch of math that was estimating how far out would we see galaxies. And there's galaxies beyond that. Friends, our God is great and awesome. I'm persuaded that if we take the Bible's trajectory in thinking about heaven, on one hand, heaven is so close to us, and on the other hand, heaven is so far beyond our grasp, that should not make us skeptical. That should make us calm. We are human, like all the rest. We are dust. Oh, but these dust creatures have had a breath of life breathed into them by the Almighty Creator God Himself. So, let me push back on what I gave you. Friends, we are not starlets. We are earth dust breathed into by the Creator of this life. Do you believe that you belong to your Creator, body and soul? Do you believe that the God who made birds fly in the heavens can metaphorically make you fly? Every time we see a bird, we remember heaven. Every time we see a star, we remember heaven. My friends, those aren't the heavens that we're talking about. We haven't even gotten to our real point today. That's why we need to go now to point number three. Heaven, the sky, and heaven, space, are revealed explicitly in the first chapter of the Bible. I pointed out that in Genesis 1-1 God created the heavens, but that heavens is not defined until later in the Bible. Point number three, heaven expanded upon progressively. So my argument today is that we learn something about heaven when we think about the creation, about the air, and about the celestial heavens. But now, we need to see and we need to think about, oh wait a minute, there's no eternity, there's no our souls going somewhere, that's not the topic of the chapter on creation. And so now we have to begin to patiently follow and let God lead our thinking as we go through the Bible and begin to learn that, oh, there is in fact not one heaven, not two heavens, But there is the third heaven. That is the heaven that we think about. Heaven as the dwelling place of God. And so, if you would, click in your Bible to Deuteronomy chapter 10. This is the first place in the Bible where this phrase is used. And then it's used numerous other places in the Old Testament. Deuteronomy 10. And the text is in verse 14. and that the earth belongs to him, he's going to a certain third location now, in verse 14. Notice this comes in the context of the covenant. God is requiring something of us, he's calling on us to love and serve him, and then I'm going to read verse 15. It's in connection with the covenant, friends, that now the third heaven, the dwelling place of God, where true believers long to go, is now revealed. Read with me Deuteronomy 10 and verse 12. And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you? But to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways, to love Him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. of the Lord which I am commanding you today for your good. Behold, to the Lord your God belong heaven and the heaven of heavens, the earth with all that is in it. Yet the Lord set His heart in love on your fathers and chose their offspring after them you above all peoples, as you are this day. Circumcise, therefore, the foreskin of your heart, and be no longer stubborn. For the Lord your God is God of gods, and Lord of lords, the Great, the Mighty, and the Awesome God, who is not partial, and takes no rides." Friends, here we have a fascinating development of the doctrine of heaven. your skin of your heart, that is a picture based on Old Testament circumcision, the Old Testament presentation of regeneration. We all must do through faith what's required here through believing in the promised Messiah. The Lord reveals not only heaven Literally, it says, to the Lord your God belong the heavens, plural. Alright? And by that, he's referring back to creation, back to the sky, and back to space. Heaven number one, heaven number two. And he also says, to the Lord God belongs the earth. But now, in between, we have a third location identified. This is a big deal. Lord your God belong the heavens and the heavens of the heavens. That's literally what it says. The heavens world of the heavens. This is the heaven of heaven. This is the heaven that is above the sky and space. This is the heaven where God dwells. This is the heaven that ultimately we're thinking about. this series. The Lord reveals not only heaven, remember the plural, but now he's revealing the heavens of the heavens. Now I'm disappointed at this point, I'll just have you know that the English Standard Version, I wish they more consistently This doctrine contained in the Torah, once you notice, is this foundational doctrine given to Moses by God Himself. This is going to be picked up in a variety of passages throughout the rest of the Old Testament. Solomon prays to the true God, acknowledging humbly that even the heavens of the heavens would not be able to hold or contain God. much less the temple that He has built in Jerusalem. Saul would say, God, You are so immense, You are so great, that even the heavens of the heavens, and by that he's referring back to this verse in the Torah, cannot contain You. If the first and the second and even the third heaven can't contain You. Because remember, heaven is created. God is not created. God is bigger than heaven. God is older than heaven. God is more, is more, won't last longer than heaven. God is God. Heaven is not God. How much less this measly little building. And I imagine the Hebrews saying, wow, this is not measly. This is not a building. But then I guess God didn't even fit in this section. It's interesting to think about. That's what Saul is praying. In the Psalms, we learn that the Lord's throne exists in heaven. He's up there, meaning His eyes can behold everyone doing their thing on the earth. Isaiah 66, verse 1, the Lord announces, heaven is my throne, and the earth is my woodstool. So what is this house that you have built for me? And what is the place of my rest? All these things my hand has made. Bringing all these things into existence, declares the Lord. Then he says something interesting. The covenant God says this, this is the one to whom I will look. He who is humble and contrite in spirit, he who trembles at my word. Friends, I would ask you today, do you tremble at the word of God? Do you mine it for its riches? Do you meditate upon its marvels? Do you embrace its promises? Is your heart filled with hope that comes from God's holy