Good morning. My name is Matthew Capone and I'm one of the pastors here at Cheyenne Mountain Presbyterian Church.
And it's my joy to bring God's word to you this morning.
We're continuing together our series in the book of Romans.
And you'll remember that Romans is a letter written by the Apostle Paul in the 50s AD.
And it's called Romans because it is written to the churches in the city of Rome.
And it is about the gospel. It's about the good news of Jesus' life and death and resurrection.
And we're continuing along in chapter 8, which is about life in the Spirit.
That is the Holy Spirit.
Last week, verses 14 through 17, we began to look at all the benefits that come to us from the Holy Spirit.
And we saw that we are adopted as God's children, God's heirs.
But then we ended with a little bit of a catch.
Verse 17 said this.
So that's great that we experience glory, but first, suffering.
So our question this week, and this is what Paul sets out to answer in verse 18.
Okay, there is glory coming.
How do we make it through the suffering in the meantime?
We do have glory to look forward to.
How do we walk through suffering now?
So with that, I invite you to turn with me to Romans chapter 8, verse 18.
And you can find that on page 7 of your worship guide.
Remember as we come to this that this is God's word.
Proverbs chapter 30 tells us every word of God proves true.
It's a shield to those who take refuge in him.
So that's why we read now Romans chapter 8, verse 18.
For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.
I invite you to pray with me as we come to this portion of God's word.
Our Father in heaven, we do again thank you and praise you for gathering us together as your people.
We thank you for giving us your word that you instruct us and guide us.
And we ask for your help, the help of your Holy Spirit this morning, that we would be able to understand and believe your words.
I am certainly not powerful enough to fix our eyes on heaven.
And so I ask that you would do that by your Holy Spirit.
I ask that you would give ordinary words that provide us with extraordinary vision.
A vision of the future that you were preparing for us, your people.
We ask all of these things in the mighty name of Jesus Christ.
Amen.
I, as some of you know, bought the house that I'm in back in 2019.
And when I walked into the house with my realtor for the first time,
what she really wanted to point out to me right away is how terrible the kitchen floors were.
It's kind of this laminate thing and some of the corners on the different laminate strips are peeling up a little bit.
And she said, well, that's because the current homeowners have used too much water to clean the kitchen floor.
Later had a handyman who came in and said, no, actually the problem is these are the wrong kind of floors for a kitchen.
They're actually not supposed to have contact with water.
But the flooring worked, right?
It's functional.
It's not urgent.
No one's going to die.
And so it took me six years.
Last year, I finally replaced the flooring with LVP.
So I have this nice vinyl in there.
And every time I make an investment like that in my house, I think, well, I guess I'm not selling anytime soon.
I actually replaced a couple toilets last year.
Not that I had to.
Again, it wasn't urgent.
They had not failed.
They were just really annoying me and I wanted to get rid of them.
I thought, well, I guess I'm not moving.
If I want to get my money out of these toilets, I got to stick around.
I got to hang on.
The previous owner of my house actually made a mistake in that area less than a year before he sold it to me.
He said yes to a door-to-door salesman and installed solar panels.
And I did not pay anything extra for the house because of the solar panels.
I got them basically for free.
Thank you, seller.
The point that I'm driving home here is this.
Whatever we believe about the future determines our actions in the present.
Whatever we believe about the future, that is almost the most important thing.
That is what Paul is banking on here in verse 18.
I've already pointed out we're coming off of verse 17 where he says suffering, then glory.
Okay, that's great.
The glory is coming, but the suffering is first.
How do we make it?
How do we hang on?
How do we hold on till the glory comes?
And Paul is simply telling us we hang on, we hold on by remembering the greatness of the future glory.
It is what we believe about the future that allows us to persevere in the present.
That's what he's saying here in verse 18.
The sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.
So this morning we're going to look at two questions very simply to structure our time together.
Question one, what is the glory?
Question two, why is it so much better?
What is the glory?
Why is it so much better?
First, what is the glory?
What in the world is Paul talking about?
Paul here is referring to the end of the story of this world.
When Paul talks about glory, he is telling us what the last chapter of life on this earth will be.
