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The word heaven appears in the Bible as early as its opening chapter: “And God called the expanse Heaven” (Gen. 1:8). The “expanse” is the canopy of sky above. Not surprisingly, this Hebrew word for heaven is illustrated by its Arabic cognate, which means “to be high, lofty, raised.”1 But the rest of the Bible goes on to show that “heaven” is higher than it first appears.
We need not wait until Revelation 21–22 to start seeing the heights of heaven. The whole Bible is the story of heaven above coming down to earth, deity coming down to humanity, grace coming down to the undeserving, to lift them up. To appreciate more fully how the biblical drama unfolds, one must read the Bible in two directions: from the beginning to the end, which is obvious, but also from the end to the beginning, which is less obvious but more illuminating. The eschatology illuminates the protology. This study of heaven and the Old Testament is premised in the validity of this two-directional reading of the Bible, centered in Jesus and his gospel.
Heaven appears in the Old Testament story in three ways: first, by episodic references; second, by developed narratives; and, third, by symbolic suggestions clarified in the New Testament.
Episodic References
Brief though they are, episodic references to heaven in the Old Testament should not be overlooked. The Bible instructs us not only by its explicit teachings but also by its embedded assumptions and givens. Indeed, its assumptions are some of its most revealing teachings.
What then do we learn from the Old Testament’s offhand comments about heaven? Here is a representative sample. Heaven intervenes in human affairs with judgments from above that for this reason cannot be evaded (Gen. 19:24). The one who chose Israel could have made any nation his own, for all things belong to him, including heaven and “the heaven of heavens, the earth with all that is in it” (Deut. 10:14; cf. 1 Kings 8:27; Neh. 9:6). “The heaven of heavens” is not an additional heaven but the totality of heaven, even as “all that is in it” clarifies the full extent of “the earth.” The point is that the God who chose Israel is no local deity but far transcends all created reality. He was not stuck with Israel, therefore; he freely chose them (cf. 1 Cor. 1:26–29). Heaven is set apart as God’s “holy habitation” (Deut. 26:15; cf. 1 Kings 8:30, 39, 43, 49; 2 Chron. 30:27). He dwells on high, not in the sense that he is uninvolved below but in the sense that he is above all earthly change, unlike the Baals, who died and rose and died and rose within the cycle of the annual seasons.
The holy habitation of God in heaven means he is not limited, nor can he be manipulated, but he makes the ultimate claim on man dwelling below. Elijah’s life on earth ended when the Lord took him “up to heaven” (2 Kings 2:1, 11). Old Testament believers usually categorized the afterlife as a descent into Sheol (e.g., Gen. 37:35). But the death of the controversial prophet Elijah was attested by God with his dramatic seal of approval, an ascent into heaven above. The Lord’s throne is in heaven (Ps. 11:4; cf. Ps. 2:4) and therefore unthreatened by earthly powers and final in its judgments. And not only is heaven his throne, but the earth is his footstool (Isa. 66:1). All created reality lies at his feet. This means that rather than to man-made temples or cathedrals, this high God comes down to the humble and contrite that tremble at his word (v. 2). Finally, as the prophetic faith clung to his sovereignty during hard times, the later literature of the Old Testament often refers to “the God of heaven” (e.g., 2 Chron. 36:23; Ezra 1:2). Indeed, the biblical interpretation of historical events is summarized in this simple but trenchant conviction: “Heaven rules” (Dan. 4:26).
If this sprinkling of Old Testament comments was all we knew about heaven, we would still have enough for a decisive answer to Dostoevsky’s chilling but valid principle, namely, that if there is no higher world and thus no moral reckoning beyond this world, no afterlife and no final reward or punishment, then everything is permissible.2 But the Old Testament tells us more.
Developed Narratives
Genesis 28
Six Old Testament passages enlarge our understanding of heaven. The first time the veil is drawn back and we are allowed a more sustained look into heaven, its vision is one of surprising grace. In Genesis 28, Jacob is not seeking God. He is running from his troubled past with Esau and toward a troubled future with Laban. But God interrupts him on the way. The striking thing is that the Lord does not reproach Jacob or even mention his embarrassing failures. His only message is one of gracious promise:
Jacob left Beersheba and went toward Haran. And he came to a certain place and stayed there that night, because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones of the place, he put it under his head and lay down in that place to sleep. And he dreamed, and behold, there was a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven. And behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it! And behold, the LORD stood above it and said, “I am the LORD, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac. The land on which you lie I will give to you and to your offspring. Your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south, and in you and your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed. Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land. For I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, “Surely the LORD is in this place, and I did not know it.” And he was afraid and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.” (vv. 10–17)
The text is marked by four uses of “behold” (vv. 12, 13, 15). This Hebrew particle—hinneh—attracts special attention to what follows.3 Three things thus compel our attention in the passage: “There, a ladder! Oh, angels! And look, the Lord Himself!”4 Then the fourth “behold” interprets the theological significance of the first three: “Behold, I am with you” (v. 15).
