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The night before Jesus died, he told his disciples in John 14:2-3, “In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.”
These words from Jesus seem clear enough. Our eternal home would be in the heavenly realm with the Father, not on a new physical earth like ours. Yet some have taken a totally opposite position.
The most popular book promoting this view was written by Randy Alcorn. Its full title is Heaven: A Comprehensive Guide to Everything the Bible Says About Our Eternal Home. The book has sold over one million copies. One well-known evangelical author and reviewer called it “the best book on heaven ever written.”
Alcorn began the 20th anniversary edition by stating his overall conclusion. He wrote that he and his wife had “talked often about what living as embodied people will be like on a resurrected Earth—a world with trees, rivers, animals, eating and drinking, reunions, old and new friendships, and above all, a place where we will worship God without sin to hinder us! Because we will still be God’s image bearers, reigning over a risen Earth, I believe we will enjoy art, literature, sports, drama, technology, and all other products of God-given creativity and glorified imaginations.”
Initial Questions
I was immediately curious as to where one would find these beliefs in “everything the Bible says” about heaven. Sports being watched or played? Extinct dinosaurs resurrected to live with us? Golf being played “with Payne Stewart?” Animals enabled to talk, as the serpent the donkey were in scripture? Note: his book excludes mosquitoes, ticks, and roaches.
A Growing Trend
Alcorn’s conjectures seem far-fetched, and I don’t know anyone personally who would go “all-in” for his teachings. However, there are people, even among friends of mine and fellow leaders in churches and Christian schools, who also affirm this basic idea: we will live eternally on a new, physical planet earth. Why?
Support for Their Views
1. First, they emphasize that God’s Word does speak of new heavens and a new earth (2 Pet 3:13; Rev 21:1). They say that the word “earth,” in its normal sense, refers to a material planet. However, this phrase, which first appears in Isaiah (65:17; 66:22), does not refer in that passage to a new, physical planet. Instead, in those texts Yahweh promised that Israel would have a rebirth, a new habitat, a restored life, after her return from Babylonian exile. So, the phrase “new heavens and a new earth” can refer to a new and improved existence.
2. Second, they claim that Romans 8:19-22 calls for a “renewed” or “restored” earth. That text speaks of the current creation ultimately being “set free from its bondage to corruption.” However, it does not say “renewed” or “restored.” It says “liberated.” In fact, this present creation cannot be renewed or restored.
We read in 2 Peter 3:7-13 that the present heavens and earth will be destroyed by fire and that the very elements themselves will burn up with intense heat. So, their view would require a recreated new earth, since the present earth will no longer exist. Romans 8:19-22 certainly does not speak of a new, recreated physical earth.
To harmonize Romans 8:19-22 with 2 Peter 3:7-13, we may conclude that God will liberate the present physical creation from its corruption by destroying it. At that point it will no longer be in bondage. Then he will provide a new mode of existence, a new way of life, a “new heavens and new earth.”
3. Third, some will find support in Jesus’ promise that “the meek shall inherit the earth” (Matt 5:5). Since they don’t see Christians owning or running the present earth in a physical sense, they believe that this promise must refer to a future physical earth. However, Jesus’ original hearers could not possibly have understood his words in this way. Jesus must have meant that the meek would enjoy an abundant life (John 10:10), the best that this world has to offer from God’s perspective. The meek, not the pushy and the powerful, would be the real winners of “the good life” in God’s eyes.
By the way, the same promise was made to Old Testament Israel (Ps 37:11), and that text cannot be understood as promising a new, physical planet earth.
4. Fourth, they may seek additional evidence in other statements Jesus made about the future. Jesus spoke of a “regeneration” in which he would sit on a throne. He said that the apostles would sit on twelve thrones and that they would judge the twelve tribes of Israel. His followers who sacrificed to follow him would receive many times more than they had given up (Matt 19:28-29; Mark 10:29f; Luke 18:29f).
Interestingly, the English Standard Version (ESV) does not translate παλιγγενεσία (palingenesia) in Matthew 19:28 as “regeneration” or “rebirth,” which is its actual meaning. Rather, the ESV interprets the word and renders it as “the new world.” By changing the text to say what it does not actually say, the ESV translators caused Jesus to say what he did not actually say. He did not say, “the new world.” He said, “the regeneration.” The ESV acknowledges this very fact in a footnote.
Back to the text. Was Jesus literally promising these twelve men some kind of eternal rulership over national Israel and its specific tribes? Hmmm …
Note that Jesus did not mention a new physical earth here at all. What he did promise had to do with the currently existing twelve apostles, the physical nation of Israel as it existed in the first century, and the twelve particular tribes. Nothing is said here about judging the Gentiles at all. If Jesus was describing the final judgment as he did elsewhere (Matt 25:31-32), the Gentiles (“all nations”) would be included.
There are other issues, too. Would Judas Iscariot get one of these physical thrones? What about the fact that the nation of Israel that exists today is not the Israel of Jesus’ day? And how will Jews know, when Jesus comes again, their tribes of origin, since Jews today cannot trace their tribal lineage? In addition, the ten northern tribes were exiled by Assyria and virtually dissolved.
Granted, these are difficult passages to interpret. However, this much is clear. They do not prove the claim that God will create a new, physical planet earth almost identical to the present earth. Perhaps Jesus used “regeneration,” “thrones,” “Israel,” and “tribes” to refer to the gospel era which was soon to begin. Because of the cross and the resurrection, there would certainly be a rebirth. The apostles would play a leading role by proclaiming the gospel, and that proclamation would begin with Israel. The church would then become the “new Israel,” as the Gentiles would be incorporated into the kingdom.
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