The term room is cozy and intimate. The terms house or estate suggest spaciousness. That’s Heaven: a place both spacious and intimate. Some of us enjoy coziness, being in a private space. Others enjoy a large, wide-open space. Most of us enjoy both—and the New Earth will offer both.

Heaven isn’t likely to have lots of identical residences. God loves diversity, and he tailor-makes his children and his provisions for them. When we see the particular place he’s prepared for us—not just for mankind in general but for us in particular—we’ll rejoice to see our ideal home.2

C. S. Lewis agrees: “Your place in heaven will seem to be made for you and you alone, because you were made for it—made for it stitch by stitch as a glove is made for a hand.”3

In Charlotte Brontë’s novel Jane Eyre, the lonely heroine has never lived in a place she could call home. She has never had a person in her life who loved her enough to know who she truly was until she established a relationship with her employer, Edward Rochester, a relationship that developed into love. When she had to leave for a few weeks to see a dying relative, he didn’t want her to leave, fearing she would not return. She replied, “Wherever you are is my home.” When you love someone, you want to be with that person. In fact, you never want to be separated. In the forty-nine years that we have been married, Donna and I have been apart from each other very few times, and now that our children are grown and have their own families, we travel everywhere together and are hardly ever apart. Here’s the unvarnished truth: I love her and I want to be with her. Wherever she is, is my home.

And that’s the message Jesus was communicating to His disciples in John 14. As you read the lengthy discourse in the Upper Room, you can’t help but notice the intimacy with which Jesus addresses His closest friends, even as His appointment on Calvary draws near. Jesus is telling us He loves us, and that the time will come when we will never be apart. Wherever He is, is our home.

In heaven we are going to be with Jesus forever and we will never be separated. When I began to think about this concept, I started to notice how often the New Testament talked about the importance of our being with Him.

For example, after Jesus explained to His disciples about the rooms in heaven, he said: “If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also” (John 14:3; italics added).

Another example occurred on the cross, where Jesus comforted a thief beside Him: “Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise” (Luke 23:43; italics added).