The three focal points of the text deserve brief comment. First, the ladder: “And he dreamed, and behold, there was a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven” (v. 12). The unique Hebrew sullam might mean “ladder,” as in the ESV text. But since angels are ascending and descending on this structure, the ESV marginal reading, “a flight of steps,” seems more likely.5 The appearance is that of an ancient ziggurat, built as a human attempt to reach up to God. One thinks, naturally, of Genesis 11 and the Tower of Babel. But the pagan concept is corrected here, for this structure provided by God stretches down earthward and up heavenward, taking the Hebrew wording literally. The point is the divine removal of every obstacle and divine provision of complete access, even as we see in God incarnate, Jesus himself (John 1:51).
Second, the angels: “And behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it!” (Gen. 28:12). All his life Jacob has felt that he has to survive by his wits, and it has not gone well for him. He has never realized how involved God really is on his behalf. Now he sees the messengers of God running errands for their Lord, accomplishing a myriad of his gracious purposes on earth and returning to heaven for more orders. Jacob is not abandoned to himself. His future does not depend on his own devices. He has an ally in God, a God highly active on his behalf through “ministering spirits sent out to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation” (Heb. 1:14).
Third, the Lord: “And behold, the LORD stood above it and said, ‘I am the LORD, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac’ ” (Gen. 28:13). How Jacob’s past is forgiven and his future redefined is not at all dependent on who he is and what he can do but entirely on who the Lord is and what he can do. All of Jacob’s hopes find their fulfillment in this one great reality: “I am the LORD.” Commenting on a similarly absolute claim of God in Genesis 17:1, Marcus Dods paraphrases the force of this wonderful message of all-sufficient divine grace:
I am the Almighty God, able to fulfill your highest hopes and accomplish for you the brightest ideal that ever my words set before you. There is no need of paring down the promise until it squares with human probabilities, no need of relinquishing one hope it has begotten, no need of adopting some interpretation of it which may make it seem easier to fulfill, and no need of striving to fulfill it in any second-rate way. All possibility lies in this: I am the Almighty God.6
The primary takeaway for Jacob from these three sights is defined by the fourth “behold,” in Genesis 28:15: “Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land. For I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” In amazing grace, God assures Jacob he is “willing to cast his lot with this man, to stand with him in places of threat.”7 Jacob’s existence is now guaranteed by all that God is.
The patriarch’s response, appropriately, is stunned amazement: “Surely the LORD is in this place, and I did not know it. . . . How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven” (vv. 16–17). What Jacob had previously seen as his lonely and precarious existence is in fact the place of God’s very presence, and now Jacob feels it. Now he can see that the hidden reality of his daily life, sins and troubles notwithstanding, is nothing less than mercies from on high moving toward an unworthy man in all his need. One again thinks of Genesis 11 and the Tower of Babel, for Bab-ilu/Babylon means “gate of gods.”8 That impressive culture saw itself as the entry point for heaven on earth through human self-exaltation. But the gospel of Genesis reverses this way of thinking. It is the God of heaven who is moving down toward earth to take over. The only hope for this world, therefore, comes from beyond this world and is not subject to human control or manipulation.
The first impression of heaven revealed in the Old Testament is that of radical divine grace secretly but faithfully involved on behalf of the helpless, below.
Exodus 24
The second passage is Exodus 24 and the confirmation of the Sinaitic covenant. Representing the people of God, its leaders are summoned into God’s presence, still worshiping “from afar” (v. 1).
Then Moses and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel went up, and they saw the God of Israel. There was under his feet as it were a pavement of sapphire stone, like the very heaven for clearness. And he did not lay his hand on the chief men of the people of Israel; they beheld God, and ate and drank. (vv. 9–11)
“Heaven” in verse 10 refers not to the abode of God but to the visible skies. Still, this passage opens a view into heaven seen from outside, from underneath, and just a glimpse. What is the insight provided here?
At Mount Sinai the leaders of Israel gather for an audience with their King. Surprisingly and bluntly, the Bible says, “They saw the God of Israel” (v. 10). Since the visio dei was fatal for sinners (33:20), theologians have long resisted the plain force of these words. The Hebrew is straightforward. But the Septuagint inserts its own meaning: “And they saw the place where the God of Israel stood.” So do the Targumim: “They saw the glory of the God of Israel.” And Saadia’s Arabic version: “And they saw the angel of the God of Israel.” Maimonides construed the experience as metaphorical: “All these instances [including Exodus 24:10] refer to intellectual perception, and by no means to perception with the eye as in its literal meaning.”9 Similar measures are taken to explain verse 11, where the Hebrew clearly says, “They beheld God.” Doubtless, those words must be qualified in some sense. But we must not explain them away with glib evasions. After all, what would be the point of noting that “he did not lay his hand on the chief men of the people of Israel” (v. 11) if the nature of their experience was to be attenuated into something less than direct and personal? The danger was real because the sight was real. They beheld God.
