Going To Heaven

by Lawrence Kelley

Though in exile, the apostle John was “in the spirit on the Lord’s day” and saw visually what we must learn to see by faith every Lord’s day – Jesus Christ standing in the midst of the Assembly (Rev 1:9-20). As Christ say’s in the psalms:“Here am I and the children whom God has given Me.” And, I will declare Your name to My brethren; In the midst of the assembly I will sing praise to You.” And in another place, “where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst of them.”

Paul refers to the importance of this in the context of church discipline saying, When you are assembled in the name of our Lord Jesus and I am with you in spirit, and the power of our Lord Jesus is present, hand this man over to Satan (1Cor 5:4-5). Here we learn that Christians assemble in the name or by the authority of the Lord Jesus and that His physical absence does not negate His actual presence.

This does not mean that the Lord is not with us at other times. Paul is not addressing the omnipresence of Christ, but is speaking of the manner of His presence. Christ is present at a table in the food court of the mall at 11:00am Sunday morning, but He is present there in a different way than He is present when He gathers us to eat at His table.

The assembly is described from this heavenly perspective in Hebrews For you have not come to the mountain that may be touched and that burned with fire, and to blackness and darkness and tempest, and the sound of a trumpet and the voice of words, so that those who heard it begged that the word should not be spoken to them anymore...But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the firstborn who are registered in heaven, to God the Judge of all, to the spirits of just men made perfect, to Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better things than that of Abel (12:18-24).

This astonishing passage compares and contrasts the assembly of Israel at Mt. Sinai with the assembly of Christians under the new covenant. The passage tells us that we assemble in Heaven itself. This means that Jesus is present among us on the Lord’s day not because He has come down, but because He has brought us up.

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This page was last modified on January 5, 2007