What is in a word? The meaning of “up” should be quite simple, but if one believes that we live on a globe, it is only a relative term.
Those who ascribe to a biblical cosmology understand “up” to be an absolute term that is the same for all people on earth.
Those who believe they live on a globe understand “up” to be a relative term, since up for someone at the north pole is the very opposite for someone living on the other side of the sphere. Why is this important?
The Bible tells us that God sits enthroned above the circle of the earth. (Isaiah 40:22) Biblical cosmologists, therefore, place God’s throne above the dome of the firmament, which means it is “up” for everyone on earth. Globe believers cannot conceive of God’s throne in this way, since the word “above,” like “up,” has only a relative meaning and would require God to be seated simultaneously in an infinite number of locations in order to be above everyone living on the spherical earth. In addition, it requires that we reinterpret “circle” to mean “sphere” to make it fit our presuppositions about the shape of the world in which we live.
When Jesus ascended to heaven, he went “up.”
While He was blessing them, He parted from them and was carried up into heaven. Luke 24:51 (NASB95)
This means heaven is “up,” just as is God’s throne. The angels told the disciples that he would come again one day in like manner, which means he will descend “down” out of heaven. This is called the Second Coming, which will be seen simultaneously by everyone living on earth.
BEHOLD, HE IS COMING WITH THE CLOUDS, and every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him; and all the tribes of the earth will mourn over Him. So it is to be. Amen. 8 “I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.” Revelation 1:7–8 (NASB95)
This of course could only happen if the earth is a stationary plane covered by the dome called the firmament, just as the Bible teaches.
If the earth is a sphere, with no absolute “up,” Jesus’ resurrected physical body could not possible be seen by everyone at once. Since we dare not nullify God’s Word to suit a pagan notion of the nature of the cosmos, we accept that up means up for everyone at the same time. This requires us to accept the Bible’s teaching about the nature of the world in which we live.
And this is why it is so important for us to know what’s up.