This is something the Bible explains for us in places like Matthew chapter 25, John chapter 5, Revelation chapters 21 and 22.
It says, hey, here's the last chapter, here's what it's going to look like.
And I'm going to tell you kind of very briefly what that story is.
In the last chapter, Jesus, in his physical body, returns to the earth.
So we refer to it as Jesus' second coming.
His first coming, we celebrate at Christmas.
His second coming, we look forward to now.
So Jesus is going to return to the earth in his second coming.
At that time, there will be a resurrection from the dead.
Everyone who has ever died will be raised to life.
John chapter 5, Jesus tells this to us explicitly.
He says there's actually going to be two resurrections.
There will be the resurrection of life and the resurrection of judgment.
Okay?
Resurrection of life is for those who have followed Jesus in faith.
They're going to have life with God forever.
Those who have not followed Jesus are going to experience the resurrection of judgment.
They will live forever apart from God in hell.
So there will be eternal separation and everlasting torment.
That's the end of the story.
Jesus returns, second coming, resurrection of life, resurrection of judgment.
Those are the events.
However, we also want to know, we need to know about the place.
What is heaven?
What exactly are we talking about?
Many people, of course, think about angels playing harps.
Whether they will or will not is probably neither here nor there.
Some people refer to it as heaven.
Revelation chapter 21 calls it a new heaven and a new earth.
Very briefly, the new heaven and the new earth is a real physical place.
It is like this earth, but surprise, new and better, even better than Eden.
So whatever good thing you have loved, experienced here on earth in heaven, it will be greater and better.
All sin, sickness, disease, pain, sorrow, suffering will be done away with.
Most importantly, we will finally be in God's presence.
By the way, that's how some people define heaven.
What is heaven?
Heaven is when we are fully in God's presence.
That's why we read from Psalm 16 this morning.
This is on page three of your worship guide.
Near the end of the psalm, the psalmist says,
In your presence, there is fullness of joy.
It's the psalmist's way of saying, the greatest things are with God.
So two questions.
What is the glory?
The glory is the physical world made new with all who have followed Christ in God's presence.
There's no more sin.
There's no more suffering.
And there is full joy.
That's our first question.
Second question.
Why is it so much better?
We might ask it a different way.
What does that full joy actually look like?
Now, I slowed us down for an entire sermon on one verse so we would not be rushed as we're talking about heaven.
And I can still only say something, not everything.
In fact, coming up against heaven, even with a full sermon, I feel inadequate.
We're just going to scratch the surface a little bit.
I'm going to give you a few things to meditate on about our heavenly future.
Why it is that this is a future that allows us to persevere in the present.
Okay.
First, we've talked about this many, many times.
The heavenly future includes a new body.
So much of our trouble in this life, so much of our pain and suffering comes from the problems of our physical bodies.
Right?
Bodies aren't working right.
As we get old, they start to fall apart on us.
We're told that in heaven, and Paul talks about this in 1 Corinthians chapter 15, by the way, if you want to read more about it.
We are going to have a new body that has no disease, no sickness, no decay, no pain, no suffering.
So the future glory that you're looking forward to will include no cancer, no allergies.
You will not have a deviated septum.
You will not break your hips.
Your body will not fall apart.
And by the way, it better not, because forever is a really long time.
So I'm hoping the body works.
I know it will.
So that's the new body.
I'm not going to spend a ton of time talking about that,
because we have discussed that many times over the last number of years.
The other thing we're going to have is what I would call perfect connection.
You might call this perfect love, and I'll explain what I mean by that.
In fact, we're going to spend the most amount of time this morning talking about this aspect of it,
and there's a reason that I'll explain to you.
So there's a famous quote by a man named Bruce Marshall,
and he says this,
The young man who rings the bell at the brothel is unconsciously looking for God.
And when I heard that quote as a much younger person, I thought,
you know, that doesn't really make sense.
That sounds to me like we're really over-spiritualizing things.
You know, someone's knocking on the door of a brothel.
What are they looking for?
They're looking for sex.
They're not looking for God.
