Will we know each other in heaven?

386–429 · Evodius of Uzalis, Letters 158.7

It seems to me also, that if the soul while occupying the living body is capable, as I have said, of strenuous mental application, how much more unencumbered, active, vigorous, earnest, resolute, and persevering will it be, how much enlarged in capacity and improved in character, if it has while in this body learned to relish virtue! For after laying aside this body, or rather, after having this cloud swept away, the soul will have come to be free from all disturbing influences, enjoying tranquillity and exempt from temptation, seeing whatever it has longed for, and embracing what it has loved. Then, also, it will be capable of remembering and recognising friends, both those who went before it from this world, and those whom it left here below.

1261–1264 · Thomas Aquinas, Of God and His Creatures: An Annotated Translation (With some Abridgement) of the Summa contra Gentiles 3.63

By that divine vision the blessed become celebrated, not before men, who may deceive and be deceived, but in the most true knowledge of God and of all their companions in bliss.

1566 · Martin Luther, Table Talk 34

We shall behold the glorious Creator face to face; and then, what ineffable satisfaction will it be to find our relations and friends among the just!

c. 1611 · Lewis Bayly, The Practice of Piety 3

Dives knew Lazarus in Abraham’s bosom (Luke xvi. 23;) much more shall the elect know one another in heaven. (6.) Christ saith that the twelve apostles shall sit upon twelve thrones (Matt. xix. 28), to judge (at that day) the twelve tribes (1 Cor. vi. 2, 3;) therefore they shall be known, and consequently the rest of the saints. (7.) Paul saith, that at that day we shall know as we are known of God (1 Cor. xiii. 11;) and Augustine out of this place comforteth a widow, assuring her, that as in this life she saw her husband with external eyes, so in the life to come she should know his heart, and what were all his thoughts and imaginations. Then, husbands and wives, look to your actions and thoughts; for all shall be made manifest one day (See 1 Cor. iv. 5.) (8.) The faithful in the Old Testament, are said to be gathered to their fathers (Gen. xxv. 35; 2 Kings xxii;) therefore the knowledge of our friends remains.

1645 · Thomas Shepard, The Sound Believer Chapter II

It is a fond, weak question, to think whether we shall know one another in heaven. Verily, you shall remember the good the Lord did you here; by what means the Lord humbled you; by what ministry the Lord called you; by what friends the Lord comforted and refreshed you: and there you shall see them with you. Do you think you shall forget the Lord and his works in heaven, which (it may be) you took little notice of, and the Lord had little glory for here?

1650 · Richard Baxter, The Saints' Everlasting Rest (abridged by Benjamin Fawcett) 11

There also is the “New Jerusalem, which is the mother of us all.” And there are multitudes of our elder brethren. There are our friends and old acquaintance, whose society in the flesh we so much delighted in, and whose departure hence we so much lamented; and is this not attractive to thy thoughts? If they were within thy reach on earth, thou wouldst go and visit them; and why not oftener visit them in spirit, and rejoice beforehand to think of meeting them there? “Socrates rejoiced that he should die, because he believed he should see Homer, Hesiod, and other eminent persons. How much more do I rejoice,” said a pious old minister, “who am sure to see Christ my Savior, the eternal Son of God, in his assumed flesh; besides so many wise, holy and renowned patriarchs, prophets, and apostles.”

1651–1677 · Thomas Manton, Works, vol. II The Blessed Estate of Them That Die in the Lord, Opened in a Sermon at the Funeral of, Sermon

