We often say that we will live forever in heaven. But Scripture speaks of a New Earth.
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.”
Revelation 21:1-3 (ESV)
So, where will we live? To begin, we recall that in this present age we are citizens of the New Jerusalem which is in heaven (Heb. 12:22) and will descend to earth in the next age. Thus, our new home is the New Jerusalem and it has the perfections of heaven! Just as Jesus’ incarnation reunited divinity with humanity so too the descent of the New Jerusalem is an incarnational reunion of the dwelling place of God with the dwelling place of humanity. Heaven and earth are united in the New Jerusalem. Yet, just as the two natures of Jesus are still distinct so too heaven and earth are still distinct; they are not fully merged. God will also create a New Heaven (Rev. 21:1); presumably, it will be the abode of the angels. Since the New Heaven and New Earth overlap, believers may be able to observe the angels and any other spiritual beings from the first heaven.
Thus, along with spiritual marriage, the descent of the New Jerusalem completes the incarnational work of the Son. Through Christ’s incarnation, all humans who believe in him are united to God in spiritual marriage. And now in Christ, God unites the dwelling place of God and humans. This fulfills the statement in Ephesians about God’s “purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth” (Ephesians 1:9-10, ESV). This event may also help explain the statement in Colossians 1:16 that all things were created “for” Christ and the statement about God’s plan to “reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross” (Colossians 1:20, ESV).
Therefore, the answer to the original question is that we will live on the New Earth, not in the heaven that now exists. This New Earth, which we also refer to as the New Jerusalem since it is our “city”, has qualities from heaven since the New Jerusalem came down from heaven. Thus, we get to live in a place that has the best of both worlds – heaven and earth!