As I've gotten older, a bit older, I kind of understand what he means by this quote.
And what he means is this.
That young man is looking for deep and intense connection.
He's looking for love.
He's looking for belonging.
He's looking to know and to be known.
He's looking to be accepted.
He's looking for the end of shame.
He's looking for true joy.
In other words, that man at the door is looking for things that he can only fully have in God's presence.
He is looking for what only God can provide.
Remember Psalm 16.
In your presence, there is fullness of joy.
When we talk about heaven, people often like to think about the things or the experiences that they will get in heaven.
And that is good and right.
But if we only think about things and experiences, we have lost the plot.
The most important thing about heaven is that God is there.
The most glorious thing about heaven is God's presence fully and finally.
Remember the covenant in the Old Testament, God's promise.
He says, I will be your God.
You will be mine.
The fact that we're heirs of God, and that includes, it means God himself is part of our inheritance.
Being with him is what it is that we look forward to.
In the Old Testament, as God's people were traveling around, they had the tabernacle,
and the placement of the tabernacle was extremely important.
It was in the middle.
And all the tribes were camped out on the sides of it, which is God's way of teaching his people in the Old Testament
that he and his presence would be in the midst of them.
That was the greatest thing he could give them.
The giver is the source of all the gifts.
The giver is greater than all the gifts.
Heaven, glory, is great because God, the giver of all the gifts, is there.
Whatever beauty you love, God is the one who made it.
And so whatever beauty you long for and chase after, God's beauty is greater still.
Whatever love and acceptance and connection and belonging that you long for,
it will never be as great as the acceptance and belonging and connection that you have with God.
In heaven.
Whatever healing it is that you are looking for and working towards,
it will never be complete in this life.
You will not be fully healed in your body, your heart, or your mind
until you are in God's presence in heaven.
We will be like him, the Bible tells us, because we will see him as he is.
It is God's presence that makes heaven heaven.
And so that's why I spend the most time on this as we think about the future glory,
because this is the biggest piece of the plot.
This is the most important thing that we're going to be with God himself.
We said earlier, what we believe about the future determines how we live in the present,
and it is our future experience of God and his love,
what theologians would say is unmediated love,
that gives us hope in the midst of our suffering now.
You can have hope in the face of devastating loss.
If you experience divorce or the death of a spouse,
and I don't mean to minimize that in any way.
Those are the sorts of things that in the wake of them,
it can feel hard even to breathe, right?
The grief is so great.
But the connection, the intimacy, and the relationship
that you will experience with God in heaven
is not even worth comparing.
If you are following God in obedience,
living out the Christian sexual ethic,
you might think, oh man, I'm missing out.
No, you're not missing out.
You will experience something far better in the world to come.
Something so much better that it is not even worth experiencing,
comparing.
Something that no one in this world has yet to know.
All those other things in life,
all the good pleasures and gifts that come from God,
those are all appetizers of what is to come.
There is something better than anything
that you have given up in this world
to follow after Jesus Christ.
If you give something up,
you are saying no to a tiny, tiny appetizer.
You will not miss the meal.
You will not miss the feast that it points forward to.
If you remain single,
because you are committed only to marrying another Christian,
you have a greater and larger hope than marriage.
There is something bigger than marriage to look forward to.
Something far greater to replace it.
Something that it is not worth comparing anything on this earth with.
It's not just relational loss that will be eclipsed in the world to come,
but also relational problems of this life done away with.
I want you to think of whoever it is in this church
that you get along with the least.
And if you're honest, right,
we all have different personalities.
Some of us get on each other's nerves.
Maybe you're in a conflict with them right now.
When you are in heaven,
the two of you will be little buddies.
All the problems that get in our way now,
those things will be swept away, right?
All our sin will be removed.
If your friend is a Christian,
you will have a future with them without friction.
By the way, we can say the same thing about your marriage.
If you're a Christian and your spouse is a Christian,
when will every conflict end?
It will end in glory.
You will enjoy one another without sin,
every relational problem removed.
Whatever happens in this life,
that's the future you're headed towards.
Heaven will be perfect connection.
It will be perfect love.