and inspired Word? It is. You are all to whom God is looking. To whom God is listening. There's a few other instances, I've included some of them there in the notes today, but I want to conclude this portion by turning to 2 Corinthians now. Turn with me. I've been alluding to this verse throughout our time here, but I want you to see that if you embrace the framing of the doctrine of heaven, there is a verse here that makes perfect sense. We're going to come to this passage, I'll explain this more fully in another time, but I just wanted to look at verse 2 here, where Paul says, 2 Corinthians 12, verse 2, I know a man in Christ who 14 years ago was caught up to the third heaven, whether in the body or out of the body, I do not know, God knows. And I know that this man was caught up in a paradise. Whether in the body or out of the body, I do not know. God knows. And he heard things that cannot be told, which man may not utter." Now, you'll find out later in the passage, Paul's actually talking about himself here. But Paul's claiming to have a vision. Whether he was physically caught up in heaven or whether his body was left behind, he says, I don't know. But notice how he describes heaven. There are so many weird interpretations of 2 Corinthians 12 too, but I hope that now it makes perfect sense. Paul is thinking like any good, biblically trained Hebrew. There's heaven in the sky. There's heaven in space. There's heaven in the secret place of God. I'm talking about the third one. I went to where God dwells. Now, either that's true or not true. Either you believe that or you don't. That was Paul's apostolic plan. This leads us to the fourth and final point today. That is, Kevin engaged in the drama of redemption. We read it earlier, and if you would, turn with me one last time to one last passage. Philippians chapter three. Because when we're in today, I want us to be aware of this framing of the doctrine of heaven that the Bible does right at the beginning. God created the heavens, God created the earth, and then God created Remember in verse one God created the heavens and the earth. And then he names the heavens, that is the sky. And then he names the heavens, that is space. And so what's left open and what's then developed a little later is the third heaven that was established at the beginning. My argument today is that we come back and that we're focused on the engagement. What I want to say here, I simply want to read beginning in verse 7. Philippians 3 verse 7. But whatever gain I had, I count it as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For His sake I have suffered loss of all things, and count them as rubbish in order that I may gain Christ. We found in him not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes from faith in Christ. Righteousness of God that depends on faith. And now, jump down to verse 13. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize. of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. And then jump down to the first point. This is where now he explicitly ties us in. First point, but our citizenship is in heaven. And from it, that is from heaven, we awaken. And by the way, this is in the singular. From it, that is from heaven, we awaken safely. The Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like His glorious body by the power that enables Him even to subject all things to Himself. So I want to challenge you today with three applications as we bring these various verses home with the year. First of all, I want to challenge you to become a student of the first heaven and the second heaven. Learn more about our atmosphere that cuddles the Earth like a blanket that cuddles our bodies every day. Also, I challenge you to become an amateur astronomer. Learn about the wondrous things happening in the heavens night by night. Real practically, I found an app on my iPhone, I don't know if it's for droids or not, but called Starworld. You can set notifications, get as much or as little as you want, believe me, as much as you want, like NASA keeps out all this stuff. But the things that are happening in the heavens, night by night, are pretty amazing. To be able to pick out and understand the movement of the planets across the olympic, versus the stars as they move across the sky. As you understand the scale and the mystery of the things you can see with your eyes, Your heart will be more and more prepared to understand the heaven and dwelling of God, which we cannot yet see with our eyes. Secondly, I want to encourage you to memorize the verse Deuteronomy 29.29. It says, The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that have been revealed belong to us and to our children forever. We are called to walk by faith in Jesus Christ. and in God, our wondrous Creator. There are parts of this universe far beyond what we can see and know firsthand in this life. The highest heaven is beyond our view. Christians believe in heaven because Christians believe in Jesus, and because Jesus the Apostle has taught us about heaven. The Apostles treat unites all confessing Christians in its assertion in the final clause, I believe in the resurrection of God and life everlasting. We challenge you to learn what it means to walk by faith in God's special revelation to mankind. Finally, I challenge you to ponder more carefully the eternal spirit that inhabits all of creation and indeed the third heaven itself. Our challenges stand on the edge of infinity. What does it mean? God is an infinite spirit, an eternal spirit, an unchangeable spirit in His being. wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth. Friends, it's this third heaven, heaven, the dwelling place of God, that we really want to pierce and to penetrate. We'll do that again in future meetings. Let's pray. Oh Lord, our God, how we thank you for teaching us about heaven. We pray, oh Lord, that you would help us to stand on the edge of that cliff, and to look out over infinity. Lord, to see further up and further in than we ever have. To think about the end, or the goal, or the purpose of all things. Lord, the same God who created the skies and gave us the scriptures, The Lord's general revelation and special revelation are revealing things ultimately about Herself to us. The Lord helped us to embrace Your truth. Your Word is truth. Thank you Lord for the opportunity to worship You together today. I pray Your blessing on Jesus.