When Joseph discovered himself to his brethren, ‘I am Joseph,’ it revived their hearts. When Christ shall say, I am Jesus, your brother, your Saviour, your Redeemer; when he shall lead us to God in a full troop and goodly company, and say, ‘Behold I and the little ones which thou hast given me,’ Heb. ii. 13, what a blessed sight will that be! Then the angels, what welcome will there be between you and them! When Christ entered into heaven, Ps. xxiv., they entertained him with applauses and acclamations: ‘Stand open, you doors, stand open; here is the King of glory, the Lord strong and mighty in battle.’ So will they welcome the saints to heaven with acclamations. They delight in the good of men. When man was created, ‘The morning stars sang together, and the sons of God shouted for joy,’ Job. xxxviii. 7; that is, the angels rejoiced and praised God. When Christ came to redeem man, a heavenly host fell a-praising God, Luke ii. 13, 14. When man is converted, the scripture tells there ‘is joy in heaven,’ Luke xv. 7. So when we come to be glorified, Christ shall come with troops of them to conduct us into those everlasting mansions. The saints, your acquaintance, with whom you prayed, suffered, familiarly conversed—memory is not abolished in heaven, but perfected—those whom we knew here, we shall know again. A minister shall see his crown, and the fruit of his labours: 1 Thes. ii. 19, ‘You are our crown,’ &c. And those that have been relieved by us shall welcome us into heaven, who, therefore, are said to receive us into everlasting habitations, Luke xvi. 9; yea, we shall know those whom we never saw; why else is it made a part of our privilege to sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob?

1710–1714 · Matthew Henry, Commentary on Matthew 17.1-13

Moses and Elias appeared to the disciples; they saw them, and heard them talk, and, either by their discourse or by information from Christ, they knew them to be Moses and Elias; glorified saints shall know one another in heaven.

1740 · Jonathan Edwards, The Portion of the Righteous 1

There is no reason why we should suppose that saints that have dwelt together in this world, and have showed kindness to each other, have been affectionate to each other’s true happiness, should not love one another with a love of gratitude for it in another world. There is no reason why good ministers whom God had made the instruments of salvation to others, should not have special joy in meeting their converts in heaven.

1771–1772 · George Whitefield, Selected Sermons 30

Did Peter know which was Moses and which Elias? Then I think, and God be praised for it, it is plain from this and other passages of scripture, that we shall know one another when we come to heaven. Dives knew Lazarus: “Father Abraham, send Lazarus:” And we are told, “he saw Lazarus sitting in Abraham's bosom.” Adam knew his wife Eve; though cast into a deep sleep when God made her out of his rib, yes, by a kind of intuition he says, “This is bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh.”

1834 · Albert Barnes, Notes on the Bible: 1 Thessalonians 2.20

Paul expected evidently to recognize the Thessalonian Christians at the day of judgment, for he said that they would be then his "joy and crown of rejoicing;" 1Th 2:19. But this could not be, unless he should be able to know those who had been converted by his instrumentality. If he expected then to recognize them, and to rejoice with them, then we also may hope to know our pious friends in that happy world. Nothing in the Bible forbids this hope, and we can hardly believe that God has created the strong ties which bind us to each other, to endure for the present life only. If Paul hoped to meet those who had been converted by his instrumentality, and to rejoice with them there, then the parent may hope to meet the child over whose loss he mourned; the husband and wife will meet again; the pious children of a family will be re-assembled; and the pastor and his flock will be permitted to rejoice together before the Lord. This hope, which nothing in the Bible forbids us to entertain, should do much to alleviate the sorrow of the parting pang, and may be an important and powerful inducement to draw our own thoughts to a brighter and a better world. Of many of the living it is true that the best and dearest friends which they have are already in heaven - and how should their own hearts pant that they may meet them there!

1843 · Henry Edward Manning, Sermons, Volume 1 25

“Shall there not be, beloved,” asked St. Austin, in preaching on the resurrection, “shall there not be a recognition of us all? Do ye think that ye shall recognise me then because ye know me now, and that ye shall not know my father whom ye have not known here, or the bishop who years ago ruled over this Church? Ye shall know all. They who shall be there, shall not therefore recognise each other because they shall behold his face; the mutual recognition of that place shall come from a higher knowledge. All shall see then, and much more excellently, as prophets here are wont to see. They shall see with a divine vision, when all shall be full of God.” So they believed of old, and so may we stedfastly believe now. All the saints of God shall have a transcendent and intuitive knowledge, not sought out of the memory, nor gathered from experience, nor drawn from reasonings, but by insights, and consciousness, and beatific vision. Shall we not know angels; Gabriel, who was sent of God to Nazareth; and him, too, whose name was “secret?” And shall we know the angels, and not know the saints of God?

