I admit that I too have scratched my head at Jesus’s teaching, “The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage, but those who are considered worthy to attain to that age and to the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage” (Luke 20:34–35). In the resurrection, God’s people will be like the angels in heaven — without spouse or sex (Matthew 22:30).

With this man, I too have wondered at this omission. Not because I could not imagine something more satisfying to live for than sex, but because lifelong commitment to a spouse in marriage is also one of the greatest joys to be had in this world. Why would it not endure into the next?

Then I married, and the nagging question increased. The thought of going from oneness with her to a more general relationship with all the saints felt like a move from tailor-made to assembly line; unique to generic. To take my spouse from me and place her in the crowd felt like unweaving a rainbow, separating me from my choicest companion, indeed, from a part of myself. Removing the rib of man a second time.

Sex and Chocolate

I stumbled upon a quote in Lewis that has helped the tension. I was troubled, as Lewis memorably puts it, not because the future reality is wanting, but because my imagination and faith are weak. He writes,

I think our present outlook might be like that of a small boy who, on being told that the sexual act was the highest bodily pleasure, should immediately ask whether you ate chocolates at the same time. On receiving the answer “No,” he might regard [the] absence of chocolates as the chief characteristic of sexuality. In vain would you tell him that the reason why lovers in their raptures don’t bother about chocolates is that they have something better to think of. The boy knows chocolate: he does not know the positive thing that excludes it. We are in the same position. We know the sexual life; we do not know, except in glimpses, the other thing which, in heaven, will leave no room for it.

Those of us who know (or at least can imagine) marital bliss and sexual pleasure may be tempted to think heaven the duller for excluding them. The perpetual sexual fast, the augment of relational depth with your spouse — “How can a world of bliss forbid such chocolates?” What does God have against chocolate? Nothing, he reminds us. He invented them.

Instead of thinking heaven the less interesting, we wonder, as the boy in Lewis’s analogy, what kind of happiness does God have in store for those who love God when the highest pleasures on earth stand as a distant and forgotten memory? What light renders the flickering candle irrelevant? This heaven, the man couldn’t understand, is the only one worthy of the name. We do not have earth’s joys 2.0 with the absence of pain. The God who joyfully invented such ecstasies, eclipses them to make room for something more.

Brilliant Shadows

To sigh at heaven because we lose something of earth, to cling to earth’s most brilliant shadows with trembling grip as they give way to the substance, is to forget what is coming. Even now, we can remind ourselves: heaven’s pleasures threaten to overwhelm earth’s best delights — delights so intoxicating that the passing of them seems an irreplaceable loss, a dimming of heaven. We need not stuff our pockets with Butterfingers and Hershey bars as we step into the marriage supper of the Lamb. God’s proclamation at the end of the story, “Behold, I am making all things new” (Revelation 21:5), contains a “new” that we on earth can’t quite comprehend.

The Bible tells us plainly that fullness of joy is in the presence of the Lord (Psalm 16:11). Eternal life is to know him (John 17:3). The new heaven and new earth descend with Christ when he returns, not before. Already God’s kingdom spreads over the face of the earth; already the gates of hell bend at the barrage of the church (Matthew 16:18); already, with every passing day, God transfers new sinners from the domain of darkness into the kingdom of his beloved Son (Colossians 1:13); yet our lives arrive fully only with the second advent (Colossians 3:4). Heaven gallops towards earth — with fullness of joy, the end of death, the vanquishing of sin, and the glory of God — seated on a white horse.

Faith unhesitatingly holds that God alone can architect the best heaven. Faith reminds us that God does not bury his best joys in a fallen world. Faith is assured that the country still ahead is best (Hebrews 11:16). We groan, not because we go to rule in that city of everlasting day without a few of earth’s favorite candy bars; we groan inwardly and wait eagerly because we long for the fullness of our adoption as sons (Romans 8:23). We enjoy chocolate, but hunger for steak. Faith teaches us to enjoy the things of earth mindful of God during the day, and to pray at night, with childlike anticipation, “One day nearer, my Lord. One day nearer!”

What Heaven Offers

In Matthew 22, the Sadducees, in an attempt to discredit Jesus, came to Him with a question regarding marriage and the resurrection. Jesus answered them with these words: “At the resurrection people will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven” (verse 30). Jesus teaches here that marriage is a relationship to be enjoyed in this life, but it will not carry forward into the next life. While we do not lose our identity in heaven (Luke 16:23), we will not hold the same relationships that we do on earth. Our existence will be quite different from what we are used to here. The fact that there is no marriage in heaven implies at least two other things: 1) There will be no procreation in heaven; the number of the redeemed is set, and, with no death, there will be no need to propagate the race. 2) There will be no sexual intercourse in heaven. The appetites and desires of this world will give way to higher and infinitely more gratifying delights in the world to come.

For centuries, the temple and its sacrifices were at the heart of worship, but once Christ came and offered Himself as the ultimate sacrifice, the temple system and its sacrifices were no longer needed (John 4:22-23). They were “copies of the heavenly things,” and the earthly temple was only “a copy of the true one” in heaven (Hebrews 9:23-24). In the same way, the marriage relationship is a picture of our relationship with Christ (Ephesians 5:31-32). Once we are present with Christ, the illustration will no longer be needed. We will have the reality, which is far better than any earthly representation. This is why Jesus is called the Bridegroom, the Church is called His Bride, and our celebration in heaven is called the Wedding (John 3:29; Matthew 22:1-14; Revelation 19:7-9).

Visual Verse of the Day

“We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not despairing; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed.” 2 Corin 4:8-9"