Many rooms and house cleaning

The idea of “many rooms” puts images in my head. I think of an office full of cubicles, or a building full of offices, or even West Edmonton Mall with more than 800 stores. This also reminds me of a large mansion like the Biltmore house with 250 rooms, yet from what I know about the size of the family of God, these are small numbers compared to the dwelling places in heaven.

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? (John 14:2)

This should encourage all who are afraid concerning their eternal resting place. The Lord says, “Whosoever will may come…” and He is making certain there is accommodation for all. He is preparing many rooms and created heaven as an everlasting dwelling for all who love and follow Him. This is a vast multitude. Some say tens of thousands in East Asia are coming to Christ each day. This makes my images of mansions puny compared to what He is building for His people.

Thinking back, these words were first spoken to disciples who were poor, sinful people. I wonder what they thought when they heard it. What could they imagine from “many rooms”? Did they have any inkling of what their small band would become? Did they have a clue that one day we would live in God’s many rooms, rooms enough for millions of His children?

Knowing something about the heart of God, I’m sure there will be sufficient and suitable accommodations for all sorts of persons as well. People from every nation, condition and circumstance, great sinners and moral people, weak and strong, babes in Christ and those more mature will have an eternal home. As today’s devotional reading says, there is in heaven enough for the happiness of everyone who hearkens to the call of the gospel.

For those, there are two promises regarding a dwelling place. Heaven is the eternal result for those who believe in Jesus Christ, but there is more. In doing a simple Greek word search, I discovered that this verse uses the same word as the one translated, “rooms”….

Jesus answered him, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. (John 14:23)

The Father and the Son, also the Holy Spirit are looking for many rooms in many hearts, yet this is a personal invitation to anyone and a statement about what happens to those who love and obey Jesus: That person is loved by God and becomes a room, an abiding place, a home for Him!

Now how is all this practical? I think of the many rooms that I have been in and how they affected my life. I also think about the many people I’ve met and know, and how each one affects my thoughts and actions. This verse about God making His home in me must be taken literally. When I let that impact me, then I cannot go anywhere or be with anyone without being aware that I am the dwelling place of God. That changes my life and so it should.

I’m also convicted that Jesus is preparing a place for me, but what kind of place have I prepared and maintained for Him? He lives here in my heart! Without trivializing this astonishing reality, it definitely makes me want to take out the garbage, clean up the clutter, polish the remaining contents, and freely offer them to His use. 

Home-making and Housekeeping

Home spawns many familiar sayings, from "Home is where the heart is" and "Peace, like charity, begins at home" to Oprah Winfrey’s, "I think that when you invite people to your home, you invite them to yourself."

Bill Cosby observed that, “Human beings are the only creatures on earth that allow their children to come back home.” Is this related to Meister Eckhart’s statement, “God is at home, it's we who have gone out for a walk”?

Jesus understood the dearness of home to the human heart. He used it to illustrate eternal life and the dwelling place of God by saying,

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? (John 14:2)

The ultimate home is where God lives. Sinners who are estranged from Him have indeed “gone for a walk” and some may not even care to go home. Yet others of us long for that place. Sometimes I am caught up in the thought of eternal life with Him, even saying aloud, “I want to go home.”

More often, I say it when life is hard and because the idea of home for a Christian is in deep contrast to this alien life here on earth. Here, I am a citizen of heaven living on earth as an ambassador, and find great appeal in being with God in the place He prepares for me.

This morning, I’m again prompted to think about this heavenly home where God lives. This is not to be confused with a building or house for public worship. A church is often called “God’s house” yet it is only a building where God’s people meet. The temple of Solomon was called God’s house also for God was represented as dwelling there with His throne in the Holy of Holies.

Sometimes the whole universe is represented in Scripture as God’s house, built one story above another. But the highest heaven is represented as the house of God, reserved for himself for his own dwelling. The psalmist expressed this in verses such as, “To you I lift up my eyes, O you who are enthroned in the heavens” (Psalm 123:1) and “The Lord is in his holy temple; the Lord’s throne is in heaven…” (Psalm 11:4)

There is a sense where the house of God is closer than heaven. Because He lives in His people, those who genuinely believe in Jesus Christ are called the temple of the Holy Spirit, the dwelling place of God. Collectively, we are His household living here on earth, along with the saints who have gone before us and live in His heavenly home.

So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. (Ephesians 2:19–22)

This places on me a responsibility because my role as a housekeeper has several senses. I’m engaged in keeping tidy and maintaining the structure in which I live. I must do the same for my spiritual life for Christ lives in this earthen vessel and wants my life of clay to bring Him glory. For both, I have the help and grace of the Holy Spirit.

I’m also charged with care for the Body of Christ which is His corporate dwelling place. This includes allowing other Christians to care for me. Together we can do this because of the Lord’s grace and mercy.

As for the other house, the home of God, Jesus said He is there preparing a place for us, or as my post a couple of days ago says, He is preparing an opportunity for us. For this, my participation is more about what I leave out of this life. If I clutter it up with sin or even temporary treasures, there will be less space for the treasure He gives as a down payment on my future and final home. 

Renovation project?

Occasionally I dream that I’m living in a different house, not a surprise for we have moved many times. Someone told me that houses in such dreams represent things in my life. Sometimes the house is large and spacious with many rooms. Sometimes it is filled with furniture, or people. Sometimes there are hidden and locked rooms. These could be pictures of what is going on, or perhaps dreaming about a house last night could reflect the devotional focus of the past few days.

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? (John 14:2)

In this verse, the house is not mine, but God’s, and His Son is the way or door into His house. “Jesus said… ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me’” (John 14:6). While the door is open and everyone is invited, there is only one entrance. No one can get in any other way.

In the postmodern thinking of today, this exclusiveness makes some people angry. They think it presumptuous to claim only one way to God, and even to claim being sure of heaven. However, it isn’t what I say but based on the claim of Jesus Christ and the promises of God. He said that He is the only way and that He is preparing a place for those who believe in Him. He also says we can know that we have eternal life (1 John 5:13).

In my dream, I had guests in my house, a couple and their daughter, not close friends but not enemies. I’ve not thought about them for months. Perhaps the dream is a signal to pray for them, but in context, it is likely a reminder about that future home. That is, when I am in those many rooms of my Father’s house, there will be others there too. Heaven will not be filled with “us four, no more, shut the door” but with all of God’s children. As the song goes, “Red and yellow, black and white, all are precious in His sight, Jesus loves the little children of the world.” God may be inclusive about the way into His house, but He is not inclusive about those He invites.

The Lord loves all those that I love and all those that I might not like very much. Heaven’s house could be filled with the people I’ve disagreed with here, even those that have hurt me or given me grief. I will live for eternity with them. So perhaps the dream was to remind me to be at peace with others, forgiving those who have sinned against me and loving those who seem less lovable than the people on my preferred guest list.

Of course, in heaven, negative attitudes and sour relationships will not exist. In being made like Jesus, each of us will be fully cleansed of our selfish and sinful desires and responses. We will not have those childish I-wants that can turn dreams into nightmares. Yet as I think about the house in my dream and the house that Jesus describes, He seems to be saying that the place He is building there can also describe the place that He wants to build here.

That is, my heart and home here on earth could be enlarged and more like heaven. Jesus wants me to make room for everyone including family, friends and even those not on those lists. As He prepares a perfect dwelling place in heaven, He also wants to repair my home, heart, and attitude here, including anything that is broken down, run-down or has closed doors. Heaven’s windows have a warm glow. What about where I live right now?

I would not be surprised if last night’s house dream signals another major renovation project.