1850 · Henry Edward Manning, Sermons, Volume 4 20

The perfect restitution which shall be in the kingdom of the resurrection will bring back, not only perfect mutual recognition, but the restoration of all pure and consecrated bonds. Shall we be told that in the kingdom of God Jacob will no more be the son of Isaac, nor Isaac the son of Abraham? that Ruth shall not be to Naomi in bliss what she was in widowhood? Shall James and John be brothers no more, nor Martha and Mary sisters? or shall not St. Joseph be the espoused husband of the ever-virgin Mother, and the Lord her Divine Son?

1855 · Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Spurgeon's Sermons, Volume 1 (1855) 39

Some people think that in heaven we shall know nobody. But our text declares here, that we “shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob.” Then I am sure that we shall be aware that they are Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob. I have heard of a good woman, who asked her husband, when she was dying, “My dear, do you think you will know me when you and I get to heaven?” “Shall I know you?” he said, “why, I have always known you while I have been here, and do you think I shall be a greater fool when I get to heaven?” I think it was a very good answer. If we have known one another here, we shall know one another there. I have dear departed friends up there, and it is always a sweet thought to me, that when I shall put my foot, as I hope I may, upon the threshold of heaven, there will come my sisters and brothers to clasp me by the hand and say, “Yes, thou loved one, and thou art here.” Dear relatives that have been separated, you will meet again in heaven. One of you has lost a mother—she is gone above; and if you follow the track of Jesus, you shall meet her there.

1856–1869 · J. C. Ryle, Expository Thoughts on the Gospels: Mark 12.18-27

The world beyond the grave is a world unseen by mortal eye, and therefore unknown. The conditions of existence there, are necessarily hidden from us, and if more were told, we would probably not understand it. Let it suffice us to know that the bodies of the saints shall be raised, and, though glorified, shall be like their bodies on earth--so like, that those who knew them once shall know them again. But though raised with a real body, the risen saint will be completely freed from everything which is now an evidence of weakness and infirmity.

1860 · Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Spurgeon's Sermons, Volume 6 (1860) 306

Personality will be maintained. I do not doubt but what you will know Isaiah in heaven, and you will recognize the great preachers of the ancient Christian church; you will be able to speak with Chrysostom, and will talk with Whitfield. It may be you shall have for your companions those who were your companions here; those with whom you took sweet counsel, and walked to the house of God, shall be with you there, and you shall know them, and with transporting joy you shall there together tell your former trials and ancient triumphs, and the glories you are alike made to share.

1869 · Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Spurgeon's Sermons, Volume 15 (1869) 887

We shall not sit down with men in iron masks and see none but great unknowns, but we shall, "know even as we are known." Doubtless even before the body rises there will be marks and peculiarities of constitution about disembodied spirits by which we shall be able to detect them and shall hold happy, intelligent communion with them. Ah, well, you gray-headed saints, your best friends have gone before you and the thought of seeing them may well make you long to be on the wing. Your dearest ones are on the other side of Jordan—they went to their heritage a long while ago—they abide in the land of the living, while you still linger in the land of the dying.

1872 · John Wesley, Sermons on Several Occasions 122

I answer plainly, I cannot tell: But I am certain that they do. This is as plainly proved from one passage of Scripture as it could be from a thousand. Did not Abraham and Lazarus know each other in hades, even afar off? even though they were fixed on different sides of the “great gulf?” Can we doubt, then, whether the souls that are together in paradise shall know one another? The Scripture, therefore, clearly decides this question.

1885 · George MacDonald, Unspoken Sermons, Second Series 7

I care little to speculate on the kind of this body; two things only I will say, as needful to be believed, concerning it: first, that it will be a body to show the same self as before—but, second, a body to show the being truly—without the defects, that is, and imperfections of the former bodily revelation. Even through their corporeal presence shall we then know our own infinitely better, and find in them endlessly more delight, than before.

1898 · Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Spurgeon's Sermons, Volume 44 (1898) 2554

And oh, my Brothers and Sisters, if you have been bereft of all your friends—if they have departed in the faith of Jesus, you shall see them again! "Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth: Yes, says the Spirit, that they may rest from their labors; and their works do follow them." But yet more blessed are they to be, "for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible," and we shall see the bodies of those we once loved on earth. Those bodies we once silently gazed upon, as they lay in all the stiffness of death, we shall see quickened and glorified!

