Heaven on Earth

The phrase ‘Heaven on earth’ is usually uttered in a secular context to denote bliss or utopia. Indeed, unwittingly retaining a sort of Gnostic paradigm, many if not most Christians seem to find the phrase to be somehow offensive, or even blasphemous – how can Heaven be on earth, when the former is holy and the latter wicked? This state of affairs is peculiar, since the Bible as I see it is essentially a story about – you guessed it – Heaven on Earth.

The theme is introduced in the very first verse of the Bible: “in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth”. In the creation process, there is no distinction between natural and supernatural; nature is brought into existence through super-nature. The substance of Genesis, in turn, is echoed in the book of Revelation, where we see a New Jerusalem descending from Heaven to Earth. In between the beginning and the end, we have the life of Jesus himself, who came from Heaven to dwell in earthly form, descending into the bosom of the earth, and then ascended back to Heaven.

On either chronological side of Jesus, we see more hints of Heaven colliding with earth. In the Old Testament, there is the Jewish temple/tabernacle, which contained the presence of God on earth. Heaven and earth have been torn asunder thanks to sin, but nevertheless we see a remnant of the divine remaining amongst the profane. In the New Testament, we ourselves have become the temple, with the Holy Spirit dwelling within us. Although we still await the time when Heaven and earth will be reunited, spiritually speaking we are already there.

The Lord’s Prayer, which is directed to “our Father in Heaven”, contains the curious phrase, “Your Kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven”. Clearly, Jesus thought that Heaven-on-earth was an important agenda – one which He came to set, and which he wanted us to continue pursuing.

The Old, New, and Ancient Covenants

It is common for Christians to speak about two covenants in the Bible, namely the so-called ‘Old’ and ‘New’ Covenants. In this post, I would like to suggest that this list is not exhaustive. I will argue, firstly, that a covenant of sorts existed before the ‘Old’ Mosaic Covenant, with Adam, Noah, and Abraham as its representatives, and secondly, that the ‘New’ Covenant is actually a return to this ‘Ancient’ Covenant. Finally, since I am already on the subject, I will show how all of these covenants point to Jesus.

The so-called ‘Old’ Covenant, as I’m sure the reader will be aware, was given to Moses in the book of Exodus. Its precise starting point is unclear, but it is Chapter 15 verses 25-26 where God first issues the sort of conditional promise that characterises this covenant: “…the LORD made for them a statute and a rule, and there he tested them, saying, ‘If you will diligently listen to the voice of the If you will diligently listen to the voice of the LORD your God, and do that which is right in his eyes, and give ear to his commandments and keep all his statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you that I put on the Egyptians, for I am the LORD, your healer.’” From this point all the way through the books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, a seemingly endless body of rules and regulations – the so-called ‘Law’ – is established. The gist of Exodus 15 is reiterated over and over again in these passages – if the Israelites obey the Law, God will bless them.

The Bible clearly states that the Law could make no one righteous – that is to say, it could “justify” no one – for no one could obey it ‘to the letter’ (Romans 3:20; Galatians 2:15, 3:11; Hebrews 10:1); rather, it acted as a mirror to show us the need for a saviour (Romans 7:7). This saviour was Jesus, who came to fulfil the Law by living a perfect life, and so, through our faith in His sacrifice, rather than our obedience to the Law, make us righteous before God (e.g. Matthew 5:17; Romans 3, 8:3; Galatians 2:21; 2 Corinthians 5:21; 1 John 5:4; Hebrews 10; Ephesians 2) – the New Covenant, which is not just for Israel, but for all of humankind. I would also point out that the Law did not only point ahead to Christ; in fact, Christ was in the picture even before the Law is given, all the way back in Exodus 15. Near the end of the chapter, the Israelites start to complain to Moses that they have no water to drink, for the waters at Marah were bitter (verses 23-4). God then shows Moses a log, which he lobs into the water, making it sweet (verse 25). It is immediately after this miracle, which manifestly alludes to the cross of Christ, where we find the first reference to the Law (verse 26). Furthermore, when comparing Jesus and His covenant to Moses and his covenant, the book of Hebrews - which explicitly uses the terminology of the 'Old' and 'New' Covenants - cites Psalm 95 to refer to the episode where the Jews test God by demanding water at Massah/Meribah, two chapters later in Exodus. As you probably know, Moses addresses this situation by bring forth water from the Rock of Horeb, which in 1 Corinthians 10:4 we are told is a metaphor to Christ.

