Is Christ in Heaven Building Our Mansions?

“In my Father’s house are many abodes (KJV, mansions)¸ if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you.” (John 14:2)

Recently a  subscriber, commenting on my previous post, “Heaven or the New Jerusalem is there a difference?” asked “Is Jesus not the Carpenter? I heard that He is in heaven building our mansions.”

In this post we’ll consider our readers question of whether Jesus went to heaven to build us heavenly mansions. We’ll consider according to the Scriptures, where Jesus went and what His going and returning was to produce.

“Mansions” or “Abodes” in the Father’s House?

In response to his question, I can say that our dear Lord Jesus is surely a builder, for in Matthew 16:18, He promised to build His church. But the thought that He is “in heaven building our mansions,” though comforting as it may seem, is a misunderstanding due to an archaic translation of John 14:2, “In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you”(KJV).  The Greek word translated “mansions” in this verse is actually the word for “abodes” (µονή, pronounced “monee”) and is the same word as in John 14:23 where the Lord Jesus said,

“If anyone loves Me, he will keep my word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make an abode with him.”

An “abode” with the Father and the Son is not something we have to wait for until we die. Rather, it is a mutual abode that we can enjoy today in the resurrection life of Christ.

Physically, what can abide in you and at the same time you abide in it? The most simple response is “air.” You are in the air and the air is in you. Well, our wonderful Christ, after making the promise of John 14:2,  passed through the process of death and resurrection to become a life-giving Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45).

“So also it is written, “The first man Adam, became a living soul;” the last Adam became a life-giving Spirit.”(1 Cor. 15:45)

Since Christ is now the life-giving Spirit in resurrection, we can be in Him and He also can be in us, like the air. This is the base for the mutual abiding referred to by the Lord Jesus in John 15:4,

“Abide in Me and I in you. As a branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me.” (John 15:4)

“Going” in Death and “Coming Again” in Resurrection to Produce Many Abodes

First, it is important to see that Christ’s “going to prepare a place for us” in John 14:2 was not going into the heavens to build heavenly “mansions.” Rather, His “going” was into death and  His “coming again” was  in resurrection that He might build Himself into the members of His Body in resurrection. For it is only as the Spirit of Christ in His resurrection, that Christ can be in His believers (Rom. 8:9-10).

Christ’s death and resurrection has opened the way for us today to become the many abodes in the Father’s house, the members of Christ’s Body, the church (Eph. 1:23). It is based upon His death and resurrection that we can receive Christ into us by faith (John 1:12, and be put into Christ (1 Cor. 1:30).

“But as many as received Him, to them He gave the authority to become children of God, to those who believe into His name.”  John 1:12

“That if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.” (Rom. 10:9)

When we believe in God’s great work of raising Christ from the dead, confessing that Jesus is Lord, we are immediately saved, and receive Christ into our deepest part, our spirit (2 Tim. 4:22; Rom. 8:10). Thus Christ enters us to abide in us.  Not only so, but when we believed into  Christ, God transferred us out of Adam and into Christ,

“But of Him [God] you are in Christ Jesus, who became wisdom to us from God: both righteousness and sanctification and redemption.” (1 Cor. 1:30)

What a wondrous fact that as believers, we are in Christ and Christ is in us!

In John 14,  we can see Christ telling His disciples that He was going into death (v. 2) and “coming  again” in resurrection to receive us to Himself, so that where He is ( in the Father) we might be also (v. 3). This is so that we might abide in Him and He might abide in us (v. 20):

“In that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.” (John 14:20)

In John 15, based on the Lord’s process in John 14,  we can enjoy the present and practical abiding in Him today:

“Abide in Me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the vine; you are the branches. He who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit; for apart from Me you can do nothing.” (John 15:4-5)

What true believer would deny that for us to abide in Christ as the vine and the branches in John 15 is something in the present tense, an abiding in Him in this age? However, the base for us to abide in Him today is the fact of  His “going” in death and His “coming again” in resurrection that we can have this mutual abode with Christ and the Father in John 14:20.

As we are loving the Lord, keeping His word (14:23),  abiding in Him and His words abiding in us (15:7), we are living in the reality of the mutual abiding today.

In my last post, I reflected on the distinction between “heaven” and the “New Jerusalem.” In this post, I have contrasted “heavenly mansions” with” mutual abodes.” Here again, I would say that it is a difference between “going” and “becoming,” that is, becoming a mutual abode, instead of going to a heavenly mansion. May none of the Lord’s children be deprived of  the most wonderful experience of a present, spiritual union with Christ, waiting for a  future, physical mansion in heaven. It is only as we are living in the reality of our mutual abiding with Christ today, that we can be built into the New Jerusalem as the mutual dwelling of God and His redeemed for eternity.