And it will be that way
because God himself will be there.
So we talked briefly about the new body.
Talked extensively about perfect connection
or perfect love.
I'm gonna talk for a little bit about one more thing,
which is real treasure.
Remember, Paul in verse 17
is focusing in on suffering
that comes because you are a follower of Jesus.
Last week, we looked at 2 Timothy 3,
which says,
all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus
will be persecuted.
And as you follow Christ in this life,
you will lose all sorts of things.
Maybe you'll lose money.
You'll almost certainly lose social status or connections.
Might be a hit to your reputation.
You might miss out on opportunities
that you would have if you weren't a Christian.
And you know what?
You know what?
In heaven,
none of that will matter.
Not a single bit of it.
And
you can't take it with you anyway.
None of those things
are things you can drag with you
into the next world.
And all of those things
are susceptible
to theft
and loss
and decay.
That's why Jesus says,
you know,
don't store up treasure
on earth
where moth and rust destroy
and where thieves
break in
and steal.
But there is a place
where moth and rust
do not destroy
and where thieves
do not break in
and steal.
And that place
is called
heaven.
Peter,
in his letter,
1 Peter,
tells us
that we have an inheritance
that is imperishable,
undefiled,
and unfading.
Kept
in heaven
for you.
In other words,
no matter
what losses
you experience
on this earth
or in this life,
it has no effect
on your inheritance
in heaven.
There are things
that no lawsuit,
no breakup,
no surprise,
no health crisis
can touch.
There are things
in heaven
for you
that are secure
no matter what.
No matter what
happens now,
your inheritance,
what is waiting
for you in heaven,
cannot be touched.
No matter what
is shaken
in this world,
it cannot be reduced.
Whatever you lose
now
pales
in comparison
to what you
cannot
lose.
In fact,
we could say,
as Paul does,
it's not
even worth
comparing.
It's often said
that a regular
person
living today
in 2026
is better off
than the most
powerful person
in the world
500 years ago.
Most powerful
person in the world
500 years ago
had no running
water.
They did not
have antibiotics.
They had no
indoor plumbing.
That person
cannot imagine
the life
you live now.
They cannot
imagine the
benefits
that we
experience.
We might say
it's not even
worth comparing.
Heaven
will be
like that.
it will
blow away
the experience
of the
greatest,
most powerful
person in
this world.
Some people
think that
Elon Musk
is going to
be the
world's
first
trillionaire
within the
next number
of years.
The things
that are
waiting for
you in
heaven
are greater
than anything
Elon Musk
can imagine.
it's like
comparing
someone
500 years
ago
to someone
today
except
even more
stark,
even greater,
even more
exponential.
Being in
heaven is like
that.
There are
things about
it that we
cannot right
now imagine.
I've given
you these
tasty samples
of what
heaven includes.
You'll notice
though that
Paul actually
doesn't do
that.
Verse 18,
he just
says,
look,
it's going
to be so
great it
won't even
be worth
comparing.
There's
things right
now that
your mind
can't
comprehend,
that your
head would
explode if
you heard
about how
glorious
heaven will
be.
That's
what it
is,
Christian,
that you
have to look
forward to.
No matter
the sufferings
you experience
in this
world,
don't trade
anything for
it.
No matter
what trouble
you come
up against,
do not
give up
your faith
in Christ
because
nothing is
worth trading
for that.
A few
years ago,
I was
meeting with
a Christian
counselor and
I had made
a breakthrough
about how
to manage
some of the
suffering that
I had
experienced in
my own
life and I
said to
him,
man,
I wish
that I
had discovered
this 10
to 15
years ago.
I could
have skipped
the last
10 to 15
years of
pain over
this issue
if I had
known this
so much
earlier.
And he
looked at
me and
he said,
Matthew,
you're still
young.
Which is
his way of
saying,
yeah,
that's great.
You would
have loved
to know
this 10
or 15
years ago.
And you
know what?
You now
know it
for the
rest of
your life.
And you
have hopefully
more than
10 to 15
years ahead
of you,
right?
You have
so much
time to
now put
this to
work in
your life.
