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Chapter 35—The School of the Hereafter
Heaven is a school, its field of study the universe, its teacher the
Infinite One. A branch of this school was established in Eden, and,
after the plan of redemption has accomplished its purpose, education
will again be taken up in the Eden school.
“What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart con-
ceived,” ... God has prepared for those who love Him.”
1 Corinthians
2:9
, NRSV. Only through His Word can a knowledge of these things
be gained, and even this affords but a partial revelation.
The prophet of Patmos thus describes the location of the school
of the hereafter: “I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first
heaven and the first earth had passed away. ... Then I, John, saw the
holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God,
prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.”
Revelation 21:1, 2
.
“The city had no need of the sun, or of the moon to shine in it, for the
glory of God illuminated it, and the Lamb is its light.”
Revelation
21:23
.
Between the school established in Eden at the beginning and the
school of the hereafter there lies the whole compass of this world’s
history—the history of human transgression and suffering, of divine
sacrifice, and of victory over death and sin. Not all the conditions
of that first school of Eden will be found in the school of the future
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life. No tree of knowledge of good and evil will afford opportunity
for temptation. No tempter is there, no possibility of wrong. Every
character has withstood the testing of evil, and none are longer
susceptible to its power.
“To him who overcomes,” Christ says, “I will give to eat from the
tree of life, which is in the midst of the Paradise of God.”
Revelation
2:7
. The gift of the tree of life in Eden was conditional, and it was
finally withdrawn. But the gifts of the future life are absolute and
eternal. The prophet sees the “river of water of life, clear as crystal,
proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb.” “And on this
side of the river and on that was the tree of life.” And “there shall be
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