1901 · Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Spurgeon's Sermons, Volume 47 (1901) 2729

How did Peter, and James, and John know that these two men were Moses and Elijah? They had never seen them in the flesh, yet they evidently recognized them—so, as they knew people whom they had not known on earth, I am sure that I shall know in Heaven those whom I did know here—I shall have the advantage of them in that respect. I suppose they said to each other, as soon as they saw these men, "That is Moses! That is Elijah!" Yet they had never seen them— and shall not we, when we meet our dear kindred and friends, say at once, "That is So-and-So, with whom I took sweet counsel on earth when we walked to the House of God in company"? Surely, the mutual recognition of the saints hardly needs a better support than this passage supplies!

1905–1910 · Alexander Maclaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture: John (chapters 1 to 14) 14.2

Are they to dwell isolated in their several mansions? Is that the way in which children in a home dwell with each other? Surely if He be the Father, and heaven be His house, the relation of the redeemed to one another must have in it more than all the sweet familiarity and unrestrained frankness which subsists in the families of earth. A solitary heaven would be but half a heaven, and would ill correspond with the hopes that inevitably spring from the representation of it as ‘my Father’s house.’

1907 · Augustus Hopkins Strong, Systematic Theology Part VIII. Eschatology, Or The Doctrine Of Final Things

Brotherly love in the next world implies knowing those we love, and loving those we know. We certainly shall not know less there than here. If we know our friends here, we shall know them there. And, as love to Christ here draws us nearer to each other, so there we shall love friends, not less but more, because of our greater nearness to Christ.

1908 · Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Spurgeon's Sermons, Volume 54 (1908) 3077

I trust you all firmly believe that you will recognize your friends in Heaven. I consider the doctrine of the non-recognition of our friends in Heaven a marvelously absurd one! I cannot conceive how there can be any communion of saints in Heaven unless there is mutual recognition. We could not hold communion with unknown beings! If we knew not who they were, how could we be able to join their company?

1908 · Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Spurgeon's Sermons, Volume 54 (1908) 3077

I suppose we shall know those blessed Patriarchs when we sit down with them. And if we know them, there is but one step to the supposition that we shall know all the general assembly! Moreover, there will be but very little difficulty in discovering them because every seed has its own body by which we are taught that everybody, being different from any other body when sown, will, when it rises in a spiritual fashion, be in like manner different from any other. And although the spiritual body may have none of the lineaments upon its face like we have, and no marks as we have, because it will be far more glorious and splendid, yet it will have so much identity that we, being instructed, shall be able to say of it, "This is the body that sprang from such a seed," just as we recognize the different kinds of corn or flowers that spring from the different kinds of seed that are sown! Take away recognition and you have taken away, I think, one of the joys of Heaven.

1914 · Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Spurgeon's Sermons, Volume 60 (1914) 3403

If all flowers were alike, where were the glorious crown of summer? And if all bodies in the Resurrection world, or even all spirits in the disembodied state could all be precisely one like another, the very beauty of Heaven would be extinct in a degree. No, there they are from different tribes, nations, peoples and tongues—and this betokens individuality and gives us hope that we shall know each other in Heaven even as we are known! Yet a unity about them, for they all wore white robes, and they all carried palms, and they all sang the same song.

c. 206–207 · Tertullian, On the Resurrection of the Flesh (De resurrectione carnis) 62

To this discussion, however, our Lord’s declaration puts an effectual end: “They shall be,” says He, “equal unto the angels.” As by not marrying, because of not dying, so, of course, by not having to yield to any like necessity of our bodily state; even as the angels, too, sometimes were “equal unto” men, by eating and drinking, and submitting their feet to the washing of the bath—having clothed themselves in human guise, without the loss of their own intrinsic nature. If therefore angels, when they became as men, submitted in their own unaltered substance of spirit to be treated as if they were flesh, why shall not men in like manner, when they become “equal unto the angels,” undergo in their unchanged substance of flesh the treatment of spiritual beings, no more exposed to the usual solicitations of the flesh in their angelic garb, than were the angels once to those of the spirit when encompassed in human form? We shall not therefore cease to continue in the flesh, because we cease to be importuned by the usual wants of the flesh; just as the angels ceased not therefore to remain in their spiritual substance, because of the suspension of their spiritual incidents. Lastly, Christ said not, “They shall be angels,” in order not to repeal their existence as men; but He said, “They shall be equal unto the angels,” that He might preserve their humanity unimpaired. When He ascribed an angelic likeness to the flesh, He took not from it its proper substance.