If you
are a
Christian,
no matter
your age,
you are
still
young.
The life
that is
ahead of
you,
with God
forever in
heaven,
is so
much
greater
and longer
and farther
than anything
you've
experienced
now.
every loss
in this
life
pales in
comparison
and it
is a
small
dot.
It's a
small dot
on the
page
of
everything
that's
ahead.
No matter
what suffering
you have
walked through,
if you're
95 years
old,
you are
still
young.
if you're
in Christ.
You might
think of
this or
that loss
or mistake
and think,
man,
it's all
over.
Don't
lose heart.
Don't
give up.
Your
inheritance
is coming.
It
cannot
be
touched.
It's
undefiled,
imperishable,
unfading,
kept
in
heaven
for you.
There's
an important
prepositional
phrase here,
verse 18.
Paul says,
the glory
that is to
be revealed
to us.
Paul's
telling us
there's a
limit,
right?
He's not
saying the
glory that
will be
revealed to
everyone in
the world.
No,
he's saying
the glory
that's going
to be
revealed to
those who
have faith
in Jesus
Christ.
In other
words,
I'll state
it negatively.
If you
are not
a Christian,
if you
are not
following
after Jesus
in faith,
this promise
is not
for you.
Remember,
resurrection
of life,
resurrection
of judgment.
Last week,
we talked
about how
we're adopted,
we're heirs
of Christ,
heirs of
God,
co-heirs
of Christ,
because of
what Jesus
did for
us.
Of course,
if you're
not following
after Jesus
in faith,
you're still
alive.
It's not
too late.
It's not
too late
to repent
of your
sins,
to admit,
hey,
I actually
live a
life that
has separated
me from
God,
that I
deserve his
punishment
and his
judgment,
and it's
not too
late to
turn to
Christ,
to accept
the perfect
life that
he lived
on your
behalf,
to trust
in the
death he
took that
you deserved.
Heaven can
also be your
inheritance.
You can be
adopted,
you can be
a son and
heir of
God,
because of
what Jesus
did,
what Jesus
did in
his life,
and his
death,
and his
resurrection.
You know,
sometimes when
you read a
movie review,
and especially
if it's a
recent release,
there will be
a warning at
the top,
and what
does it
say?
spoiler alert,
right?
Which is to
say, we're
going to give
away some
really important
plot points.
So if you
don't want to
know how the
movie ends,
if you want
to be
surprised,
do not
read this
article.
Now, some
people would,
you know,
close the
review immediately,
right?
Other people
would say,
yes, this is
what I want.
I've told you
before, my
mom likes to
know spoilers,
in fact, so
much so that
there's times
when she cannot
enjoy a book
unless she has
already read
the last
chapter.
Like, so
know what's
happening in
the last chapter
so she can
enjoy the rest
of the book,
right?
She knows how
it ends,
and so all
stress and
tension is
dissolved,
and she can
just kind of
follow along
and know
that it's all
going to be
okay.
When I was
growing up,
sometimes we'd
be watching a
movie, my
mom would run
over to the
computer while
we're watching
it to look up
how the movie
ends, okay?
that's the
Christian life.
God has told
us the last
chapter.
He has given
us the spoiler.
He has
explained to
us how it
all ends so
that we can
follow him in
faith,
persevering no
matter what
comes.
all the
tension has
been removed,
right?
You can enjoy
the story.
You know how
it ends.
Come ye
disconsolate,
where ye
languish.
Come to the
mercy seat,
fervently
kneel.
Here bring
your wounded
hearts,
here tell
your anguish.
Earth has
no sorrows
that heaven
cannot
heal.
Let's pray.
Our Father
in heaven,
we do
praise you
and thank you
again for the
hope of glory,
the hope of
heaven.
We ask that
you would
keep our
eyes fixed
on the right
horizon line,
that you
would pull
us away
from the
many
distractions
and trinkets
that tempt
us,
and instead
you would
set our
eyes on
Jesus Christ,
that we
would live
our life
looking forward
to our future
with him.
We ask all
of these things
in his mighty
name.
Amen.
Thank you.