“Behold, I will create new heavens and a new earth.  The former things will not be remembered, nor will they come to mind.”  —  Isaiah 65:17

I have a book that belonged to my mother entitled Heaven by W.A. Criswell, a pastor, and Paige Patterson, president of the Criswell College.  In the fifth chapter of the book is an interview with Criswell by Patterson.  Here are a few of the questions.  This is an interesting book and good reading.

Patterson:  How do you see the difference between the new heaven and the heaven that exists today?

Criswell:  It is the difference between Eden as it was on this earth and the planet earth as we see it today.  Eden was a beautiful paradise.  Think of the animals and the beauty of life that existed in the Garden of Eden.  Yet in the world today there is death and sorrow, pain and heartache, disappointment.  All of this has come because of the entrance of sin.  That is going to be the difference between this creation that you see and the heaven that God is going to recreate.  When God re-creates this universe with the infinitude above and around us, it is going to be Edenic.  Every star will be perfect; every planet will be perfect; every part of the universe will be perfect, and we will be perfect in it.

Patterson:  What will the everyday life in heaven be like?

Criswell:  Paul says, “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him” (1 Cor. 2:9).  That is what life is going to be like in heaven.

Patterson:  What is your concept of heavenly rewards?

Criswell:  When a Christian dies, the judgment that he faces is not a judgment in the sense of whether he or she is going to be saved or lost.  When the Christian faces the bema (Greek), literally “judgment seat,” of the Lord God, it is a place for rewards (2 Corinthians. 5:10; Romans 14:10; 1 Corinthians 3:13).

We are all judged as to whether we are lost or saved in this world – not up there, not finally by and by, but in the present here and now.  When the Christian stands before the bema of God, he is given his rewards according to his faithfulness of work and service to God here in this life.

The lost man is judged according to the depths of the punishment that he will endure at the Great White Throne Judgment (Matthew 25:32-46).  The man who continually does evil is going to suffer far more than the man who is just lost.  The rewards that we are given in heaven or in torment are very real, and they differ a great deal according to the life that we have lived here.