Heavens

Definition

  1. Jehovah God’s own dwelling place; the “highest heavens”; a spirit realm invisible to human eyes.
  2. The great invisible organization of Jehovah God, composed of mighty spirit creatures: the only-begotten Son (the Word or Logos, “Michael the Archangel”), who is now Christ Jesus, and the holy angelic host, with ranks of cherub, seraph and other angel messengers or deputies. This organization is often called God’s “woman”, “Zion,” “Jerusalem.” The 144,000 (Revelation 14) at resurrection become part of this heavens.
  3. The “New Heavens” (the Kingdom composed of Christ Jesus and [when resurrected] His 144,000 anointed followers or New Jerusalem, members of the royal family, immortal and incorruptible, a part [the capital] of God’s invisible organization).
  4. The invisible ‘covering cherub’ over the original righteous earth.

The pre-flood arrangement of Satan and the angels who rebelled and joined him.

  1. The present-day invisible organization of Satan and his wicked demons, the fallen angels.
  2. The visible (physical) universe, the “starry heavens”.
  3. The atmosphere surrounding the earth.
  4. The position of glorified Kingdom ministry to which the anointed remnant are now exalted.
  5. The lofty position occupied in Satan’s wicked visible organiza­tion of politics, commerce and false religion by Satan’s ministers of false religion who claim to be ministers of God.

(1) God’s Dwelling Place

1 Kings 8:27, 30 “But will God in very deed dwell on the earth? behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain You; how much less this house that I have built! And hearken You to the supplication of You serv­ant, and of Your people Israel, when they shall pray toward this place: yea, hear You in heaven, Your dwelling-place; and when You hear, forgive.”

Psalm 11:4 “Jehovah, His throne is in heaven.”

Psalm 14:2 “Jehovah looked down from heaven upon the children of men.”

Psalm 33:13 “Jehovah looks from heaven.”

Isaiah 66:1 “Thus says Jehovah, Heaven is My throne.”

Hebrews 9:24 “For Christ entered, not into a holy place made with hands which is a copy of the reality, but into heaven itself, now to appear before God for us.”

2 Corinthians 12:2, 4 “I know a man in union with Christ who, fourteen years ago—whether in the body I do not know, or out of the body I do not know; God knows —was caught away as such to the third heaven…. that he was caught away into paradise and heard unutterable words which it is not lawful for a man to speak.”

Revelation 2:7 “Let the one who has an ear hear what the spirit says to the congregations: To him that conquers I will grant to eat of the tree of life, which is in the para­dise of God.” [“Paradise” here represents heaven]

Job 1:6 “Now it came to pass on the day when the sons of God came to present themselves before Jehovah, that Satan also came among them.”

Hebrews 8:1 “We have such a high priest as this, and He has sat down at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens.”

Deuteronomy 10:14 “Behold, unto Je­hovah your God belongs heaven and the heaven of heavens, the earth, with all that is therein.”

(2) God’s Great Invisible Organization

Revelation 12:12 “On this account be glad, you heavens and you who reside in them.”

Ephesians 1:20, 21 “Christ.. . seated … at His right hand in the heav­enly places, far above every government and authority and pow­er and lordship and every name named.”

Galatians 4:26 “But the Jerusalem above is free, and she is our mother.”

Revelation 12:1 “And a great sign was seen in heaven, a woman ar­rayed with the sun, and the moon was beneath her feet, and on her head was a crown of twelve stars, and she was pregnant.”

Isaiah 54:1, 5, 6 “Sing, O barren, you that did not bear; break forth into singing, and cry aloud, you that did not travail with child: for more are the children of the desolate than the children of the married wife, says Jeho­vah. For your Maker is your hus­band; Jehovah of hosts is His Name: . . . For Jehovah has called you as a wife forsaken and grieved in spirit, even a wife of youth, when she is cast off, says your God.”

Revelation 9:16 (mar.) “And the num­ber of the armies of cavalry was 200,000,000: I heard the number of them.”

