Not long ago when I was talking with a ‘mid-Acts’ preacher, who had graduated from a 'mid-Acts' school, he tried to convince me there were two separate eternal destinations for God’s saints. He repeatedly told me that ‘the church, the body of Christ’ (meaning people who have been saved ONLY during the dispensation of grace, through Paul’s ministry) will go ‘far up above all heavens’ .... and that ‘Israel’s kingdom program saints’ (though in heaven now) will come down to earth to reign with Jesus for 1,000 years, and then in eternity. The passage he continually referred to was:
Eph 4:8-10 Wherefore he saith, When he ascended up on high,
he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men.
9 (Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth? (My friend thought this verse was about when Jesus appeared to Saul on the road to Damascus, but according to Rom 10:7, when Christ descended into the deep was when he was dead.)
10 He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things.)
Before I addressed his conclusion .... of two different locations:
1) ‘up far above all heavens’ for the saints saved through Paul
and 2) ‘Israel’s earthly kingdom’ for saints outside of Paul’s ministry ....
I attempted to establish some common ground. I asked him several questions.
Question #1: Where is Jesus NOW?
He answered, “Far up above all heavens,” but I somehow managed to get him to agree that Jesus was presently sitting at the right hand of God the Father in heaven:
Eph 1:20-23 Which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places,
21 Far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come:
22 And hath put all things under his feet,
and gave him to be the head over all things to the church,
23 Which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all.
After Jesus’ death and resurrection, and after He showed Himself alive for 40 days (Acts 1:3) .... Jesus was taken up to heaven (Acts 1:2,9) where He sat down at His Father’s right hand (also Acts 2:31-33; Heb 1:3,13, 8:1 10:12, 12:2; 1 Pet 3:22):
Mark 16:19 So then after the Lord had spoken unto them,
he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God.
Col 3:1 If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above,
where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God.
Question #2: Where are the dead saints NOW in ‘what-he-calls’ Israel’s kingdom program?
He answered, “They are in heaven now .... with the Lord .... waiting to come to earth in His kingdom.”
Eph 4:8 Wherefore he saith, When he ascended up on high,
he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men. (also Psa 68:18)
When Jesus died, He went DOWN into the middle of the earth:
Matt 12:40 For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
In time past, the center of the earth was the location of paradise:
Luke 23:43 And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, To day shalt thou be with me in paradise. (also Luke 16:19-31)
We know that paradise was moved UP to the 3rd heaven .... because Paul was caught UP into paradise:
2 Cor 12:2,4 I knew a man in Christ above fourteen years ago, (whether in the body, I cannot tell; or whether out of the body, I cannot tell: God knoweth;) such an one caught up to the third heaven.
4 How that he was caught up into paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter.
Here is my point: Paradise is in the 3rd heaven.
That means that it is ABOVE the 1st heaven ....
and ABOVE the 2nd heaven.
God fixed His glory ABOVE the heavens:
Psa 8:1 O LORD our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth!
who hast set thy glory above the heavens.
God’s mercy is ABOVE the heavens.
God is exalted ABOVE the heavens:
Psa 108:4-5 For thy mercy is great above the heavens:
and thy truth reacheth unto the clouds.
5 Be thou exalted, O God, above the heavens: and thy glory above all the earth; (also Psa 57:5,11; Psa 113:4-6)
Question #3: God is above WHICH heavens?
The logical answer is, since God is in the 3rd heaven in paradise .... then He must be ABOVE the 1st and 2nd heavens. To me, that is not hard to get.
Question #4: Where are ‘what-he-calls’ the church, the body of Christ saints NOW that have died?
The ‘mid-Acts’ preacher, told me (without a verse) they are on ‘a higher plane’ that he says is located “far above all heavens.” I asked him if he meant there is a 4th heaven. He would not comment yes or no, but he made his story go like this: The saints who have died in Israel’s kingdom program are now in the 3rd heaven, in their mansions in the holy city, new Jerusalem, with God. They can look out their windows, into like ‘the sky of heaven’ and see the body of Christ saints ‘up there’ .... on ‘a higher plane’ .... from where they are.
I told him that God broke down the middle wall of partition here on earth (Eph 2:14); but did he think God erected a middle wall of partition up in heaven --- so He could keep the ‘body of Christ saints’ separated from ‘Israel’s kingdom program saints’? Did God keep the gates to the city shut, with its high walls, in order to keep the body of Christ saints OUT of it? What if the two separate groups got mixed in together while they are presently ALL up in heaven? “They won’t,” he said, “That’s why the body of Christ saints are on a higher plane.”
Inventing ‘a higher plane’ in the name of right division. How absurd!
The truth is, we share a joint inheritance WITH Israel:
Eph 3:6 That the Gentiles should be fellowheirs,
and of the same body,
and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel:
That’s the fellowship of the mystery, according to Paul.
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