True Education
Joys and Pursuits in Heaven
There we shall know even as also we are known. There the loves and sympathies that God has planted in the soul will find truest and sweetest exercise. The pure communion with holy beings, the harmonious social life with the blessed angels and with the faithful ones of all ages, the sacred fellowship that binds together “the whole family in heaven and earth”—all are among the experiences of the hereafter. TEd 190.3
There will be music there, and song, such music and song as, except in the visions of God, no mortal ear has heard or mind conceived. TEd 190.4
“As well the singers as the players on instruments shall be there.” Psalm 87:7, KJV. “They shall lift up their voice, they shall sing.” Isaiah 24:14. TEd 190.5
“For the Lord will comfort Zion, He will comfort all her waste places; He will make her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like the garden of the Lord; joy and gladness will be found in it, thanksgiving and the voice of melody.” Isaiah 51:3. TEd 190.6
There every power will be developed, every capability increased. The grandest enterprises will be carried forward, the loftiest aspirations will be reached, the highest ambitions realized. And still there will arise new heights to surmount, new wonders to admire, new truths to comprehend, fresh objects to call forth the powers of body and mind and soul. TEd 190.7
All the treasures of the universe will be open to the study of God’s children. With unutterable delight we shall enter into the joy and wisdom of unfallen beings. We shall share the treasures gained through ages upon ages spent in contemplation of God’s handiwork. And the years of eternity, as they roll, will continue to bring more glorious revelations. “Exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think” (Ephesians 3:20) will be, forever and forever, the impartation of the gifts of God. TEd 191.1
“His servants shall serve Him.” Revelation 22:3. The life on earth is the beginning of the life in heaven. Education on earth is an initiation into the principles of heaven. The lifework here is a training for the lifework there. What we now are, in character and holy service, is the sure foreshadowing of what we shall be. TEd 191.2
“The Son of man did not come to be served, but to serve.” Matthew 20:28. Christ’s work below is His work above, and our reward for working with Him in this world will be the greater power and wider privilege of working with Him in the world to come. “‘You are My witnesses,’ says the Lord, ‘that I am God.’” Isaiah 43:12. This also we shall be in eternity. TEd 191.3
Why was the great controversy permitted to continue throughout the ages? Why was Satan’s existence not cut short at the outset of his rebellion? It was that the universe might be convinced of God’s justice in His dealing with evil, that sin might receive eternal condemnation. In the plan of redemption there are heights and depths that eternity itself can never exhaust, marvels into which the angels desire to look. The redeemed only, of all created beings, have in their own experience known actual conflict with sin. They have identified with Christ, and, as even the angels could not do, have entered into the fellowship of His sufferings. Will they have no testimony as to the science of redemption—nothing that will be of worth to unfallen beings? TEd 191.4
Even now, “to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places” is “made known through the church the manifold wisdom of God.” And He “raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.” Ephesians 3:10, RV; 2:6, 7. TEd 191.5
“In His temple everyone says, ‘Glory’” (Psalm 29:9), and the song that the ransomed ones will sing—the song of their experience—will declare the glory of God: “Great and marvelous are Your works, Lord God Almighty! just and true are Your ways, O King of the saints! Who shall not fear You, O Lord, and glorify Your name? for You alone are holy.” Revelation 15:3, 4. TEd 191.6
In our earthly, sin-restricted life, the greatest joy and the highest education are found in service. And in the future state, freed from the limitations of sinful humanity, we shall find our greatest joy and highest education in witnessing, and learning anew “the riches of the glory of this mystery,” “which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.” Colossians 1:27. TEd 192.1
“It has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.” 1 John 3:2. TEd 192.2
Then, in that great multitude which no one can number, presented “faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy” (Jude 24), the Son of God—He whose blood has redeemed us and whose life has taught us—“shall see the travail of His soul, and be satisfied.” Isaiah 53:11. TEd 192.3