After this, John says the heavenly city is a perfect cube, each side being 12,000 stadia, or 1,400 miles.
New Jerusalem of Revelation 21 is 2225 km in length, width, and height. A city of these gigantic proportions cannot be located on Earth; but, as stated in Rev. 21, A New Heaven and a New Earth, the city comes "down out of Heaven from God", presumably onto, the "new earth."
It is primarily God's dwelling place in the biblical tradition: a parallel realm where everything operates according to God's will. Heaven is a place of peace, love, community, and worship, where God is surrounded by a heavenly court and other heavenly beings.
The Bible does not say in any part that it is only the 144,000 that will go to heaven. The revelation to John supports Matthew 8:11, which says that many will come from every corner of the earth to sit with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. The number 144,000 that were sealed or chosen are not pre-chosen.
Sacred Scripture teaches that Enoch and Elijah were assumed into heaven while still alive and not experiencing physical death.
He says the heavenly city has four sides, each with three gates, corresponding to the 12 tribes of Israel. Then he mentions 12 huge foundation stones, which correspond to the 12 apostles. After this, John says the heavenly city is a perfect cube, each side being 12,000 stadia, or 1,400 miles.
Heaven will be a place of joy, not pain.
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” (Revelation 21:3-4).
But one thing is clear: In heaven, we will have new and perfect bodies -- bodies that will never age or become weak or die, because they will be like Christ's glorious body after His resurrection.
The reunion of believing loved ones
When Paul writes to believers who grieve the loss of a loved one, he offers them this comfort: “We who are still alive will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air” (1 Thessalonians 4:17, emphasis mine).
They are probably the most fortunate people on the planet.
So if all animals praise the Lord—and thus believe in Him—and if “whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life,” it stands to reason that one beloved verse, John 3:16, tells us that animals will also be with their Creator in heaven.
Later Christian tradition attributed the duty of greeting the souls of the faithful at the Gates of Heaven to Saint Peter.
The celestial kingdom is the highest of the three degrees of glory. It is thought by the LDS Church to be the "third heaven" referred to by the apostle Paul in the King James Version of 2 Corinthians 12:2 and it is said to correspond to the "celestial bodies" and "glory of the sun" mentioned in 1 Corinthians 15:40–41.
In the Book of Revelations (Revelation 21:12), there is reference to the twelve gates, each of which represents a different passageway to heaven. Additionally, in folklore and mythology, it is commonly believed that there exists twelve gates, or entrances, to the underworld.
In religious or mythological cosmology, the seven heavens refer to seven levels or divisions of the Heavens.
We enter heaven immediately upon our death, or our souls sleep until the second coming of Christ and the accompanying resurrection.
As for the rest of humankind, after the final judgment, it is expected that the righteous will receive eternal life and live forever on an Earth turned into a paradise. Those granted immortality in heaven are absolutely immortal and cannot die by any cause. Even God himself wouldn't be able to kill them.
You enter heaven by forgiveness and through the righteousness that Jesus gives you. You do not enter into heaven by the Christian life. It's always true that where faith is birthed, works will follow, but salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.
Besides being kept in the all-powerful hand of the Lord Jesus, Justin, 12, understands the totality of God's forgiveness: "If you are saved, and you really mean it, no sin can turn you from heaven because when God died for you, he died for all your sins, even the ones in the future. You should ask God for forgiveness."
According to Jewish and Christian traditions, there are four living creatures, although their description varies by source.
"As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.
That gives us 7Vaven = 504.5 K, which is considerably lower than the 798 K originally calculated. So the traditional belief is correct after all; at 717.6 K, hell is indeed much hotter than heaven.