WHERE IS HEAVEN LOCATED?
To prove where heaven is located, I need to first prove that heaven is a real place and that “our Father’s House” and the New Jerusalem and heaven are all the same thing.
In John 14:24, Jesus said,
“In my Father's house are many mansions:
if it were not so, I would have told you.
I go to prepare a place for you.
And if I go and prepare a place for you,
I will come again, and receive you unto myself;
that where I am, there ye may be also.”
(John 14:2-3 KJV)
Obviously, Christ’s expression, “my Father’s House”, refers to heaven, yet according to this verse, heaven is designed as a literal house for God’s own family—a house that is so incredibly gigantic that it contains a separate dwelling place for every single person in heaven.
But if Christ’s expression, “my Father’s House”, means a literal house, then just how big would “our Father’s House” have to be in order for it to contain a separate dwelling place for every single person who will ever go to heaven?
Well, I don’t claim to know how many people are going to heaven, nor do I claim to know what percentage of people get saved. But I do know that as of 2017, there were about 7 billion people living on earth, and some Internet sites claim that as many as 100 billion people have lived and died on earth so far. http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-16870579
Therefore, using a double minimum-limit argument, even if only 50 billion people will have lived and died by the time of God’s judgment, and even if the rate of salvation is as low as only 2% of those 50 billion, there would still be at least 1 billion people going to heaven (because 2% of 50 billion equals 1 billion). And 1 billion people would be more than 25 times the population of the greater Tokyo area (which is a little less than 40 million).
Accordingly, for “our Father’s House” to accommodate a minimum of at least 1 billion people in 1 billion separate dwelling places—a literal city of people more than 25 times the population of the greater Tokyo area—then our “Father’s House” would have to be roughly the size of a small planet.
Well, surprisingly, Revelation 21 actually describes an ultra-gigantic house that is indeed the size of a very small planet. This house is so big that God even gave it a name—the New Jerusalem—and refers to it as a “city” a total of 15 times in Revelation 21 and 22, presumably because there will be at least a billion people living there (in at least a billion separate dwelling places). In Revelation 21:14, the apostle John tells us that our “Father’s House”—the New Jerusalem—has 12 floors [footnote 1], and if the measurements of our “Father’s House” are to be taken literally (as I believe they must be in order to accommodate more than a billion dwelling places) then each floor of our “Father’s House” is about 1500 miles long and 1500 miles wide, and the entire house itself is 1500 miles high [footnote 2] to accommodate the 12 floors. This means that the inside of our “Father’s House” is the size of 3 ½ continents [footnote 2] or roughly the size of the dwarf planet Pluto [footnote 3] with a total inside land surface of 27 million square miles that is roughly the same as the total land surface of the planet Mercury [footnote 4].
[1] In Revelation 21:14, the apostle John tells, “The wall of the city had twelve foundations…”, which means that our “Father’s House—the New Jerusalem—has 12 floors. You see, when you look at a tall building from the outside, you can easily count the number of floors it has by simply counting the number of levels of windows, because generally, the foundation for each floor is located immediately below each level of windows. So, when the apostle John said, “The wall of the city had twelve foundations…”, this must mean that our “Father’s House”—the New Jerusalem—has 12 floors to it.
[2]Then, in Revelation 21:15-17, the apostle John also tells us that each of the 12 floors is approximately 1500 miles long and 1500 miles wide. For it is written:
“The angel who talked with me had a measuring rod of gold to measure the city,
its gates and its walls. The city was laid out like a square, as long as it was wide.
He measured the city with the rod and found it to be 12,000 stadia in length,
and as wide and high as it is long. The angel measured the wall using human
measurement, and it was 144 cubits thick.” (Revelation 21:15-7 NIV)
The word stadia is in this verse is the Greek word for stadium, and if the King James translators were correct that the Greek or Roman stadium averaged about 1/8 of a Roman mile in length (i.e. the length of a furlong—220 yards), then 12,000 stadia x 220 yards per stadia x 3 feet per yard divided by 5280 feet per mile equals exactly 1500 miles on each side. So, according to the above Bible verse, this would make “our Father’s House”—the New Jerusalem—to be 1500 miles long, 1500 miles wide and 1500 miles high. Therefore, our “Father’s House”—the New Jerusalem—is a gigantic 12 story house, with each floor containing 2 ¼ million square miles of land surface (1500 miles x 1500 miles = 2 ¼ million square miles per floor), which would make the total land surface area inside “our Father’s House” to be 27 million square miles (2 ¼ million square miles per floor x 12 floors = 27 million square miles). And since the entire earth contains only 57.5 million square miles of land surface*, this means that “our Father’s House” contains 46.9% (or roughly 50%) of the entire earth’s land surface. And since the earth has 7 continents, and since half of 7 is 3 ½, then the inside of our Father’s House—the New Jerusalem—is about the size of 3 ½ continents, certainly large enough to accommodate several billion people, with lots of room left over.