But it is not God himself the text describes. The focus is directed lower: “There was under his feet as it were a pavement of sapphire stone, like the very heaven for clearness” (v. 10). What the leaders of Israel talked about after this experience was not what God himself looked like (Deut. 4:15). Their lasting impression was what lay beneath God’s feet. Lifting their eyes from the slopes of Sinai, they found themselves gazing up through the pavement of the heavenly throne room (cf. Ezek. 1:26; Rev. 4:6). Rather than opaque, the tile work was translucent and of great value—sapphire stone “like the very heaven for clearness,” that is, like the sky on a perfect day: beautiful blue, with nothing to mar or impair the view. God wanted heaven above to become visible from below and beautiful to the human eye.
In the presence of the high King, consistent with the vivid reality of the experience, the representatives of the people “ate and drank” (Ex. 24:1). Not only did they survive the experience of seeing God; they thrived. Presumably, the food came from the peace offerings referred to in verse 5. But the covenant was sealed by a sacred meal (cf. Gen. 31:44–46) as a matter of personal fellowship, not mere legal demand.
The insight of Exodus 24 into the reality of heaven is this: there is more to God than the law, as is obvious even at the ratification of the law. “Further up and further in,” to borrow from C. S. Lewis, higher than the heights of Sinai and its furthest reaching and most searching demands, far above the best we can achieve, the gracious Lord of heaven is inviting sinners into personal communion with himself. His highest category for us is not demand but welcome.
1 Kings 22
The third narrative view into heaven is provided in 1 Kings 22. The prophet Micaiah is shown the councils of God above as Jehoshaphat and Ahab form their plans below. The news for Ahab is not good:
And Micaiah said, “Therefore hear the word of the LORD: I saw the LORD sitting on his throne, and all the host of heaven standing beside him on his right hand and on his left; and the LORD said, ‘Who will entice Ahab, that he may go up and fall at Ramoth-gilead?’ And one said one thing, and another said another. Then a spirit came forward and stood before the LORD, saying, ‘I will entice him.’ And the LORD said to him, ‘By what means?’ And he said, ‘I will go out, and will be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets.’ And he said, ‘You are to entice him, and you shall succeed; go out and do so.’ Now therefore behold, the LORD has put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these your prophets; the LORD has declared disaster for you.” (vv. 19–23)
Two things stand out—one theological, the other moral. Theologically, are we to understand that God in heaven above works by committee? Does he need or even benefit from the ideas of his angelic servants? The prophet Isaiah asked,
Who has directed10 the Spirit of the LORD,
or what man shows him his counsel?
Whom did he consult,
and who made him understand?
Who taught him the path of justice,
and taught him knowledge,
and showed him the way of understanding? (Isa. 40:13–14)
Given the Old Testament’s clarity about the sovereign independence of God, the vision of heaven here in 1 Kings 22 is fascinating. The King is holding court. His angelic armies stand before him at attention, awaiting orders. But he puts a challenge to them: “Who will entice Ahab,” even to his defeat (v. 20)? Hands go up all over the room, with various proposals. Then one angelic spirit steps forward with a bold plan: “I will . . . be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets” (v. 22). He gets the job.
It is worth noting that God is the one who raises the question of a strategy for bringing Ahab down. The topic does not emerge from the angelic hosts, nor is it prompted by any inadequacy in God. Moreover, the outcome concerning Ahab is certain. The Lord intends to judge him. In addition, it is the Lord’s commission and promise that make the angel’s mission successful. The only question is one of method.
Still, 1 Kings 22 reminds us that the flinty objectivity of the Bible resists dogmatic over-categorization. I myself see the theological anomaly embedded in this passage as more delightful than problematic—God would, in some real sense, without diminishing himself, draw his mighty angelic servants into discussion and collaboration. And I gladly echo the restraint of John Calvin when he says God’s sovereignty is “a secret so much excelling the insight of the human mind that I am not ashamed to confess ignorance. Far be it from any of the faithful to be ashamed of ignorance of what the Lord withdraws.”11
The positive exegetical function of this surprising account of heaven is its contrast with the earthly counsels of Jehoshaphat and Ahab. The human kings are sitting on their grandiose earthly thrones (v. 10). But there is a higher throne above (v. 19). The false prophets of Samaria stand before the human kings with one message of foolish encouragement (vv. 11–12). But the superhuman hosts of heaven stand before the divine King with multiple strategies for overruling destruction (vv. 19–21). There is nothing in the text to require a limited view of God—quite the opposite. He is not a helpless spectator as events unfold on earth. He sits enthroned in heaven “above all earthly powers,” to quote Luther, bringing judgment with inescapable inevitability.