c. 390 · John Chrysostom, Homilies on the Gospel of Matthew 70.2

And in the first place He answers to the question asked. For since this was the cause for their not believing a resurrection, that they think the order of things is like this, He cures the cause, then the symptom also (for thence arose the disease too), and shows the manner of the resurrection. “For in the resurrection,” saith He, “they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as angels of God in Heaven.” But Luke saith, “As Sons of God.” If then they marry not, the question is vain. But not because they do not marry, therefore are they angels, but because they are as angels, therefore they do not marry.

c. 393–395 · Augustine of Hippo, Our Lord's Sermon on the Mount (De sermone Domini in monte) 1.15.41

Therefore, if I were to ask any good Christian who has a wife, and even though he may still be having children by her, whether he would like to have his wife in that kingdom; mindful in any case of the promises of God, and of that life where this incorruptible shall put on incorruption, and this mortal shall put on immortality; though at present hesitating from the greatness, or at least from a certain degree of love, he would reply with execration that he is strongly averse to it. Were I to ask him again, whether he would like his wife to live with him there, after the resurrection, when she had undergone that angelic change which is promised to the saints, he would reply that he desired this as strongly as he reprobated the other. Thus a good Christian is found in one and the same woman to love the creature of God, whom he desires to be transformed and renewed; but to hate the corruptible and mortal conjugal connection and sexual intercourse: i.e. to love in her what is characteristic of a human being, to hate what belongs to her as a wife.

413–426 · Augustine of Hippo, City of God 22.17

They shall be equal to the angels in immortality and happiness, not in flesh, nor in resurrection, which the angels did not need, because they could not die. The Lord then denied that there would be in the resurrection, not women, but marriages; and He uttered this denial in circumstances in which the question mooted would have been more easily and speedily solved by denying that the female sex would exist, if this had in truth been foreknown by Him. But, indeed, He even affirmed that the sex should exist by saying, “They shall not be given in marriage,” which can only apply to females; “Neither shall they marry,” which applies to males. There shall therefore be those who are in this world accustomed to marry and be given in marriage, only they shall there make no such marriages.

1261–1264 · Thomas Aquinas, Of God and His Creatures: An Annotated Translation (With some Abridgement) of the Summa contra Gentiles 4.83

For the pleasures that attend such actions are not the ends of those actions, but rather the action is the end and purpose of the pleasure, nature having arranged for pleasure as a concomitant of such actions, lest for the labour that goes with them animals should desist from these actions necessary to nature, as they certainly would desist, were they not enticed by pleasure. It is therefore a perversion of order and an indecency for actions to be done solely for the pleasure that goes with them (B. III, Chap. XXVII). This then shall nowise be the case with the risen Saints, whose life we must assume to be a life of perfect order and propriety. Moreover the notion is ridiculous of seeking bodily pleasures, common to us with brute animals, where there are in view the highest delights, shared with the angels, in the vision of God (B. III, Chap. LI). Hence the Lord says: In the resurrection they shall neither marry nor be given in marriage, but shall be as the angels of God (Matt. xxii, 30).

1834 · Albert Barnes, Notes on the Bible: Mark 12.25

Are as the angels - That is, as the angels in respect to connections and relations. What those connections and relations may be we know not, but this passage teaches that the special relation of "marriage" will not exist. It does not affirm, however, that there will be no recollection of former marriages, or no recognition of each other as having existed in this tender relation.

