Hope for Christians and Creation Romans 8:18-25

A 2005 ABC News poll asked people who believed in heaven if heaven was a place people existed spiritually or physically. --78% said spiritually --8% physically, --9% both.

Outline of Romans 8:18-25 18 Main point: What happens now is insignificant compared to what is coming. 19-22 A Theology of Creation 23 The Redemption of the body 24-25 A Theology of Hope

Psalm 115:16 The heavens are the Lord's heavens, but the earth he has given to the children of man.

Genesis 3:17-19 “Because you . . . have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground because of you; in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life;  thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field.   By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”

Genesis 1:26, 28 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” (v. 26) And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” (v. 28)

Isaiah 35:1-2 The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad; the desert shall rejoice and blossom like the crocus; it shall blossom abundantly     and rejoice with joy and singing.

Isaiah 11:6-9 The wolf shall dwell with the lamb,     and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, and the calf and the lion and the fattened calf together;     and a little child shall lead them. 7 The cow and the bear shall graze;     their young shall lie down together;     and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. 8 The nursing child shall play over the hole of the cobra,     and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder's den. 9 They shall not hurt or destroy     in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord     as the waters cover the sea.

Matt. 19:28: “In the regeneration” (“genesis again; “renewal”) Acts 3:21: “Restoration of all things” Colossians 1:20: “and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven.”

Philippians 3:20-21 But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself.

1 Corinthians 15:52-53 For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. 53 For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality.

John 16:33 I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”

Revelation 21:4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”