Hebrews 2:5 “For He has not put the world to come… in subjection to angels.“

What is this world to come…a world not in subjection to angels, but to humans?

Psalms 8:6 says that man was set over the works of God’s hands, And all things were put in subjection under his feet. The book of Hebrews repeats this statement in Hebrews 2:6-8. Because of the sin of Adam, men lost that exalted position over the earth. But God had a rescue in mind, a plan to restore man to his original position as ruler over the earth.

Its so easy for self-centered humans to only see their life and its immediate surroundings. From birth, men and women learn to concern themselves with themselves, their own needs, their own survival. The longer I study the bible, the more I begin to get a bird’s eye view from Heaven, a revelation of the mind of God as I encounter His viewpoint in the bible. I receive a continually unfolding view of His plan from past ages, and an unfolding view of the future that He has planned for all of us. It’s like your whole focus changes and you no longer concentrate on just your own little life and how everything affects you, but begin to see the purposes of God from all eternity, what His plan was in the beginning before man sinned, how He planned to rescue us from the works of the devil and all the patience and sacrifice He exercised in bringing that to pass. You receive light on the plan He has for your own life, what He planned before the world began for you personally, You begin to discover this plan through the gifts and talents and interests that you have. Those point to your place in the present age.

Through the revelation of the Holy Spirit which has been given to the born again person, knowing God is now available on a plane never experienced before. 1 Peter 1:10-12 talks about a salvation that even angels desired to look into. Through a continual daily relationship with Him, God gives us understanding of His kingdom and His plans. Granted, I might only have a smidgeon of it, but each revelation of Him works to perfect the picture that is the puzzle of this life until the last piece of it goes into place. A friend used to tell me that God is VAST….

The plane of time that we currently live in is not all there is to life…the scriptures give us glimpses here and there of future ages, of a time when the wolf and the lamb will graze together (Isaiah 11:6) and the lion will eat straw like an ox (see Isaiah 66:25). It will be a time when a person 100 years old will be considered a child (Isaiah 65:20). This sounds like a wonderful time! It sounds like Heaven!

Paul, in speaking to the Corinthians about a matter in the Church assembly that they needed to attend to, said in 1 Corinthians 6:2-3 “Do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world will be judged by you, are you unworthy to judge the smallest matters? Do you not know that we shall judge angels? How much more, things that pertain to this life?”

This verse refers to the future time or age when the Church, the heirs of the kingdom, will judge the world alongside of Jesus to Whom all judgment has been committed (John 5:22). We are in training for that time while we live here on the earth. Ephesians 2:6 says He has already elevated us and made us sit together with Him in the heavenly places. We don’t judge people per se, but we are to judge sin. We are to pray for and assist those caught in sinful actions, but we do not hate them. We love the person and hate the sin which will destroy their lives. We are to love people who are still deceived by sin, but Paul does call the Church to judge sin in the Church. Read those verses in 1 Corinthians 5 and 6; then go to 2 Corinthians 2:6-8 where Paul instructs the Church to restore the same man from 1 Corinthians. The Church is to uphold the standard of God, but to do it in love and mercy and with the goal of restoring the person.

The born again people of God have much to look forward to, both now and in eternity!