All things new
Revelation 21:5 All Things New (Heaven pt 4) 11/21/2004
"Behold I make all things new" (Rev. 21:5).
Have you ever tried to picture what it will be like the instant after you die? After your heart beats the last beat?
There are lots of stories of near-death experiences and out-of-body experiences. I don’t doubt all of these, but
Satan will use lots of ways to deceive us about what life after this life is like.
Heaven will be a real place (speaking of the eternal heaven which is the New Jerusalem located on the New
Earth)
1. Why would God resurrect our bodies if we were going to live in some spiritual existence
2. Why would God prepare a New Heavens and New Earth is we were not going to live in material bodies
3. Heaven will be the fulfillment of our part in the Lord’s Prayer “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth
as it is in heaven
God Himself prepared man’s first home on Earth.
1. Genesis 2:8-9 says God had planted a garden in Eden and there He put the man He had formed.
a. “planted a garden” shows God’s personal touch, He had prepared it
b. In same way, He prepared the New Jerusalem
2. Eden was not just a garden. It was a land of natural wonders
a. God planted a “garden in Eden”
The eternal purpose of God for creation and for his people will not be complete until all things are made new
and the glory of the Lord fills them all.
1. In verse 5 God says, "Behold, I make all things new."
2.What does God mean “I make all things new”
a. “all things” means “all things”
There will be new heavens and a New Earth and a New Jerusalem
1. The New Jerusalem is the capital city of the New Earth
a. John sees it coming down from the present Heaven, it comes down to earth
2. It is called a city.
a. A city has streets, people, activities
b. A city has architecture, culture
c. This city will have no crime
3. The wall and city gates (21:12-14)
a. The city will be surrounded by a wall with 12 gates, three on each side
b The wall itself will be one of the wonders of the city
(1) The wall is 216 feet in width
(2) The wall is not to help defend the city for there will be no enemies, no enemies
(3) It is a constant reminder of the eternal security of inhabitants
c. The gates will never be closed
(1) You will not be locked in, there will be total freedom to come and go as you please.
(2) We will have an infinite universe to travel through
4. Dimensions Revelation 21:15-16
a. 1,400 to 1,500 miles in length, width, and height
b. Shape of the city (21:16) is “foursquare”
c.. The ground level of the city will be nearly two million square miles
(1) 40 times bigger than England, ten times as big as France or Germany and that is just the ground level
(2) It would be roughly the distance from Maine to Florida and from the Atlantic Ocean to Colorado.
d. If you allow fifteen feet a story, the New Jerusalem would be 5,028 stories high,
(1) Each story would contain 2,250,000 square miles
5. All this is just the New Jerusalem. There is still the New Earth
6. v. 21 The streets are of pure gold, so pure, they appear to be transparent as glass
7. The city will be of pure gold, clear as glass (21:18)
8. Inside the city we will walk on streets of gold
9. 21:25 There shall be no more night there
a. That doesn’t mean much to us because we have electricity, flashlights
b. To those in the First Century the only source of light was a small wick in a bowl of oil.
c. Darkness brought fear and danger
All things new means God is going to make us spiritually and morally new
1. The greatest frustration of this age is that we still sin.
a. We want to be holy and we fall short of the holiness we long for. We want to love and we say hurtful things.
b. We want to worship and we feel cold. We want to walk in peace and we feel anxiety. We want to be pure in
thought and impurity bombards our minds.
2. Revelation 21: 27 Nothing unclean will ever come into it."
a. Nobody who has any stain on them at all will ever come into the heavenly city, to the abode of God, the
heaven of heavens.
b. Chapter 22 :14 says same thing
3. We must be perfect to get into God’s heaven and that is one reason we are not sure of our salvation
The whole idea of God's redemption is to make us perfect.
1.The whole idea is to fit us to dwell forever in the presence of God.
