WHAT THE BIBLE SAYS ABOUT HOW MUCH THOSE IN THE HEREAFTER KNOW ABOUT OUR LIVES IN THE HERE-AND-NOW.

Your latest "Nothing But The Bible" question got me to thinking about the relationship between Heaven and Earth. I am looking for some clarification.

Do our loved ones who have gone to Heaven also look down upon the Earth and it's activities? I have always thought that the two realms were separated from each other and that because of the void of both sin and time that when we get to Heaven we won't think about our family or the people on Earth in general. Furthermore, someone once told me that because of the timelessness of Eternity, that to those in Heaven, every one is already there - if that makes sense. In other words, there aren't people sitting around in Heaven just waiting for others (you) to arrive.

If you have time to clarify these points, it sure would help a brother trying to understand the Heavenly realm.

Since this question is prefaced by a former question, I have inserted the former question and answer here, before answering Alan’s question.

In the original manuscripts, the Bible was not divided into chapters and verses. These divisions were added by the translators. Since the first word in chapter twelve is “wherefore,” we may safely conclude that the author of Hebrews is referring us back to what he has just written; namely, chapter eleven.

The eleventh chapter of Hebrews is the famous Faith Chapter of the Bible. It has been called “God’s Hall of Fame” and the “Roll Call of Faith.” It is comprised of those heros of the faith who performed such great exploits for God down through the ages. It is these champions of faith that comprise the “great cloud of witnesses” that surround us in our daily lives.

The picture being painted here is truly extraordinary. It is a picture of the heavenly grandstands filled with the past champions of the faith, who are now witnessing our lives and cheering us on in our service of Christ. With such witnesses looking on, how can we not be inspired to free ourselves from all worldly encumbrances and sinful entanglements in order to faithfully “run” our “race” for Christ, just as these onlooking and cheering champions of the faith once ran theirs?

There is no reason to conclude from Hebrews 12:1 that the heavenly grandstands solely consist of VIP seating. It is entirely possible that along with the past heros of the faith, our late loved ones are also witnessing our lives and rooting for us in our service of Christ. Now, to what extent they are privy to our present circumstances, the Bible doesn’t say, it only insinuates in this singular verse that they too may help to comprise our “great cloud of witnesses.” Truly, this thought should provide us with even more incentive to free ourselves of all worldly encumbrances and sinful entanglements in order to “run” our “race” faithfully for Christ.

In Revelation 6:9-11, the souls of martyred saints in Heaven are told that their blood will not be avenged by God’s judgment of the earth until the full compliment of Christian martyrs have won the martyr’s crown. If nothing else, we may safely glean from these verses that Heaven’s inhabitants are aware of the continuing persecution and martyrdom of their fellow-Christians on earth. From the opposite end of the spectrum, Hell’s inhabitants are shown by our Savior’s story of the rich man and Lazarus to remember their earthly lives and to be very much aware of their lost relatives’ dire and desperate spiritual straits (Luke 16:19-31).

To me, passages like these appear to refute the notion that those in the hereafter are ignorant of everything going on in the here-and-now. While the Bible doesn’t tell us how much they know, it certainly suggest that those in the hereafter have some knowledge of some peoples’ current earthly lives.

Someone once asked the great preacher G. Campbell Morgan if he believed we would know our loved ones in Heaven. Dr. Morgan replied, “I certainly do. I know my loved ones here and I think I’m going to know them there. I do not expect to be a bigger fool there than I am here!” According to the Apostle Paul, we now “know in part,” but when we get to Heaven we “will know even as also we are known” (1 Corinthians 13:12). We will not only know our loved ones and be known by them in Heaven, but we will know each other far better there than we do here.

The problem we have grappling with our future eternal state in our current temporal condition is best summed up by the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 2:9: “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.” Heaven is not just beyond anything we’ve ever seen or heard, but beyond anything we could even imagine. If it is beyond our imagination, it is obviously beyond our comprehension.

We simply cannot get our heads around eternity while our feet are still planted in time. Neither can we understand the infinite with finite minds. Therefore, the answers to all of our hereafter questions await our being disrobed of corruptible flesh, removed from this sin-cursed earth, donned in glorified bodies, and translated into the Celestial City. I look forward to continuing this conversation with you there, where we’ll no longer be looking at dim reflections but experiencing heavenly realities.