31 | January | 2015 | For What Saith the Scriptures?

HOW OLD WILL WE BE IN HEAVEN?

by Shawn Brasseaux

“My 5 and 7 year old wanted to know if we are raptured now, will they stay children? Will we age in heaven or stay in the age that we are raptured in?”

Thank you for these thought-provoking questions—those little minds are certainly thinking and that is good! The Bible is not clear about our “age in heaven,” so God has given us liberty to speculate (we will know for sure one day!). As with any Bible questions that are not sufficiently answered in Scripture, we can at least look at some general statements that the Bible says about our bodies in heaven. I would urge you to look at these verses and come to your own conclusions. Study out the matter more on your own; perhaps you will get further than I have in this brief study.

Many say that we will be in heaven the same age as Jesus Christ was when He left earth (around 33 years old). I would tend to agree with them there, since Philippians 3:20-21 says: “[20] For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: [21] Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself.”

Our glorified bodies will be just like Jesus Christ’s resurrected body, the body He had when He physically ascended into heaven in Acts 1:9-11 (cf. Mark 16:19; Luke 24:51). That body was able to travel at high speeds to cross the universe—Jesus traveled from Earth, to Father God in Heaven, and back to Earth, in less than eight days (John 20:11-31). His body could move through walls and locked doors (John 20:19). He was able to eat physical foods such as honeycomb and broiled fish (Luke 24:30; John 24:41-43). That body was also aged 33 years when He left Earth—He began His ministry at around age 30 (Luke 3:23) and we can use various verses from the Four Gospels to estimate that He had a three-year-long ministry. As Philippians 3:21 says, those glorified bodies will be the means whereby Jesus Christ uses us to fulfill His will in the heavenly places in eternity!

Heaven being filled with babies that need to be nursed, or children and elderly people who need to be tended to, that is not my view of Heaven. God would have us function by ourselves, fully able to do His will without having someone else to take care of us. That is why I hold to the idea that we will neither be “young” nor “old,” but somewhere around “middle-age,” in heaven, never to age, weaken, slow down, et cetera. Personally, I do not see elderly Christians remaining elderly in heaven and juvenile Christians remaining juveniles in heaven. I see us all being one age, neither young nor old (whatever common age that is I would say Christ’s age). Again, apart from speculation, we will just have to wait and see for ourselves!