Daniel 7:10 “A fiery stream is­sued and came forth from before Him: thousands of thousands ministered unto Him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before Him.”

Hebrews 12:22, 23 “But you have ap­proached a mount Zion and a city of the living God, heavenly Jerusalem, and myriads of angels, in general assembly.”

2 Peter 2:11 “Whereas angels, al­though they are greater in strength and power, do not bring against them an accusation in abusive terms, not doing so out of respect for Jehovah.”

2 Kings 19:35 “And it came to pass that night, that the angel of Jehovah went forth, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred and eighty-five thou­sand: and when men arose early in the morning, behold, these were all dead bodies.”

(3) Christ and His Joint King­dom Heirs “New Heavens”

Isaiah 65:17 “Behold, I create new heavens and a new earth.”

Revelation 21:1 “And I saw a new heaven and a new earth.”

2 Peter 3:13 “But there are new heavens and a new earth that we are awaiting according to His promise, and in these righteous­ness is to dwell.”

Revelation 21:2 “I saw also the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God and prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.”

Psalm 19:1 “The heavens declare the glory of God.”

Begins with Christ’s enthrone­ment, lasts forever

Revelation 12:5 “And she gave birth to a son, a male, who is destined to shepherd all the nations with an iron rod.”

Revelation 11:15 “And the seventh angel blew his trumpet. And loud voices occurred in heaven saying: ‘The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ, and He will rule as king for ever and ever.’ “

Isaiah 66:22 “For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before Me, says Jehovah, so shall your seed and your name remain.”

(4) The Invisible ‘Covering Cher­ub’ over the Original Righteous Earth

Hebrews 1:10 “And: ‘You, O Lord, founded the earth at the begin­ning, and the heavens are works of Your hands.’ “

2 Peter 3:5 “For, according to their wish, this fact escapes their notice, that there were heavens in ancient times and an earth standing compactly out of water and in the midst of water by the Word of God.”

Ezekiel 28:14 “You were the anointed cherub that covers: and I set you, so that you were upon the holy mountain of God; you have walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire.”

(5) Preflood Arrangement of Sa­tan and Rebellious Angels

Genesis 6:4, 11 “The Nephilim were in the earth in those days, and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them: the same were the mighty men that were of old, the men of renown. And the earth was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.”

Jude 6 “And the angels that did not keep their original posi­tion but forsook their own proper dwelling-place He has reserved with eternal bonds under dense darkness for the judgment of the great day.”

2 Peter 2:4 “Certainly if God did not hold back from punish­ing the angels that sinned, but, by throwing them into Tartarus, delivered them to pits of dense darkness to be reserved for judg­ment.”

1 Peter 3:19, 20 “In this state also He went His way and preached to the spirits in prison, which had once been disobedient when the patience of God was waiting in Noah’s days, while the ark was being constructed, in which a few people, that is, eight souls, were carried safely through the water.”

Disrupted at the Flood

2 Peter 3:6 “The world of that time suffered destruction when it was deluged with water.”

(6) Satan’s Present-Day Invisible Organization of Demons

2 Peter 3:7 “But by the same word the heavens and the earth that are now are stored up for fire and are being reserved to the day of judgment and of de­struction of the ungodly men.”

Ephesians 6:12 “Because we have a fight, not against blood and flesh, but against the governments,… against the world-rulers of this darkness, against the wicked spirit forces in the heavenly places.”

Mark 13:31 “Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will not pass away.”

Isaiah 50:3 “I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sack­cloth their covering.”

Began with reorganization after Flood; destroyed at Armageddon

Hebrews 1:10, 11 “And: ‘You, O Lord, founded the earth at the beginning, and the heavens are works of Your hands. They will perish, but You are to remain continually; and they will all grow old like an outer garment.'”

Revelation 12:3 “And another sign was seen in heaven, and look! a great fiery-colored dragon, with seven heads and ten horns and upon its heads seven diadems.”