1865–1868 · Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Morning and Evening: Daily Readings jul-22.am

In heaven they marry not, but are as the angels of God; yet there is this one marvellous exception to the rule, for in Heaven Christ and his Church shall celebrate their joyous nuptials. This affinity as it is more lasting, so is it more near than earthly wedlock. Let the love of husband be never so pure and fervent, it is but a faint picture of the flame which burns in the heart of Jesus.

1871 · Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology, vol. 2 (Part II, Anthropology; Part III, Soteriology, chapters I-XIV) 3.13.1

The future body will not be subject to the wants, the infirmities, or the passions which belong to the present state of existence. “In the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven.” (Matt. xxii. 30.) The saints are to be like angels, not in being incorporeal, but as being immortal, and not needing reproduction for the continuance of their race.

1872 · John Wesley, Sermons on Several Occasions 137

But then, as our Lord tells us, those who shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world “neither marry nor are given in marriage, neither can they die any more, but they are equal to the angels.” Their bodies are neither subject to disease, nor want that daily sustenance which these mortal bodies cannot be without. “Meats for the belly, and the belly for meats; but God will destroy both it and them.” This is that perfect happiness which all good men shall enjoy in the other world, — a mind free from all trouble and guilt, in a body free from all pains and diseases. Thus our mortal bodies shall be raised immortal. They shall not only be always preserved from death, (for so these might be, if God pleased,) but the nature of them shall be wholly changed, so that they shall not retain the same seeds of mortality; — they cannot die any more.

1904 · Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Spurgeon's Sermons, Volume 50 (1904) 2909

The closest ties of earthly relationship must, to a great extent, end in death, for there are no husbands and wives, as such, in Heaven. There cannot be, "for in the Resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in Heaven." There are other ties, of a spiritual kind, that will far outshine the best of bonds that linked us together here, but, when all other ties are broken, Jesus will always be our Kinsman, our Brother! We shall find the fraternal relationship better understood, more fully enjoyed and more clearly manifested up there than it can ever be down here. When all other relationships are growing dim, this blessed eternal kinship will shine out the more brightly!

1684 · John Owen, Meditations and Discourses on the Glory of Christ pref

Only there is this difference in these things:— Our participation of the heavenly, spiritual perfections of the angelical nature is for eternity; our participation of the imperfections of the animate creatures here below is but for a season. For God hath designed our bodies unto such a glorious refinement at the resurrection, as that they shall have no more alliance unto that brutish nature which perisheth forever; for we shall be ἰσάγγελοι — like unto angels, or equal to them. Our bodies shall no more be capable of those acts and operations which are now common to us with other living creatures here below.

1710 · Matthew Henry, Commentary on Job 19.23-29

] Soul and body shall come together again. That body which must be destroyed in the grave shall be raised again, a glorious body: Yet in my flesh I shall see God. The separate soul has eyes wherewith to see God, eyes of the mind; but Job speaks of seeing him with eyes of flesh, in my flesh, with my eyes; the same body that died shall rise again, a true body, but a glorified body, fit for the employments and entertainments of that world, and therefore a spiritual body, 1 Cor. xv. 44. Let us therefore glorify God with our bodies because there is such a glory designed for them.

1740 · Jonathan Edwards, The Portion of the Righteous 1

I would only observe, that however great the glory of the place is, the glory of their bodies will doubtless be far greater; for the place is made to be a dwelling-place for their glorious bodies, and the inhabitants will doubtless be more glorious than the habitation that is made for them; as the end is of greater value than the means. However bright heaven itself shall shine, the bodies of the saints themselves will shine far brighter, and appear far more beautiful.

1871 · A. R. Fausset, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on 1 Corinthians 15.50

The spirit extracted from the dregs of wine does not so much differ from them, as the glorified man does from the mortal man [Bengel] of mere animal flesh and blood (Ga 1:16). The resurrection body will be still a body though spiritual, and substantially retaining the personal identity; as is proved by Lu 24:39; Joh 20:27, compared with Php 3:21.

1872 · Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology, vol. 3 (Part III, chapters XV-XX; Part IV, Eschatology) 4.2.1

Let it suffice us to know that as we have borne the image of the earthly, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly. Well might the Apostle exhort believers not to mourn for the pious dead, whom they are to see again, arrayed in a beauty and glory of which we can now have no conception.