What raises eyebrows here, concerning morality, is that God would get involved in enticing Ahab by a lie made plausible and popular through the false prophets. The thrice repeated “entice” is the key word (vv. 20, 21, 22). The older standard of Hebrew lexicography defined this word strongly as “deceive”12; the newer authority defines it more moderately as “persuade, convince.”13 But, however this Hebrew verb is nuanced, the problem remains in the explicit phrase “a lying spirit” in verses 22 and 23.
Does heaven tell lies? No. But heaven can use lies. Ahab says to Micaiah, “How many times shall I make you swear that you speak to me nothing but the truth in the name of the LORD?” (v. 16). Outwardly, Ahab not only desires but demands the truth. But, in reality, his heart is open only to flattering assurances. What he wants is impossible—true flattery from heaven through the mouth of a true prophet so that he can then disregard God and do what he wants to anyway. What better plan to defeat such a man, therefore, than by strengthening the illusion he loves? Micaiah does give Ahab fair warning of defeat: “I saw all Israel scattered on the mountains, as sheep that have no shepherd” (v. 17). But Ahab dismisses it as the same-old same-old blah-blah-blah (v. 18). It is then that the prophet reveals God’s purpose of judgment. Zedekiah the false prophet responds by mistreating Micaiah, Ahab has him arrested, and the king proceeds toward his own destruction under the power of his chosen lies.
What becomes visible about heaven from 1 Kings 22? The God who rules there is so shrewd that he can advance his purposes on earth through his angelic host without making himself dependent on them. He is so shrewd that he can bring doom through the false promises of false prophets without falsifying himself. And as it was then, so it is now: “Therefore God sends them a strong delusion, so that they may believe what is false, in order that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness” (2 Thess. 2:11–12). Truly, God is not mocked.
Job 1–2
The fourth passage is Job 1–2. The text does not explicitly locate this drama in heaven, but its situation stands in contrast with the earth (1:7–8; 2:2–3) and is identified as “the presence of the LORD” (1:12; 2:7). The heavenly vision unfolds in two nearly parallel episodes:
Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan also came among them. The LORD said to Satan, “From where have you come?” Satan answered the LORD and said, “From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it.” And the LORD said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, who fears God and turns away from evil?” Then Satan answered the LORD and said, “Does Job fear God for no reason? Have you not put a hedge around him and his house and all that he has, on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land. But stretch out your hand and touch all that he has, and he will curse you to your face.” And the LORD said to Satan, “Behold, all that he has is in your hand. Only against him do not stretch out your hand.” So Satan went out from the presence of the LORD. (1:6–12)
Again there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan also came among them to present himself before the LORD. And the LORD said to Satan, “From where have you come?” Satan answered the LORD and said, “From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it.” And the LORD said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, who fears God and turns away from evil? He still holds fast his integrity, although you incited me against him to destroy him without reason.” Then Satan answered the LORD and said, “Skin for skin! All that a man has he will give for his life. But stretch out your hand and touch his bone and his flesh, and he will curse you to your face.” And the LORD said to Satan, “Behold, he is in your hand; only spare his life.” So Satan went out from the presence of the LORD. (2:1–7)
Three questions invite reflection. First, why is this in the Bible at all? One reason is to press us toward a more realistic understanding of our own lives. We might read the story of Job as a rare and extreme example of godly suffering. In this case, the message would be, “Look at this worst-case scenario. If you can see the truth here in Job’s life, then surely in your comparatively small problems . . .” Alternatively, we might read the story as a representative and even common experience of godly suffering. In this case, the message would be, “Here is what all of God’s people can expect of life. It is where God calls us all to trust him.” The reasoning of James, namely, that the Old Testament prophets and the sufferer Job teach us what it means to wait patiently on the Lord (James 5:7–11), creates the presumption that the book of Job is indeed to be read as a guide to standard-issue experience for all of God’s people. This being so, the visit of Satan to the court of heaven, though mysterious to us, should be accepted as paradigmatic of the startling reality we are involved in. Job 1–2 is giving us insight into our own lives.
Second, what does “Satan” mean? In the Hebrew text this word is marked by the definite article—“the Satan”—more like a title than a name. But its force here combines two uses of the root stn—to oppose and to accuse.14 Satan opposes God by accusing Job. The latter’s sufferings consist not only in his afflictions as such but also in the inquisitional accusing torments of his so-called friends, their outlook apparently inspired by Satan (4:12–21). The crisis of Job’s existence is not pain, horrible as it is, but the insinuation of guilty pain for which, his friends believe, he has no one to blame but himself. This common experience among the godly, though instigated by Satan, is nevertheless finally traceable to heaven above. “You incited me against him,” God says (2:3). Satan is true to his name.