Isaiah 34:4 “And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll; and all their host shall fade away, as the leaf fades from off the vine, and as a fading leaf from the fig-tree.”

2 Peter 3:10 “Yet Jehovah’s day will come as a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a hissing noise.”

Revelation 20:11 “And I saw a great white throne and the One seated on it. From before Him the earth and the heaven fled away, and no place was found for them.”

(7) The Physical Universe

Genesis 1:1 “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”

Genesis 22:17 “I will multiply your seed as the stars of the heavens.”

Isaiah 40:12 “Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and meted out heaven with the span?”

Psalm 19:1 “The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firma­ment shows His handiwork.”

(8) Earth’s Atmosphere “the Sky”

Genesis 1:6-8 “And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. And God made the firmament, and di­vided the waters which were un­der the firmament from the wa­ters which were above the firma­ment: and it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, a second day.”

Genesis 7:11 “In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.”

2 Kings 2:1, 11 “And it came to pass, when Jehovah would take up Elijah by a whirlwind into heaven, that Elijah went with Elisha from Gilgal. And it came to pass, as they still went on, and talked, that, behold, there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, which parted them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven.”

Luke 17:24 “For even as the lightning, by its flashing, shines from one part under heaven to another part under heaven, so the Son of man will be.”

Deuteronomy 1:28 “Where are we going up? our brethren have made our heart to melt, saying, The people are greater and taller than we; the cities are great and fortified up to heaven; and moreover we have seen the sons of the Anakim there.”

(9) The Remnant’s Position of Glorified Kingdom Ministry

Revelation 11:12 “And they heard a loud voice out of heaven say to them: ‘Come on up here.’ And they went up into heaven in the cloud, and their enemies beheld them.”

Revelation 8:1 “And when He opened the seventh seal, a silence occurred in heaven for about a half hour.”

Revelation 13:6 “And it opened its mouth in blasphemies against God, to blaspheme His Name and His residence, even those residing in heaven.”

1 Thessalonians 4:17 “Afterward we the living who are surviving will to­gether with them be caught away in clouds to meet the Lord in the air; and thus we shall always be with the Lord.”

Ephesians 1:3, 4 “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, for He has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in union with Christ, just as He chose us in union with Him before the world’s foundation, that we should be holy and without blemish before Him in love.”

Ephesians 2:6 “And He raised us up together and seated us together in the heavenly places in union with Christ Jesus.”

(10) Position of Satan’s Minis­ters of False Religion, False “Stars”

Revelation 12:4 “Its tail draws a third of the stars of heaven, and it hurled them down to the earth. And the dragon kept standing before the woman.”

Revelation  6:13 “And the stars of heaven fell to the earth, as when a fig tree shaken by a high wind casts its early figs.”

Matthew 24:29 “Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the

moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.”

2 Corinthians 11:13-15 “For such men are false apostles… of Christ. And no wonder, for Satan him­self keeps transforming himself into an angel of light. It is there­fore nothing great if his minis­ters also keep transforming them­selves into ministers of righteous­ness. But their end shall be ac­cording to their works.”

Jude 12, 13 “These are .. . stars with no set course, for which the blackness of darkness stands reserved forever.”

“Heavens Opened” Means Dis­cernment of Spiritual Things

Revelation 4:1 “After these things I saw, and, look! an opened door in heaven, and the first voice that I heard was as of a trumpet, speaking with me, saying: ‘Come on up here, and I shall show you the things which must take place.’ “

Mark 1:10 “And immediately on coming up out of the water He saw the heavens being parted, and, like a dove, the spirit com­ing down upon Him.”

Acts 7:56 “And he said: ‘Look! I behold the heavens opened up and the Son of man standing at God’s right hand.’ “

Revelation 11:19 “And the temple sanctuary of God that is in heav­en was opened, and the ark of His covenant was seen in His temple sanctuary.”

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