Revelation - Part 21
Notes
Transcript
1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.
2 And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.
4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”
So, to recap from last week, the 1000 year reign ended with Satan being release for a little while
He deceived people into rising up against Christ
They were defeated quickly with fire from Heaven
Satan joined the AntiChrist and False Prophet in the Lake of Eternal Fire
And then the White Throne Judgement took place.
All of the dead both great and small were judged by the books.
I believe the books referred to here are the books of the Bible
and the Book of that person’s life.
The Bible says that every idle word we say will be recorded.
Anyone who wasn’t found in the Lamb’s book of life was thrown into the lake of fire.
Then we start chapter 21, where John sees a new vision.
He sees a new heaven and new earth coming down our of Heaven from God.
1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.
At this point we must have passed seal six.
12 When he opened the sixth seal, I looked, and behold, there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth, the full moon became like blood,
13 and the stars of the sky fell to the earth as the fig tree sheds its winter fruit when shaken by a gale.
14 The sky vanished like a scroll that is being rolled up, and every mountain and island was removed from its place.
We can also line this up with the 7th Bowl.
17 The seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air, and a loud voice came out of the temple, from the throne, saying, “It is done!”
20 And every island fled away, and no mountains were to be found.
So, we are know where we are on the timeline here based on that statement in verse 1.
1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.
The new heaven and the new earth are not part of time then.
Time is now gone
We are entering eternity at this time.
2 And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
Remember, the bride is going to have to be prepared.
And according to chapter 19 verse 7, it is the bride who makes herself ready.
Which is why Jesus told the parable of the 10 virgins
5 wise, and 5 foolish
The wise had made themselves ready
and the foolish had not
So, if you’re going to be part of the bride of Christ
You have a responsibility to make yourself ready
Don’t listen to those preachers or easy believism
who will tell you that Jesus is just going to have grace on everyone
and we will all go to heaven
No, there are those who will be ready when the bridegroom comes
They will be fully responsible for not being ready
and they will be considered foolish.
3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.
The God of the OT was a God above us.
he sat on his throne in heaven
he did not dwell with men
But Jesus changed all that.
23 “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us).
14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
The NT authors got a chance to see God dwell with man for a season
But once we get to new Jerusalem
We will dwell with God forever
1 “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me.
2 In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?
3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.
Verse 2 says “mansions” in KJV version, and it is translated as “rooms” in many modern translation, and I think that is a better translation
Because the idea that we will have many mansions over there sounds nice
but the idea portrayed by the Scriptures is that we are supposed to dwell with God
not in a separate giant house alone down the street from God
but in a one dwelling place that has many rooms
and there is a room for you there.
The Greek word is “monai”
and it litterally means, “a dwelling place”.
So, Jesus said, i’m going to get a room ready for you
I’ve got a place for you to stay when you come over to my house.
3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.
Also, it says God himself will be with them.
Why “himself”?
Seems redundant unless you realize that John is trying to show us that God is alone. He is by “himself”.
It isn’t God themselves
It isn’t the 3 persons of God
We will dwell with God HIMself.
verse 4 is one of my favorite verses.
4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”
What a promise this is.
you can look at cancer and say, that’s a former thing
death is a former thing
pain is a former thing
sorrow is a former thing
And those former things will be gone forever
Leaving us with just love, Joy and peace for eternity.
5 And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”
6 And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment.
7 The one who conquers will have this heritage, and I will be his God and he will be my son.
8 But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”
5 And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”
Notice the speaker is the one on the throne.
and his words are ‘trustworthy and true”
Which is also translatable as “faithful and true”.
We have already shown in this series that the one on the throne is Jesus.
The only God.
The throne room scene in chapter four identified him as the one that spoke with a voice like a trumpet at the beginning of the visions
and Chapter 1 identifies that voice as coming from Jesus walking amongst the golden candlesticks.
But, “faithful and true” is also another name for Jesus.
14 “And to the angel of the church in Laodicea write: ‘The words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of God’s creation.
This is clearly Jesus being identified as the “faithful and true”.
Since he is the one speaking to the 7 churches of Asia in that context
It is the exact same Greek words that are translated as “trustworthy and true” in Rev 21.5
11 Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse! The one sitting on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he judges and makes war.
Once again, same Greek words identifying Jesus as the Faithful and True.
So, if there is any doubt who is on the throne…
Keep reading.
Because it get more clear as we continue to read.
6 And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment.
When he says “it is done” it sounds like the same thing Jesus said on the cross.
And of course, we’ve already shown in this series that the Alpha and Omega, beginning and the end is referring to Jesus.
In the next chapter we will see it clearly written in red letters.
Your Bible should have these words in red too
because Jesus is the speaker here just like he is in the next chapter
but the fact that many Trinitarians think this is God the Father speaking is telling
because, guess what… it is God the Father Speaking
Because Jesus is God the Father.