Third, that Satan appears in heaven itself—is this home invasion? Is heaven violated? Is God rivaled? What are we to think of the God of Job 1–2? It is important to see Satan’s role in the book of Job as essential to the drama but still minor. His malice leads to Job’s sufferings, but he disappears from the book after chapter 2, like Judas in the story of Jesus. When the tension of this story is finally resolved in chapter 42, Satan does not reappear. Only God appears, for only God is needed. The author attributes to God alone final responsibility for Job’s sufferings as “all the evil that the LORD had brought upon him” (42:11). This is consistent with how the story begins. Satan to God: “But stretch out your hand and touch all that he has” (1:11). God to Satan: “Behold, all that he has is in your hand” (v. 12). Satan to God: “But stretch out your hand and touch his bone and his flesh” (2:5). God to Satan: “Behold, he is in your hand” (v. 6). Job is put into Satan’s hand, but Satan is held in God’s hand. “There is evil here, but not dualism.”15 God lures Satan into a humiliating defeat, Job is memorialized as a triumphant saint, we are instructed in the reality of our lives, and heaven remains inviolate.
What then do we learn of heaven from Job 1–2? The message is summed up well in the classic commentary by Franz Delitzsch when he speaks of “heaven, where everything that is done on earth has its unseen roots, its final cause.”16 Yes, the objecting thoughts well up in our minds as we consider that strong theology. But we join Job in saying, “I lay my hand on my mouth” (40:4). The sovereignty of heaven over our sufferings on earth is our biggest perplexity in this life, but it is also our only hope.
Isaiah 6
The fifth passage is Isaiah 6, where God calls the prophet to the difficult ministry of hardening people’s hearts by proclaiming the only truth that could soften them, if only they had not already passed the point of no return. It begins when heaven is opened up to him one day while worshiping at the temple in Jerusalem:
In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called to another and said:
“Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts;
the whole earth is full of his glory!”
And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke. And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!” Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar. And he touched my mouth and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.” (vv. 1–7)
The temple provides an entry point into ultimacy, the throne room of the King. Through the earthly keyhole, so to speak, Isaiah is enabled to see into heaven above. Two great realities are deeply impressed upon him.
First, the holiness of God. The Hebrew root for holy points to “that which is marked off, separated, withdrawn from ordinary use.”17 Who God is as God—so infinitely superior to the burning seraphim that they must cover themselves in his presence—demands the unique threefold superlative “Holy, Holy, Holy,” that is, intensely and infinitely holy.18 He is set apart by his moral majesty: “The Holy God shows himself holy in righteousness” (5:16). He is hazardous to all who are unholy: “The Light19 of Israel will become a fire, and his Holy One a flame, and it will burn and devour” (10:17). Who he is defies our categories, incomparable with all below: “To whom then will you compare me, that I should be like him? says the Holy One” (40:25). He dwells in eternal transcendence, beyond our reach: “For thus says the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: ‘I dwell in the high and holy place’” (57:15). At the sight of the Holy One of Israel, guilty little Isaiah panics.
Second, the grace of God. One of the seraphim peels off from his flight path to dive straight at terrified Isaiah. The angel is holding a burning coal from the altar. He holds it with tongs not because it is hot—he himself is a burning one, for that is what seraph means—but because it is sacred. But taken from the place of sacrifice, this hot coal, signifying atonement, though untouchable, touches Isaiah. He does not defile the atonement. The atonement purifies him. This grace is powerful grace, grace greater than all our sin. And now, rather than remaining a mere concept, this grace is applied to Isaiah personally with a touch, as felt forgiveness: “Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for” (6:7). A surprise comes down to Isaiah from heaven above. The one he most dreads—pure, industrial-strength deity—is the one, the only one, who can release him from anxiety and qualify him for service.
What is the insight into heaven of Isaiah 6? It is a twofold message. On the one hand, heaven is a dangerous place. Without the grace of God, we might as well walk into a blast furnace to be incinerated. On the other hand, with the grace of God, heaven is a safe place, the only safe place. The various human opinions of us here in this world, including our opinions of ourselves—often a confused mixture of glib self-assurance and angry self-condemnation—matter nothing, less than nothing. All that finally matters is the verdict of heaven. And heaven is the one source of forgiveness in the universe. “Who can forgive sins but God alone?” (Mark 2:7).
Daniel 7
Our final passage is Daniel 7. The power of this text lies in its contrast between the clash of human kingdoms on earth (vv. 3–8), so savage as to be branded bestial, and the sublime rule of God’s humane kingdom coming down from heaven above to triumph “forever, forever and ever” (v. 18). Verses 9–10, shifting from prose to poetry, set the scene:
As I looked,
thrones were placed,
and the Ancient of Days took his seat;
his clothing was white as snow,
and the hair of his head like pure wool;
his throne was fiery flames;
its wheels were burning fire.