2. Salvation is a process. You accepted Jesus as Lord and Savior and were born again, but that was only the
beginning
a. Salvation is past, present, and future. You were saved, you are saved, but you are being saved.
b. The ultimate salvation is when we are made perfect to be able to enter heaven
3. When you put your faith in Jesus Christ you were made a new creation, 2 Corinthians 5:17 says.
a. The life of God dwells in your soul. You are a new person on the inside. There is newness in you
b. You have a new heart and a new Spirit.
4. And all of that, get this, is a down payment, a first installment on the fullness of what you're going to get in the
future.
a. The seed of eternal perfection is in you
b It is planted, mark this, it's not yet in full bloom.
c. And we long for the day when that perfection comes. We long to be what we shall be.
5. Romans 8:23 "And we ourselves," second phrase there, "we ourselves having the firstfruits of the Spirit,"
a. Having had the down payment, having had the first installment, having had the new heart, new life,
new Spirit in us, having had a taste of that, "we ourselves groan within ourselves."
a. And what are we groaning about? "Waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body."
b.We've had a taste of what a redeemed soul is like, we'd like to get the whole thing redeemed, you
understand that? And so we live in hope, waiting to be what we will be.
6. We will be made spiritually and morally new--not just partially as now, but wholly.
a. Look at verse 2: "And I saw the Holy City, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven, prepared as a bride
b. This is a picture of the church prepared and beautified for her husband, Jesus Christ.
b. When God makes all things new he makes the church--the people of God--spiritually and morally beautiful
for his Son.
c. verses 9-11:
Will we be capable of sinning?
1. The wages of sin is death and since there is no death, there will be no sin
2. What happens to change us?
a. We are made totally righteous by God. We will not forget the ugliness of sin
b. we will be delivered totally from sin
3. I John 3:2 At Jesus’ coming (2:28) we shall be somehow transformed into His likeness.
a. We will be free from the possibility of defilement, sin, sickness, sorrow, and death.
God will also make all things new--including our bodies. What will we be like in Heaven?
1. Verse 4 points in this direction: "He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more,
2. Jesus called people in Heaven by name (Lazarus, Abraham, Isaac)
3. We won’t become angels
4. We will maintain our own identities
a. You will be you in heaven.
b. Everyone will not look alike in heaven, faceless people walking around like zombies
5. Our resurrected bodies will be real physical bodies
a. Our bodies will be free of the curse so there will be no pain
b. We will be restored to our original beauty as God planned before sin
c. The most beautiful person you have ever seen is still under the curse, a shadow of the beauty God created
6. Everyone will not look the same. Everyone will not be the same height or build
7. God created us with five senses and they will be part of the resurrected bodies.
a. We will be able to taste, smell, see, speak, and feel
8. I believe we will all be the same age = 30 years old
a. If infants go to heaven as infants, they must somehow grow to whatever age of development as others
God will make our relationship with him new and glorious.
1, 21:4 "I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, 'Behold, the dwelling of God is with men. He will dwell
with them,
2. How many times will a little child say what we all feel, "But daddy, I can't see him." That is a real heart cry that
we should never lose.
a. Revelation 22:4 gives the answer to it: "They shall see his face and his name shall be on their foreheads."
When God makes all things new he will make us spiritually and morally as pure as Jesus.
He will give us a body like the body of his glory,
He will renovate all creation to take all futility and evil and pain out of it, and finally he himself will come to us
and let us see his face.
The corrupted fallen part of the world will be gone and the world be restored to the way it was meant to be in the
beginning. No curse.
When we see it, we will feel at home as never before. We will take one look at it and know it is all we have ever
wanted and desired. (ever look for a new home and find one you love) The reason we love this present earth is
because it has just a taste of what God created it to be.
Genesis 2:8
And the Lord God planted a garden toward the east, in Eden; and there
He placed the man whom He had formed
Romans 8:22-23
For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs
together until now. 23 Not only that, but we also who have the firstfruits of
the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for
the adoption, the redemption of our body.
1 John 3:2
Yes, dear friends, we are already God’s children, and we can’t even
imagine what we will be like when Christ returns. But we do know that
when he comes we will be like him, for we will see him as he really is.