You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God,

and they will reign on the earth. (Revelation 5:10—NIV)

As soon as our body is redeemed we can live once again on the earth.

To those who are worried about losing Heaven, don't be! Heaven is coming to the earth. The Lord Jesus is going to rule from Jerusalem during the thousand-year Kingdom Age, and you want to be with Him. I sure do not want to be stuck up in Heaven when Jesus is down here. Do you?

Then after the thousand-year Kingdom Age the Godhead will descend to the earth in their Tabernacle, which is the Christian Church. You don't want to remain asleep in your mansion in Heaven when God and Christ are down here, do you?

I didn't think so.

The best of Heaven is coming to the earth. It came two thousand years ago in the Lord Jesus Christ. It will come again soon in the Lord Jesus and His brothers, the members of His Body.

After a thousand years of adjustment the entire Group is coming down in the form of the new Jerusalem, the holy city. Then the earth will be Paradise once again. The difference is, the sons of God will be sitting in the thrones of judgment and rulership, making sure there are no more rebellions.

To keep something for eternity you have to be given it, lose it, and then get it back the hard way. The race of Adam received Paradise, lost it, and then will get it back the hard way. The Lord Jesus did not come from Heaven to do the whole job for us but to help us restore what was lost. If He did the whole work Himself we would lose it again, because it is in the regaining of it that we learn the value of it and how to keep it.

If your goal is eternal residence there is little you have to do. Hold on to your ticket. Don't be too bad. Practice jumping up and down in case the "rapture" includes the physical body. Some say it does and some say it doesn't. Have some warm clothes laid by because it gets cold when you get up in the region of the clouds.

Don't worry about your bills, the wicked can pay them while you are sitting in air-conditioned comfort, eating popcorn and watching the Jews without the Holy Spirit preach the Gospel in the face of Antichrist. Won't that be fun for us! Not for the Jews, of course.

However if your goal is to inherit the earth then the demands on you are total. You must lay down your life, take up your cross, and follow the Lord Jesus. You must turn over your life to Him without reservation.

Prepare yourself to suffer. No one who has not suffered will govern the nations with Jesus Christ. No cross, no crown! We enter the Kingdom of God through much tribulation.

To be continued.