Here in non read letters, we are made to believe it is God the Father saying He is the Alpha and Omega
But we know it is Jesus, the Faithful and True
and It becomes clear in chapter Rev 22.13
When Jesus explicitly says…
13 I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.”
6 And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment.
Even this statement following his identity as Alpha and omega
Is a direct quote from Jesus in John chapter 4 and chapter 7.
13 Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again,
14 but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
So, clearly this is Jesus speaking, yet most Bibles do not put these words in red.
but we know who it is.
8 But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”
This is not a full list, as we have seen with similar lists like this in the NT
They are examples of the type of people who will not enter Heaven
It doesn’t mean that if you ever were one of these types of people you are going to hell
because Paul said “such WERE some of you” when he makes a similar list
but then says, but you were washed and sanctified by the water and the Spirit
So, those who Obey Acts 2:38, and continue to walk in the Spirit will no longer be under this condemnation according to Paul in Romans chapter 8.
But for those foolish virgins, that don’t make themselves ready
Those would-be brides that do not prepare themselves
They will have to suffer the second death
Which is worse than the first death
The first death you can be resurrected
but the second death is eternal separation from God
Which is the death God was talking about when Adam and Eve sinned
They didn’t drop dead right then and there
But they were spiritually separated from God.
And that is what hell is.
And it is forever.
But, there is another place
a better place
and John gets to see a vision of it next.
9 Then came one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues and spoke to me, saying, “Come, I will show you the Bride, the wife of the Lamb.”
10 And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great, high mountain, and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God,
11 having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal.
12 It had a great, high wall, with twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels, and on the gates the names of the twelve tribes of the sons of Israel were inscribed—
13 on the east three gates, on the north three gates, on the south three gates, and on the west three gates.
14 And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and on them were the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.
15 And the one who spoke with me had a measuring rod of gold to measure the city and its gates and walls.
16 The city lies foursquare, its length the same as its width. And he measured the city with his rod, 12,000 stadia. Its length and width and height are equal.
17 He also measured its wall, 144 cubits by human measurement, which is also an angel’s measurement.
18 The wall was built of jasper, while the city was pure gold, like clear glass.
19 The foundations of the wall of the city were adorned with every kind of jewel. The first was jasper, the second sapphire, the third agate, the fourth emerald,
20 the fifth onyx, the sixth carnelian, the seventh chrysolite, the eighth beryl, the ninth topaz, the tenth chrysoprase, the eleventh jacinth, the twelfth amethyst.
21 And the twelve gates were twelve pearls, each of the gates made of a single pearl, and the street of the city was pure gold, like transparent glass.
22 And I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb.
23 And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb.
24 By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it,
25 and its gates will never be shut by day—and there will be no night there.
26 They will bring into it the glory and the honor of the nations.
We won’t go into every detail here for the sake of time,
because most of this is self explanatory
and I want to be careful not to over symbolize everything
as I have tried to do in this entire series
First I want to discuss the size of the city.
It is 12,000 stadia
A stadia is the word we get Stadium from
It was a place where races took place
and we typically measure races today in meters or yards
but in John’s day, it was stadia, which is plural for stadion.
A stadion is about 200 yards.
12,000 stadia works out to about 1,380 miles
This is almost 2 million square miles.
To give you an idea, the entire United kingdom is only 94k sq miles
All of India is only 1.2 million square miles
with almost 2 billion people living there.
The US is 3.5 Million sq miles, including Alaska and HI
And New Jerusalem is about 2 million sq miles
So somewhere between the size of India and the US.
That would be a big city according to my Alabama math.
The walls are 114 cubits, which is about 216 feet high.
you aren’t getting over those walls
But you won’t have to scale them
because the Bible says the gates will all be open day and night
Since there is no night
19 The foundations of the wall of the city were adorned with every kind of jewel. The first was jasper, the second sapphire, the third agate, the fourth emerald,
Some people explore the possible meaning behinds these jewels
and there are some interesting ideas
I won’t get into them all
but I did want to point out that the first is Jasper
On the Ephod of the Priest
The Jasper was last
but Jesus said the Last shall be first
I wonder if there is some connection here
22 And I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb.
There is no need to go to a place of worship
Because we are going to be in the presence of God eternally
IN the NT God made us his temple
but in Heaven, God is our temple
23 And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb.
The light of that city comes from the Glory of God
I don’t have time to go through each scripture on this topic
but I believe this is going all the way back to when God said let there be light and there was light even before the sun was created 4 days later
and that was the first words of God
and John said the word became flesh and we beheld his glory
and Paul said we saw the glory of God in the face of Jesus christ
and so, here in Heaven,
we don’t have a sun, moon or stars
just the word of God
The glory of God
Which is the Lamb.
God With us.
25 and its gates will never be shut by day—and there will be no night there.
27 But nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s book of life.
We are reminded that nothing unclean will ever enter it
So, no need to bring a broom or a mop
it is clean city
Only those who are written the book of life will be there.
with God
in peace
forever.