A stream of fire issued
and came out from before him;
a thousand thousands served him,
and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him;
the court sat in judgment,
and the books were opened.
The court of heaven convenes. At the center is one venerable, majestic, and pure, with vast angelic armies at his command. What are four earthly kingdoms to these myriad superhuman agents of the Judge? The only one qualified to rule the world is fully equipped in every respect to do so.
The assurance of the vision is strong. God can be trusted with the entirety of world history. Far above the reach of earthly opposition, a hope stands as sure as heaven itself that the historical cycles of violent rise and decline will be forever broken. How will this hope come down to us? It will come through a final judgment. The database of heaven is keeping a careful record of every human deed (Rev. 20:12). Nothing escapes the all-seeing eyes of God. His memory is comprehensive and infallible, with instant recall. Therefore, as Daniel 7:10 concludes, with every sufferer on the edge of his seat, glad for the heavenly books to show the truth so long denied in this world of spin and cover-up, longing for the Ancient of Days to put an end to corrupt earthly power, what, in fact, is God’s overruling plan for this world?
I saw in the night visions,
and behold, with the clouds of heaven
there came one like a son of man,
and he came to the Ancient of Days
and was presented before him.
And to him was given dominion
and glory and a kingdom,
that all peoples, nations, and languages
should serve him;
his dominion is an everlasting dominion,
which shall not pass away,
and his kingdom one
that shall not be destroyed. (vv. 13–14)
The royal “one like a son of man” in verse 13 stands in contrast to the beasts of earthly power in verses 3–8. Finally, a humane King, one like us, to rule us!20 The Semitic idiom “son of man” emphasizes his authentic humanity21 while the surrounding context argues his deity.22 For everyone who has settled the matter of the authority of Christ, there is no question about the identity of this person. There was no doubt in the mind of Christ himself:
Again the high priest asked him, “Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed?” And Jesus said, “I am, and you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power, and coming with the clouds of heaven.” (Mark 14:61–62)
What is the insight into heaven here in Daniel 7? It is that God’s final judgment at the end of history will not bring annihilation but humanization. The kingdom of this world will be “taken away” from those currently holding power; through Jesus our Messiah the new and lasting kingdom will be “given to the people of the saints of the Most High” (vv. 26–27). Quite wonderfully, then, heaven is the most humane and humanizing place in the universe. We do not look to this world for the restoration of our human dignity. It will come down to us through the perfect Son of Man. A. A. Hodge drew out the implications:
Heaven, as the eternal home of the divine man and of all the redeemed members of the human race, must necessarily be thoroughly human in its structure, conditions, and activities. Its joys and occupations must be all rational, moral, emotional, voluntary and active. There must be the exercise of all the faculties, the gratification of all tastes, the development of all latent capacities, the realization of all ideals. The reason, the intellectual curiosity, the imagination, the aesthetic instincts, the holy affections, the social affinities, the inexhaustible resources of strength and power native to the human soul, must all find in heaven exercise and satisfaction. . . . Heaven will prove the consummate flower and fruit of the whole creation and of all the history of the universe.23
Symbolic Suggestions
Returning now to the principle that the eschatology illuminates the protology, our final view into heaven is prompted and guided by Revelation 21–22. The two chapters parallel one another, with 21:1–8 restated and enlarged in 21:9–22:5.24 Many lines of biblical expectation converge here. For example, negatively and surprisingly, no temple is found in heaven (21:22). God had said, “And let them make me a sanctuary, that I may dwell in their midst” (Ex. 25:8). The sacred precincts of the tabernacle and temple, cleansed by the sacrificial system, constituted ground zero for the saving presence of God among sinners. But in the eschaton, everything provisional is fulfilled and transcended. Now the divine presence is fully manifested, directly given, and immediately felt, with God himself and the Lamb being the eternal temple of the redeemed. Other connections with the Old Testament are clearly apparent in Revelation 21–22. But heaven is represented here primarily in the forms of a city and a bride:
And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. (21:2)
The two metaphors, city and bride, point to the same reality (vv. 9–10). From one perspective, heaven as our eternal home will be an organized social collectivity, like a city. From another perspective, heaven as our endless experience will be an ideal romance, like a bride on her wedding day. But the two merge into one experience, as Augustine instructs us:
Two cities have been formed by two loves: the earthly by the love of self, even to the contempt of God; the heavenly by the love of God, even to the contempt of self. The former, in a word, glories in itself, the latter in the Lord. For the one seeks glory from men; but the greater glory of the other is God, the witness of conscience. The one lifts up its head in its own glory; the other says to its God, “You are my glory.”25
Heaven will be an eternal community sharing this love for God without diminution or dissent. Both insights into heaven—city and bride—are rooted in and shed light on the Old Testament.
