Where is jesus?

Where Is Jesus?   Is He in Paradise,  in Heaven with God, or Possibly Both?

Jesus ascended "into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God" (Mark 16:19). Several Scriptures substantiate the same truth (Luke 22:69; Romans 8:34; Ephesians 1:20; Colossians 3:1; Hebrews 8:1; 10:12; 1 Peter 3:22). Paradise and Heaven are two distinct, different places. When Christ revealed Himself to Mary (after His Resurrection), He admonished her, "Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father" (John 20:17). Ecclesiastes 5:2 says, "God is in heaven." 

After Christ's death on the Cross, He was "in paradise" for three days and three nights (Luke 23:43). When He spoke to Mary, He had been to Paradise, but not to Heaven. The question is, if Jesus is in Heaven, and when a saint dies, he goes to Paradise (a separate, distinct place), how is it possible that saved one is "with Christ" (Philippians 1:23)?

Christ is part of the Triune Godhead—God the Son—but He is nonetheless God. Hebrews 1:8, quoting Psalm 45:6, says, "But unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever." Here, He is clearly denoted as "God" and, as such, has all the divine qualities of God. One quality is omnipresence, the ability of being everywhere present. But there is a deeper truth portrayed in this reality. In His divine person and presence, there is a unity of things divine. 

In John 3:13, Jesus (speaking to Nicodemus) said, "And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven." Jesus was on the earth, speaking to Nicodemus, yet said He was "in heaven." In Ephesians 1:20, the divine penman wrote concerning Christ, "When he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places." The "heavenly places" are a spiritual position we occupy as well, for Ephesians 2:6 says, "And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus." 
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In Revelation 1:13, Jesus is portrayed as being "in the midst of the seven candlesticks [representing the church; Revelation 1:20]." In His divine personage and divine quality of omnipresence, He has the ability of being "in heaven," "in heavenly places," and "in the midst of" the church. Ephesians 1:10 tells us, "That in the dispensation of the fulness of times [this New Testament dispensation] he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him." 

Knowing that He has gathered "together in one all things in Christ," that He has a presence "in heaven," and when the saved "depart," they are "with Christ" reveals that Jesus has a presence in Paradise as well.

Earl R. Borders

From the  May 2024 issue of The Gospel Trumpeter