*(http://hypertextbook.com/facts/2001/DanielChen.shtml)
[3] The New Jerusalem is 1500 miles long (roughly the distance from Maine to Florida) and the dwarf planet Pluto is 1475 miles in diameter. This means that the length of just one side of “our Father’s House” is roughly the same size as the diameter of the dwarf planet Pluto.
[4] The land surface area inside our Father’s House”—the New Jerusalem—is approximately 27 million square miles, which is equal to 70 million square kilometers. This is roughly the same size as the land surface area of the planet Mercury, which is approximately 74 million square kilometers. Therefore, according to Revelation 21:14-17, the inside of our “Father’s House” has the same land surface as does a small planet.
(http://www.smartconversion.com/otherInfo/Surface_area_of_planets_and_the_Sun.aspx)
So, for the following 3 reasons, I am totally convinced that “our Father’s House” and the New Jerusalem and the Kingdom of Heaven are all one in the same eternal dwelling place.
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In John 14:2-3, Jesus describes Heaven as “our Father’s House” containing a literal city of people living within it, and Revelation 21 describes the New Jerusalem as an ultra-gigantic “house” also containing a literal city of people living within it.
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The Church (the bride of Christ) will live in heaven for all eternity, yet Revelation 21:2 tells us that the New Jerusalem is the bride of Christ (the Church).
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We are taught that the streets of gold, the pearly gates and the throne of God are all in heaven, yet Revelation 21 and 22 tell us that the streets of gold and the pearly gates and the throne of God are all in the New Jerusalem.
So, for these reasons, it should be clear that “our Father’s House” and the New Jerusalem and the Kingdom of Heaven are all one in the same eternal dwelling place. Therefore, I will use all three terms interchangeably, and whatever conclusions apply to the New Jerusalem, will now also apply to heaven itself.
So, with that as an introduction, let us now ask the question,
“WHERE IS HEAVEN LOCATED?”
The key to understanding the location of the Kingdom of Heaven is to recognize that from the moment God first created our planet, Christ has always wanted to sustain the lives of the human bodies of all mankind by using the literal sunlight of his personal GLORY as the source of all our LIGHT, HEAT, FOOD and OXYGEN for all eternity. If this is true, then the Kingdom of Heaven must be located in a hollow place within the sun itself.
But how did I arrive at this admittedly bizarre conclusion? Well, as I understand it, in heaven, evidently Christ intends to use his personal GLORY as literal sunlight to illuminate the New Jerusalem—Heaven itself, which, in turn will illuminate the New Earth. For it is written:
"The city does not need the sun or the moon to
shine on it, for the GLORY of God gives it light
and the Lamb is its lamp." (Rev. 21:23 NIV)
Therefore God will be using the brightness of his own personal glory to literally illuminate the entire Kingdom of God as if his personal glory were the equivalent of literal sunlight.
However, the Bible also teaches us that,
"[The outer walls of the Kingdom of Heaven]
shone with the GLORY of God, and its brilliance
was like that of a very precious jewel, like jasper,
clear as crystal." (Rev. 21:11 NIV)
So somehow, the same glory of God that illuminates the entire 12-story Kingdom of Heaven also ends up literally SHINING THROUGH all 6 outer walls of the Kingdom of Heaven (the four sides, plus the top and the bottom of "Our Father's House"). Therefore, the 6 outer walls of the Kingdom of Heaven must be somewhat TRANSPARENT. The relative transparency of the outer wall of the Kingdom of heaven is confirmed in two additional ways. First, as noted above, Revelation 21:11 tells that the walls of the city were "as clear as crystal". Second, this transparency also fits the apostle John's description of all the precious gemstones that he saw embedded in the walls of the Kingdom of Heaven as recorded in Revelation 21:19-20. For it is written:
"The foundations of the city walls were decorated
with every kind of precious stone. The first foundation
was jasper, the second sapphire, the third agate, the
fourth emerald, the fifth onyx, the sixth ruby, the
seventh chrysolite, the eighth beryl, the ninth topaz,
the tenth turquoise, the eleventh jacinth, and the
twelfth amethyst." (Revelation 21:19-20)
The natural result is that all 6 outer walls of the Kingdom of Heaven end up glowing so brightly with the sunlight of the Glory of God that this same brightness could be seen by the apostle John as he witnessed God's glory radiating from the walls of the city into outer space. Presumably, this is why John wrote that the entire Kingdom of Heaven...