As for the city, it begins in Genesis 4. None other than the violent persecutor Cain invented it: “Cain knew his wife, and she conceived and bore Enoch. When he built a city, he called the name of the city after the name of his son, Enoch” (v. 17). God planted a garden, but Cain built a city. Doomed by God to be “a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth” (v. 12) because he murdered his godly brother, Cain satisfied his need for security and belonging by his own strategy—a city. In this way he kept the divine curse from exerting its full impact on him.26 A city, therefore, is more than a mere collection of buildings. It was meant, from the beginning, to establish a buffer between the rebellious self and the judging God. It provided a way to thrive without depending on God or facing up to oneself. It was established as a monument to human self-salvation.
There can be no surprise that Cain’s mentality of self-fortification reappears in intensified form at Babel, the height of defiant human autonomy: “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves” (11:4). But God said to Abram, “I will . . . make your name great” (12:2).
Cain’s city was never complete. The Hebrew does not literally say, “he built a city,” but literally, “he was building a city.”27 He spent his life building it because it was never big enough, secure enough. He named it Enoch after his son, whose name suggests “dedication.”28 Cain dedicated his life to his city project for his own glory through his son. His city and family thus stood for his successful defeat of God’s curse upon him—as he saw it, anyway.
What then does God do with this man-made symbol of anxiety, guilt, and pride? He redeems it. He even takes it into heaven. God takes the garden of Eden from Genesis 2 and the city of Enoch from Genesis 4 and combines them into one heavenly garden-city in Revelation 21–22, his own eternal dwelling place with his people:
Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city; also, on either side of the river, the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. No longer will there be anything accursed, but the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and his servants will worship him. (22:1–3)
The prophetic vision invites us into a world so new we can scarcely imagine it, yet not unlike our present world. The eternal garden-city will be refreshed by a river flowing with the water of life as an outpouring of God’s very presence. The Tree of Life will heal all who partake of it. There will be no need of caution or care, for every aspect of the curse will be redeemed. It is a picture of endless human rejuvenation.29 In this way, the Old Testament story of the city is more than fulfilled. It is fulfilled with, so to speak, excess: “Eschatology not only recapitulates the protology . . . but escalates it.”30
As for the bride, she appears first in Genesis 2. After making the first woman from Adam’s flesh, “God himself, like a father of the bride, leads the woman to the man”31:
Then the man said,
“This at last is bone of my bones
and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called Woman,
because she was taken out of Man.”
Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed. (vv. 23–25)
The most striking thing about Genesis 2, following immediately upon the cosmic grandeur of Genesis 1, is its simple homeliness. The outlook shifts from “God created the heavens and the earth” (1:1) to “the LORD God planted a garden in Eden” (2:8), from mankind dignified with the divine image to Adam enthralled by his wife. This movement is certainly not from the sublime to the ridiculous but from the sublime to the familiar and even common. Our eyes might miss the deeper significance of the story were it not for New Testament revelation.
After quoting Genesis 2:24, the apostle Paul writes, “This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church” (Eph. 5:32). For Paul, a mystery is not an unknowable truth but rather an insight that God must reveal for us to know it. No amount of human genius or research could discern it. The mystery, the insight, present but hidden in Genesis 2 but now revealed clearly in the fullness of the gospel, has to do not with Adam and Eve but with Christ and the church. Human marriage, significant in itself as a unique “one flesh” union, points to the ultimate union of “one spirit” between the believer and Christ (1 Cor. 6:15–17). Our engagement to Christ calls for “a sincere and pure devotion” in this life so that we might be presented to him as a pure virgin in the next (2 Cor. 11:1–3). But the most important point here is that Christ and the church are not, according to Paul’s reasoning in Ephesians 5, a metaphor for understanding the reality of human marriage; human marriage is to be seen as a metaphor for understanding the reality of Christ and the church. This being so, the marriage of Adam and Eve in Genesis 2 is not a forced intrusion jarring with the magnificence of Genesis 1. It deserves a place in the Genesis narrative as an early hint at ultimacy in heaven, where we will be always loved and never shamed.
Thanks to Revelation 21:2 and 9, we have every right to see the Genesis account of Adam and Eve as not only instructive for the conduct of a godly marriage but also, and far more, suggestive of our Savior’s eternal love for us—especially when we deserve to be shamed—and our belonging to him. The final reason marriage is to be held in honor among all (Heb. 13:4) is not that marriage in this life is heavenly but that heaven will be a marriage—the marriage.
