Spouses in Heaven
Exploration of the divine significance and potential challenges of lifelong bonding in love with a spouse and the eternal nature of this sacred relationship in the context of heaven.
Next to our salvation, the greatest earthly joy is likely the lifelong bonding in love with a spouse. And since God sanctioned this marriage relationship as good and holy, our earth logic would naturally assume it is eternal. After all, “what God has joined together, let not man put asunder” said Jesus himself. So, Heaven will naturally just be a continuation and upgrade of that same union with our beloved spouse – right? Not so fast.
Here is where Scripture pours, what feels like, cold water (in the natural) on that logical conclusion and quite honestly hoped for outcome of our marriages. For Jesus says in both Matthew 22 and Luke 20 that in heaven we do not experience marriage! Wait, please, timeout! I am now perfected, righteous, the best version of myself in Heaven, and I don’t get to be married to my dear wife who has waited and prayed for this better version of me! I smile at the irony but have to do a deep dive to comprehend the reality.
The disclaimer is I have no answer as to why I won’t stay married to my lovely wife nor will anyone else get that honor. Whew….glad for that! Scripture does not explain why Heaven is void of this wonderful union between husband and wife that God so blesses here on earth. But God does pull back the curtain slightly to allow us glimpses of Heaven - of Himself, of the Saints, of the Angels and Majestic Beings - to teach us to trust that our current reality is but a morsel of sand compared to vast seashores of Heaven.
So, a few thoughts that are only suppositions from my limited knowledge. Indulge me as I attempt to raise the periscope a little higher than my earth view.
First of all, the highest priority both now and certainly in Heaven is an intimate relationship with God. I have no doubt we will be so overwhelmed, overawed and saturated with His presence and love that we literally cannot get enough. No sugar high or temporary emotional rush here, but rather a breathe in/ breathe out continual Divine refreshing.
So where do our spouses, relatives and friends fit into this Divine and seemingly private absorption? Our current frame of reference is that there is no greater human relationship than the emotional, spiritual and sexual intimacy between a Godly husband and wife. Can the relationship in Heaven between a man and woman who were husband and wife on earth reach that deep intimacy?
I believe the answer is Yes, Yes, Forever and Ever Amen. Hope I don’t have to pay Randy Travis for that phrase? We know the absolute best love between a husband and wife on earth still remains imperfect and conditional. I don’t have to enumerate all the reasons that are so.
Conversely, we will love in Heaven like we have never loved before! Then the purest form of Godly anointed and unconditional love. Imagine giving and receiving that in Heaven to and from the person on earth we called spouse, honey, sweetie, cookie, or babe. Despite the affectionate words on earth we all unfortunately often fall short on the love in action meter.
But my premise is that in heaven we will be experiencing the greatest intimacy we have ever known with this former spouse. Just imagine the deeper intimacy of finally walking, acting and relating in perfection and reciprocation with our former spouse as God originally intended in the Garden. No more raised eyebrows, dirty looks, misinterpretations, fragile egos, harsh words, selfishness, or impure motives. What a relationship and what unmatched intimacy!
Now just suppose God allows former spouses in heaven together to pull back the curtain on their earth lives of shared experiences. And while doing so, our life movie now shows the millions of times He intervened with blessings, angelic protections, healings, gifts, and Holy visitations previously unseen to our eyes. Those new revelations to a former husband and wife are unique to them and increases even more their Divine relational intimacy.
Also, isn’t it just like our Lord to show us his Heaven movie of all the people throughout our lives as individuals and as a married couple we affected for the good with maybe one act of kindness or multiple outreaches of love. Imagine watching that movie together without “breaking the rule” of no crying in heaven. Seriously though, the emotional high of happy crying will be so far superseded in Heaven by a brand new emotion of exhilaration we have never imagined or experienced before along with an ultra-level relational bonding. Back to my analogy of an earth grain of sand compared to Heaven's millions of seashores.
It is a fair question to ask at this point, however, why no sex in heaven? After all, God set up that physical union between a husband and wife to be both Holy and physically satisfying. Some with tongue in cheek and many with all seriousness may ask God: “Lord is this one negotiable or locked in Holy Stone?” No irreverence intended here only a realistic look at questions many may have.
Consider this. When a Christian married couple has sex, God has ordained this as a joyful experience where physical, emotional, and spiritual intimacy become one. Truly one of God’s most unique and creative gifts to mankind. Although this act of lovemaking is incredibly bonding between a husband and wife and appeals to all the senses, it is, however, an act locked in the constraints of time. I would propose that in heaven there is a higher pleasure experienced by a couple. A fulfillment not confined to an act but lasting eternally. That pleasure and fulfillment would come from the deeper joy afforded by a new purer love, given and received, and the incredible intimacy of seeing a lifetime of God’s hand in our lives in millions of circumstances not currently seen by our eyes.
On earth on our best days we plant seeds of love and truth but it is not revealed to us how and when those seeds germinate. But in Heaven’s cinema, we are shown that movie of our lives where God opens the window and shows us the growth of those seeds in each and every life we impacted together and individually.
Every kind word, thought, or service we may have deemed inconsequential will now be displayed on the big screen. Not by actors, but by real people we have impacted. As former spouses watching this movie, many of these people will be known to us as children, parents, grandchildren, and friends. But there will also be millions of former strangers in the movie who were blessed by a seed we planted in their lives.
Bring out the popcorn for that movie because it could last a good chunk of eternity to watch. Would that movie date bring unparalleled intimacy to the former husband and wife? Mark it down as YES! I love that affirmative statement because no one can prove me wrong on this until we get to see what really happens in Heaven. And then if I am wrong, you will love me perfectly and not call me out. Now how God may deal with my random imaginations may be another matter! Ouch and please pass the salt and Grace shaker!
It has been fun to speculate about this renewed relationship with a former spouse. But also consider that there are billions of other new saints in Heaven – many we know, but most we have never met. Boredom in Heaven? Not hardly and a ridiculous concept in a new and perfect reality where we now get to hear and see life stories of Grace shared by these new billions of friends. An eternity to watch all of these inspiring movies, learn from others and again bask in the anointing of giving and receiving in perfect and unconditional love. The best versions of ourselves in new intimate relationships with the best versions of others.
There is a great old hymn written in the early 1800s called: “Praise the Savior Ye Who Know Him.” A verse from that song I remember singing in church in my youth goes: “Then we shall be what we would be, then we shall be what we should be. Things that are not now nor could be, soon shall be our own.”
Yes, finally we shall be what we should be! Perfected in the presence of the Lord and yet growing each moment as we interact and learn from Him. Exhilarating intimacy never imagined with Him, ever-growing intimate relationships with billions of Saints and a new mind-blowing intimacy with our former spouses, family members, and friends.
Finally, these thoughts are merely imaginations from my heart and spirit of Heaven’s incredible expansions of love and relational intimacy. I do understand that the Scripture is clear that our mind cannot conceive everything God has prepared for us. Yet I firmly believe He wants us to expand our Faith by fixing our minds on our future home. Hence my earlier “up periscope” analogy to take a peek in Spirit into Heaven.
Jesus ends His Holy Scriptures in Revelation with the promise of “Surely I come Quickly!” I will echo the next verse from the depths of my heart: “Even so come Lord Jesus!”