The New Covenant is obviously not the end of the story, for we are waiting for the New Heavens and the New Earth (Revelation 21) and our adoption as glorified sons (Romans 8:18-25); but neither, I would submit, is the Old Covenant the beginning of the story. In Genesis 12 verses 2-3, God promises Abraham: “I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonours you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” We are given some invaluable information about this Abrahamic covenant in Galatians 3 (see also the book of Hebrews), which quotes multiple scriptures from Genesis: “Abraham ‘believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness’. Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham.  And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, ‘In you shall all the nations be blessed.’ So then, those who are of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith…so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith…And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to promise.” In other words, Paul tells us that the New Covenant is actually a fulfilment not only of the so-called Old Covenant, but also of the promise that God made to Abraham – not just in the sense that Christ was Abraham’s descendant (verse 16), but also in the sense that, just as Abraham was made righteous by his faith, so are we. This makes sense, since God's promise to Abraham was articulated in a future tense ("I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring") as an "everlasting covenant" (Genesis 17:7).

Furthermore, just as the New Covenant is for all peoples, so too the Abrahamic Covenant was for "all the nations", for the distinction between Jew, Gentile, and anyone else had not yet been made. Indeed, the next chapter of Galatians (verse 22-31) emphasises that the promise was made before Isaac and Ishmael were born; we are told that Hagar the slave embodied the Old Covenant while the New Covenant was represented by the promise of Isaac. Although Galatians makes clear that Abraham was a man of faith, his faith clearly lapsed when he took matters into his own hands by going in Hagar, disbelieving God’s promise that Sarah would became pregnant at an old age (Genesis 16). It would appear that the Law, which acted as placeholder until the Messiah came (Galatians 3:24), was the eventual result of this act. Indeed, there is a striking parallel here to the Massah/Meribah episode, where Moses attempted to take things into his own hands by twice striking the Rock of Horeb - an act which eventually disqualified him from entering the Promised Land (Numbers 20:12). In this vein, we can also observe that, just as Christ was there when the Old Covenant came into existence, so He was there during the Abrahamic promise.

In the second half of Genesis 14, after Abraham wins an important battle, we are told of an elusive figure named Melchizedek of Salem who held the status of “priest of the God Most High”; in Hebrews 7 verse 3 we are further told that he was “without father or mother or genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life…resembling the Son of God.” This Christ-like priest, whose name significantly meant “King of Righteousness”, and whose place of origin (Salem, or peace) is a precursor of sorts to the city of Jerusalem, and eventually the New Jerusalem - blesses Abraham. As Hebrews 7 makes clear, the priesthood of Christ that we now inherit is a continuation of Melchizedek’s priestly line – as opposed to Levitical lineage of the Old Covenant – and thus a continuation of the Abrahamic Covenant. This latter covenant, moreover, is based on righteousness through faith, and the fact that it originated with Melchizedek, who did not belong to any ethnic group, underscores its universal nature (indeed, it is interesting to note in this respect that, since Jesus was divinely conceived, he didn't really belong to any ethnic group either). 

In fact, we can trace God’s promise to Abraham even further back in the Bible. In Genesis 9, where God draws a rainbow to symbolise his promise to Noah that he will never again judge the world through a flood – another clear picture of Christ, which evokes the transformation of the waters of Marah, Abraham’s victory in battle, and of course the Cross itself – God tells Noah the following: “Behold, I establish my covenant with you and your offspring after you, and with every living creature that is with you…I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of the flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth…This the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations…” (Genesis 9:9-12, emphasis added). The parallel to the Abrahamic promise is obvious. You will recall, moreover, that Noah and his family are the only people on earth at this time, meaning that a promise to Noah's offspring is a promise to everyone.

The promise to Noah, in turn, links to a yet older promise. In the first verse of Genesis 9, we read that “God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.’” This should sound familiar; indeed, in the very first book of the Bible (verse 28), this verse is repeatedly virtually verbatim: ““And God blessed [Adam and Eve]. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth…’”. This was the original promise, the original covenant - for the blessings of God to be freely available for all peoples. In fact, all of this is encapsulated in the book of Hebrews, which shows how Christ has been in the picture since "the foundation of the world" (4:3), explaining how the New Covenant relates to Noah, Abraham, Moses, and other Old-Testament figures, with Jesus coming to reestablish the divine rest of the seventh day of creation, reiterated through the provision of manna (Chapter 3).

In short, the New Covenant of Christ not only fulfils the Law of righteousness-through-works, but it brings us back to the Abrahamic promise of righteousness-through-faith, which is in turn a continuation of the blessings given to Noah and Adam. A beautiful picture indeed!