May it not be said that the ravishing passions and passionate ravishings of most purely spiritual, chaste, and ardent love, burning like coals of juniper, and flaming forth in the excellentest expressions imaginable, do quite surpass, transcend and out-vie those of the most strongly affectionate lovers in the world, whether wooers or married persons? Nay, these scarcely serve darkly to shadow forth those.32
Conclusion
Pervasive throughout the Old Testament is a conviction that heaven above is clearly separate from earth below. Qohelet bluntly articulates one practical implication: “Be not rash with your mouth, nor let your heart be hasty to utter a word before God, for God is in heaven and you are on earth. Therefore let your words be few” (Eccles. 5:2). But as the biblical vision comes to finality, astonishingly, we see heaven coming down to earth, transforming earth into the dwelling place of God (Rev. 21:2–3).
The Old Testament itself hints at this final breakthrough of overruling grace. The prophet Isaiah foresees the complete renovation of all things in “new heavens and a new earth” (Isa. 65:17; 66:22). In contrast with “the former troubles” of our existence in this broken creation (65:16), the renewed universe will finally be the place “in which righteousness dwells” (2 Pet. 3:13). “The first heaven and the first earth” of Genesis 1:1 will pass away (Rev. 21:1), nature yielding to super-nature. But the new creation will remain the creation. The change will be the eternal dwelling place of God—heaven above in the proper sense—descending to become the dwelling place of redeemed mankind as well.
In the end, which will have no end, “even the contrast between heaven and earth is gone. For all the things that are in heaven and on earth have been gathered up in Christ as head (Eph.1:10).”33 This, and nothing less, is the measure of our salvation.
1 Edward William Lane, Arabic-English Lexicon (New York: Frederic Ungar, 1956), I.4, p. 1433.
2 Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1998), 103.
3 “In this way [this] content acquires a particular prominence within a larger context.” C. H. J. van der Merwe, J. A. Naudé, and J. H. Kroeze, A Biblical Hebrew Reference Grammar (Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1999), 329.
4 Jan Fokkelmann, quoted in Allen P. Ross, Creation and Blessing (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1988), 488.
5 L. Koehler and W. Baumgartner, The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament (Leiden: Brill, 1995), s.v. “stepped ramp, flight of steps.”
6 Marcus Dods, The Book of Genesis (New York: Armstrong, 1902), 161.
7 Walter Brueggemann, quoted in Bruce K. Waltke, Genesis: A Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2001), 391.
8 Gerald A. Larue, Babylon and the Bible (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1969), 69.
9 Maimonides, Guide for the Perplexed, I.4.
10 ESV marginal translation. ESV text: “Who has measured . . . ?”
11 John Calvin, Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, trans. J. K. S. Reid (London: Clarke, 1961), 124.
12 BDB, s.v. “patah.”
13 Koehler and Baumgartner, Lexicon, 985.
14 John E. Hartley, The Book of Job (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1988), 72n7.
15 Francis I. Anderson, Job: An Introduction and Commentary (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 1976), 83.
16 C. F. Keil and F. Delitzsch, Commentary on the Old Testament: Job (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1972), I:52.
17 Walther Eichrodt, Theology of the Old Testament (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1961), I:270.
18 J. C. L. Gibson, Davidson’s Introductory Hebrew Grammar: Syntax (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1994), 42.
19 With other commentators, I construe this as a title for the God of Israel because of the parallelism. ESV: “The light of Israel.”
20 “He is what every human being should be if he is true to type.” Joyce G. Baldwin, Daniel: An Introduction and Commentary (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 1978), 143.
21 Koehler and Baumgartner, Lexicon, 1839, glosses with “a man.”
22 Raymond C. Ortlund Jr., “The Deity of Christ and the Old Testament,” in The Deity of Christ, Theology in Community, ed. Christopher W. Morgan and Robert A. Peterson (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2011), 52–56.
23 A. A. Hodge, Evangelical Theology: A Course of Popular Lectures (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1976), 400–401.
24 G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1999), 1039.
25 Marcus Dods, ed., The Works of Aurelius Augustine, Bishop of Hippo: The City of God (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1872), 2:49.
26 Jacques Ellul, The Meaning of the City (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1970), 1–9.
27 Paul Joüon, A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew (Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute, 1991), 411.
28 The verbal form of the root is used in Deut. 20:5 for dedicating a new home.
29 T. Desmond Alexander, From Eden to the New Jerusalem (Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel, 2008), 155–57.
30 G. K. Beale, The Temple and the Church’s Mission (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2001), 368.
31 Gerhard von Rad, Genesis: A Commentary (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1972), 84.
32 Margaret Durham, “The Epistle Dedicatory,” in James Durham, Clavis Cantici (1668), http://www.puritansermons.com/durham/durham_epistle.htm.
33 Herman Bavinck, Holy Spirit, Church and New Creation, in Reformed Dogmatics, vol. 4 (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2008), 729–30.