"...shone with the GLORY of God, and its brilliance
was like that of a very precious jewel, like jasper,
clear as crystal." (Rev. 21:11 NIV)
In fact, evidently the sunlight of the glory of God shines so brightly from the outer walls of the New Jerusalem that this same brightness also ends up illuminating the New Earth itself, such that "the nations [of the New Earth] walk in its light" (i.e. the light of the New Jerusalem). For it is written:
"The nations [of the New Earth] will walk
in ITS light, and the kings of the earth will
bring their splendor into it." (Rev. 21:24 NIV)
So, as a simple consequence of Jesus Christ using his personal glory to illuminate the entire 12-story Kingdom of Heaven (the New Jerusalem), the outer walls of the New Jerusalem transmit the brightness of God's glory outwardly to illuminate the New Earth itself. In this way, the New Jerusalem itself will provide the sunlight for the New Earth—a new companion planet that will most likely ORBIT the Kingdom of Heaven for all eternity, just like the planet Earth we live on right now is currently orbiting the sun today. And since the photosynthetic process of plants is ultimately responsible for turning sunlight into sugar (our ultimate food source) as well as turning sunlight into the oxygen that we breathe, then by using the sunlight of his personal GLORY to illuminate both Heaven and the New Earth for all eternity, Christ will personally become the source of all our light, heat, food and oxygen for all saved mankind for all time.
But God did this very same thing when he first created our planet Earth on Day 1 of the Creation Week in the first chapter of Genesis. Remember, at the very beginning of our planet’s existence, God used his personal GLORY to provide 100% of the literal sunlight for the earth for three entire days before he created the actual sun itself on Day 4.
So evidently, using the brightness of his personal GLORY to provide 100% of our planet's light, heat, food and oxygen is so important to Christ that he actually began this very process when creating our planet Earth on Day 1 of the Creation Week. And according to Revelation 21, Christ evidently continues to use his personal glory to provide 100% of mankind's light, heat, food and oxygen in heaven and on the New Earth throughout all eternity. So on Day 4 of the Creation Week when God created the sun, do you really believe that Christ would simply relinquish the joy of his personal involvement in providing 100% of mankind's light, heat, food and oxygen and simply hand this job over to the inanimate sun?
Of course not! It is far more likely that Christ would find a way to supernaturally continue to use his personal glory to be the source of 100% of mankind's light, heat, food and oxygen for all time, and therefore on Day 4 of the Creation Week Christ would merely wrap himself (and his home—“our Father’s House"—Heaven itself) within the most spectacular display of fire, light and Glory imaginable—the surface of the sun!
After all, the only way that Christ could directly use his personal GLORY to continue providing all our light, heat, food and oxygen from the beginning of this planet’s existence throughout all eternity, would be if Christ concealed both himself and heaven within the sun itself. Therefore, heaven must be inside the sun!
And why not? After all, if Hell is inside the EARTH, why couldn’t HEAVEN be inside the SUN? For it is written:
"For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the
belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three
days and three nights in the HEART of the EARTH."
(Matthew 12:40 NIV)
This verse teaches that the “HEART of the earth”—the very center of our planet—contains a relatively small HOLLOW area where Jesus went when he “descended into hell and preached to the spirits in prison”. (I Peter 3:19 & 4:6, Ephesians 4:8-10)
So, I ask again, if Hell is inside the EARTH, why couldn’t HEAVEN be inside the SUN?
Moreover, if the FIRST PARADISE was inside the EARTH, why couldn't the FINAL PARADISE be inside the SUN? For John 3:13 tells us that:
“No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who
came from heaven—the Son of Man.” (John 3:13 NIV)
This teaches us that before Christ rose from the dead and went back to heaven, that NOT ONE SINGLE PERSON had gone to heaven yet. So evidently, for the first 4000 years of earth’s history (from the time Cain killed Able in Genesis 4:8 until the time Christ rose from the dead) NOT ONE SINGLE PERSON had gone to heaven. So where did all of them (including Enoch and Elijah) end up going? Jesus tells us that they all went to a place called PARADISE. For it is written:
Jesus answered [the thief on the cross], “I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in PARADISE.” (Luke 23:43 NIV)
So that very day when the thief died, he joined Jesus in PARADISE. But Jesus did NOT ascend to heaven that day, did he? Instead, Jesus descended into hell and stayed there for the next three days. This means that both PARADISE and HELL must be side-by-side in a relatively small, HOLLOW area in the very center of the earth.
