Darkness , then light, the two earths...

but there are three heavens...

So here is the place where St Paul identifies the paradise of God with the third heaven ... but you really should have read this for yourself , else you will come back to telling me that I said it, whereas it is the scripture that says it, not me :-

2 Corinthians 12:2 I knew a man in Christ above fourteen years ago, (whether in the body, I cannot tell; or whether out of the body, I cannot tell: God knoweth) such an one caught up to the third heaven.
...4 How that he was caught up into paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter.

Again we can see that paradise is the same as the 'garden' in another passage because both contai the access to the tree of life [immortality] :-

Revelation 2:7 ... To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God.

Genesis 2:9 ... the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

Thus we find Adam is TAKEN to the 'garden' , it is not on earth , but is the third heaven, the final rest in the spirit pictured in holy sabbath of God, the sign set upon Israel for all time , because God has said they will be the first redeemed, his holy priesthood of kings, a holy nation of priests , a kingdom of priests... but very clearly they have never been so in this earth to date, and vet clearly Jesus is not yet king [Messiah, Christ] of all Israel yet, many Jews for instance do not accept him as their king yet ...

But Jesus never said his kingdom is of THIS earth, the king-priests will rule on earth [Revelation 5:10] but not this earth :-

John 18:36 Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world:

Thus the kingdom of God here is ONLY in the hearts and minds of the very few saints alive at any one time here [perhaps on average just some two thousand of the 144,000 can be alive at any one time as God will not allow them to all be killed off, despite the many attempts to do so by Satan throughout history since Jesus' death , including the total destruction of the seven holy churches of God , long in ruins , never again holding a congregation of saints]

Exodus 19:6 And ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation. These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel.

The kingdom then is established by means of first redeeming a remnant of Israel , then all Israel [ since many of Israel also died sinners and cannot live until the resurrection of the unjust, the second resurrection]

Romans 11:26 And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob:

Jacob is the original name of Israel, God renamed him when He placed His name upon him as the father of the holy nation of royal priests destined , predestinated, elected, chosen, for His kingdom ...

not by merit though, they were/are all sinners until God baptises them to know all his truth [John 16:13] and so be able to defeat Satan in temptation and thus cease from all sin... and God's baptism is thus by grace, before repentance , in this earth, but only of the few He requires as priests and kings now,... the firstfruits , the few who find the narrow strait way , the 144,000 saints

Jude 1:14 And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints

Note the new covenant is only with yet-divided Israel, and that the Jews are only one of the Houses [kingdoms] of divided Israel, the House of Israel has lived for three millenia amongst gentiles, living as gentiles, they were scattered by God amongst all nations but did not have Judaism to hold them together as a scattered people, they lost their identity and continued worshipping idols, unlike the Jews

Thus even by the time of Jesus , the House of Israel already thought of themselves as gentiles and were certainly rejected by the Jews... but Jesus says that he was sent ONLY to them , amongst the gentile nations...

Matthew 15:24 But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

Again he sends his disciples to the lost House of Israel, not to the Jews , not to the masses of the gentiles.... only Paul has the task given him of explaining about Israel to the gentiles... but the Romans decided they would rather destroy the old religion of the Hebrew saints and take the name of 'christianity' for their own paganised version, invent sinner priests in place of the saints and Jesus , and control the otherwise dangerous spread of the religion in order to keep control of the people by means of force of arms and the law of the pagan emperor through making non-Hebrew christianity the norm in the world.... it worked, just as Jesus said it would, except in the few saints, many of whom died, fed to lions to amuse the crowds of Romans, or crucified , like St Peter was in Rome [who then pretended that he gave them powers he never even had]

thus the religion of this earth was given into Satan's hands by God , except for the few whom God retains as His by means of grace, not merit, simply because He has said who will be His priests, put His very name on the line that Israel will be the first redeemed so that they can minister to the billions redeemed in the kingdom come on the new earth...

But men in the new earth kingdom still have to follow Jesus, after being freed from sin in death and the second resurrection they still require spirit baptism and perfection of their love in trial ...

Thus Satan is also released at the second resurrection [Revelation 20:3] to tempt the nations and the great battle of Armageddon ensues because he still decieves many:-

Rev 20:7 And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison,
8 And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle: the number of whom is as the sand of the sea.

God however continues the steady irreversible removal of men from Satan's grasp , men stream into New Jerusalem to become saints and be redeemed at judgement day ...

and so the new earth kingdom is the the resounding success in redemption that God has planned for , the many of Rev 7:9-10 are saved simply through god's freeing them from sin in death at or before the end of this world, through destruction they are free of sin and God promises them baptism of the spirit [Joel 2:28] to be able to resist Satan's temptations once they are alive again to receive it ...

and men thus live righteously in the new earth, countless many being redeemed at judgement day by works, not grace as in this earth (though grace causes works of course, else faith is dead] :-

Revelation 20:13 And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works.

2 Peter 3:13 Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.

There is much more of course in scripture, I cannot present it all here ... obviously the scripture is for reading with God, I can perhaps only 'whet the appetite' to get to reading and praying and meditating instead of finding other things to do in this world which are but vanity :-

Ecclesiastes 2:17 Therefore I hated life; because the work that is wrought under the sun is grievous unto me: for all is vanity and vexation of spirit.

Reading scripture, praying and meditating, enjoying the blessings of holy sabbath [from sunset to sunset in Jerusalem, absolute time, not the 'time' men changed things to for sinners] , it becomes a pleasure because one hates the world ... whereas for sinners they treat 'religion' as a necessary chore , little realising that religion of sinners cannot save anyone from anything except from the truth of God and from becoming loving, ceasing from sin...

The third heaven is timeless immortality of the spirit, the final rest with God as one being, one life immortal, but the two earths are real physical earths in which men have bodies moved by their spirit to do good or evil... just as God requires for His purpose in creating them

Lamentations 3:38 Out of the mouth of the most High proceedeth not evil and good?

Men will not understand how God issues evil from his mouth though , so how could they understand that the first earth is the darkness of night whereas the second earth is the light of day, still less that darkness and light BOTH serve God's purpose ad are alike to Him for that reason, although completely opposite in nature :-

Psalms 139:12 Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee.

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