Furthermore, Luke 16:26 teaches that there is an uncrossable chasm between HELL and PARADISE so that no one can travel between them.
(Now many Christians mistakenly believe that in this parable, the rich man in hell was seeing Abraham and Lazarus in heaven. But that cannot possibly be true, since according to John 3:13, NOT ONE SINGLE PERSON was living in heaven at that time. So the rich man had to be seeing Abraham and Lazarus in Paradise right across from Hell in the center of the earth.)
Now Paradise is most likely an underground Garden of Eden which was the afterlife-dwelling place for all the righteous people who lived and died before Christ rose from the dead and took them to heaven with him. And since Jesus has the "Keyes to Hades" (Revelation 1:18), then he took everyone living in paradise with him to heaven when he ascended from hell to heaven. For it is written:
“When he ascended on high, he led captives
in his train.” (Ephesians 4:7 NIV)
So, I ask again, if the FIRST PARADISE is inside a hollow place in the center of the EARTH, why couldn't the FINAL PARADISE be inside a hollow place in the center of the SUN?
In summary,
1. According to Genesis 1, God used his personal GLORY to provide 100% of the sunlight for the earth for three entire days before he created the actual sun itself on Day 4. And according to Revelation 21:23-24, God will continue to use the brightness of his own personal GLORY to directly provide 100% of the sunlight for the New Jerusalem and for the New Earth, and thereby personally provide all our light, heat, food and oxygen for all time. Now, since God created the sun on Day 4 of the Creation Week, the only way that Christ could continually (without interruption) use the sunlight of his own personal GLORY as the direct source of 100% of mankind's light, heat, food and oxygen would be if God created our sun to be a radiant sphere of God's own personal GLORY and then placed heaven and his own image within his own GLORY (i.e. within the sun itself). Therefore, heaven—the New Jerusalem—must be inside the sun!
2. According to I Timothy 6:14-16, Christ's actual dwelling place is in a location of unapproachable light, and the sun is indeed a place of unapproachable light.
3. By using his own personal GLORY to provide all the sunlight for the New Earth and for Heaven itself for all time (Revelation 21:23-24) Jesus will literally be “the Light of the World” for all eternity. So in John 8:12, when Jesus said, “I am the light of the world”, rather than imagine he simply means, "I am the enlightenment of the world", a more correct interpretation might be:
"I am the literally the light of the world.
In other words, through my intimate connection
with the Trinity, at this very moment,
I am literally providing all your sunlight
and thereby I am literally providing all your
light, heat, food and oxygen."
4. And this is probably why it says, “God is Light” in I John 1:5 (NIV),
5. and why Jesus’ name is the “Bright Morning Star” in Revelation 22:16 (NIV),
6. and why Zechariah said, “the RISING SUN will come to us from heaven" in Luke 1:78 (NIV) (because the Rising SUN is an actual person—Jesus Christ),
7. and why David said in the Psalms that "In them [the heavens] he [God] has set a tabernacle [his home] for the Sun [to provide our sunlight]" in Psalm 19:1,4b (KJV),
8. and why John "saw an angel standing IN the sun” in Revelation 19:17 (NIV) [because some of the angels do live inside the sun),
9. and why the first thing the apostle John saw after the sun disappeared in Revelation 21:1 was the New Jerusalem (because Heaven—the New Jerusalem—was previously hidden within the sun itself and so he couldn't yet see it),
10. and why the astronomical sign for Jesus—the “light of the world”—is a STAR (the “star of Bethlehem”).
11. And don't forget, since hell is inside a hollow place in center of the earth, it should not surprise you that heaven is likewise inside a hollow place in the center of the sun.
12. And, since the first paradise is also inside a hollow place in the center of the earth, again, it should not surprise you that the final paradise—heaven itself—is likewise inside a hollow place in the center of the sun.
If all this is true, then right now, at this very moment, the Kingdom of Heaven is located within a hollow place inside the sun itself. This means that mankind has been going around in circles for thousands of years wondering where heaven is located, and it turns out that heaven is located in the exact center of the circle of earth’s orbit around the sun.
And doesn't it make sense that, as a loving heavenly Father, that God would naturally want to make his dwelling place in heaven to be so close to us that he could simply use the sunlight of his personal GLORY to literally provide all our light, heat, food and oxygen for all eternity?
No wonder God says,
“Heaven is my throne
and earth is my footstool.”
(Isaiah 66:1) (NIV)
In conclusion, the Kingdom of heaven is much closer than you might think, a place of “unapproachable light” (I Timothy 6:14-16) that is a mere 93 million miles or so from earth. Viewed in this way, heaven sounds pretty close, doesn’t it?