Shining Forever

Intro: Instagram Filters

I’ve never been much of a photographer - barely even a picture-taker person

I took Jeremiah on a trip a few years ago and Kim had to remind me to take a bunch of pictures of the trip

So when I take a picture, I take out my phone, get the shot in view, and click - that’s it

But there are so many more sophisticated options

I was running through the list of filter options available in the Instagram app

Fade (then fade warm and fade cool)

Boost

Graphite

Rosy

Emerald (are there people out there looking for more green hues in their pictures?)

Midnight

Grainy

Halo

Wavy (which mostly looks like the camera spazzed out in the rendering the picture)

Lo-Res (are people trying to make their pictures look worse?)

And on and on

Overall, I don’t get it, but someone must use them

This morning, we are going to be looking at Revelation 21, the next to last chapter of the Bible

It is the culmination of all things, the endgame

Early in the chapter is the promise that God is making all things new

Now here is the hard part for us: we struggle to imagine what that could possibly be like

All things new… and good… and right…

It’s almost like we all live every day with an Instagram filter permanently applied

But instead of a filter that adds a red or green hue, it’s a filter where we can only see through the lens of sin and depravity

We don’t have to look around for very long to realize that the world we live in is really broken, really messed up

Sin and its resultant depravity are this filter we look through and can hardly imagine the good or the true or the beautiful

We struggle to imagine what it would be like if the sin and depravity filter were removed from the picture so its full beauty could shine through

That is what we are hoping to do, in a small way, here this morning

Framework

But first, let’s recap how we got here in our series

In the first week of this series, I set out a framework that I labeled as “biblical theology” where, as we study the idea of light and dark in the Bible, we would learn how to understand the development of a theme by pulling the thread to see how the theme progresses over the course of the Scriptures

To do so, we have followed an intentional progression

But now I would like to give some language to the progression that we have followed throughout this series

Creation / Fall / Redemption / New Creation

Creation: For whatever we are studying, what is the good and beautiful that God created?

We saw God speak light into the darkness of Creation in Genesis 1

Fall: How did the introduction of sin into the world mar and obscure that good thing God made?

We saw judgment for sin in the plague of darkness in Exodus 10

Redemption: How did the coming of Jesus that culminated with his death and resurrection redeem that beautiful thing God made, but that we marred in our sin?

We saw the darkest moment when Jesus died on the cross to redeem us from our sins in Luke 23

New Creation: How will the coming of Jesus as he ushers in the New Creation restore that to an even greater goodness and beauty?

And, this morning, we come to the New Creation

The Greek word for “end” is “telos”

So what does the end of the Bible - the telos of all things - say about light and dark?

To see that, let’s turn in our Bibles to Revelation 21, the next to last chapter in the whole Bible

If you are not sure where that is, go to the last page and work back just a little

Scripture Reading: Revelation 21:22-27

Revelation 21:22–27 ESV

And I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb. 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. By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it, and its gates will never be shut by day—and there will be no night there. They will bring into it the glory and the honor of the nations. 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.

Pray

Context

So here we are, at the end of the Bible

God’s Word is giving us a picture of what it will be like when Jesus returns

And we find that God is still using the powerful imagery of light and dark that opened the Bible in Genesis 1

Revelation 21 describes the triumphant return of Jesus

All the old, broken things will be gone

All sickness, hurt, suffering, pain, tears, death - gone forever

That is the moment of New Creation - our very namesake as a church!

God is going to bring heaven down to the earth where all will be new and all will be right

Revelation 21 and 22 are our invitation to take off the Instagram filter of sin and depravity and to see… and to dream

But not just some cross your fingers to hope for dream or a dream that you wish you wish would never end

A real, living, better than you could dream reality with no filters, no distortions, and no brokenness

Only good and true and beautiful forever

Jesus the Light

We started this series with the imagery of light from John 1

John 1:9 “The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world.”

And then in John 8:12 “Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.””

Revelation - our passage this morning - was written by that same John

And he is bringing the imagery of Jesus as the Light of the World to its ultimate reality

This morning we are going to see that:

Jesus, the Light of the World, reveals the glory of the Father

Jesus, the Light of the World, shines forever, dispelling all darkness

Jesus, the Light of the World, is also the Lamb who brings us with him into the New Creation

Jesus, the Light of the World, reveals the glory of the Father

Look with me again at verse 22

Revelation 21:22–23 “And I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb. 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.”

Jesus is depicted here as a lamp

And what does a lamp do?

It reveals the light

If I were to say “turn on the lights”, none of us would attempt to produce light with our own power

We would just turn on the lamp

That lamp is for us, then, a picture

As a lamp shines the light, Jesus shines the radiance of the glory of God

In fact, those words come from just a bit earlier in Revelation 21

Revelation 21:11 “having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal.”

Now, the idea of the “glory of God” can be a tough one for us to wrap our minds around, so I’ll share an illustration that some of you may have heard me use before

Imagine the idea of glory as the beautiful, multi-faceted diamond

And, really, isn’t that the picture verse 11 invites us to describing the glory of God as a “most rare jewel”?

If I look at that diamond from just one side, I might see that it is really beautiful

But will I have understood the full radiance and full beauty of that diamond?

I have to turn the diamond so I can look through different angles and in different lighting to see the light refract in new and beautiful ways

Only then can I start to grasp the beauty of that diamond

In that way, Jesus is the Light that refracts the beauty - the glory - of God to us!

We can see the glory of the Father because Jesus reveals that glory to us

Jesus, the Light of the World, shines forever, dispelling all darkness

Let’s keep going, back to verse 23

Revelation 21:23–25 “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. By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it, and its gates will never be shut by day—and there will be no night there.”

Let’s also add in a few verses later in Rev 22

Revelation 22:5 “And night will be no more. They will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will reign forever and ever.”

Twice we have this wording of “no night” in the city of God that is coming

We have, in this series, seen several ways that night and dark are used

Chaos and disorder

Judgment

Sin and evil

Hopelessness

Night we will be gone - but what does that even mean?

It means that all chaos, sin, judgment, and hopelessness are forever gone!

We also have that fascinating phrase because of how it connects back to Genesis 1

“And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it”

Remember that in Genesis 1, God creates light on the first day (Gen 1:3) but he didn’t create the sun and moon until day 4 (Gen 1:16)

So there was light before the sun and moon

And now, here in the New Creation, there is light after the need for a sun and moon

Such cool parallelisms

But one more really important thing to see here

The light shines forever

We already saw twice the language of “no night”

But add in the phrase “its gates will never be shut by day - and their will be no night there”

Jesus is the light that shines forever

And where Jesus, the Light of the World, shines, darkness is forever dispelled

So no more chaos or evil or judgment

And, if we went back to early in the chapter, no more sin, no more tears, no more sorrow or suffering or sickness or death

All those gone… forever… dispelled by the Light

Jesus, the Light of the World, is also the Lamb who brings us with him into the New Creation

The third truth we want to see is that Jesus is both the Light of the World and the Lamb of God who was slain

We see that word “Lamb” 3 times in the verses we just read

The word “lamb” appears 38 times in the NT - 29 of them here in the book of Revelation

76% of the times it is used occur here, in the final picture we get of Jesus

And here is the significance: Jesus is not only the light that shines to reveal the glory of God

He not only shows the path to God, Jesus is also the path to Father

He is the one who was slain as the sacrificial lamb to bring us to God… to bring us with himself to the New Creation!

Jesus, the Light of the World, is also the Lamb who brings us with him into the New Creation

Application

It’s often easy to get lost in conversations about heaven, the New Creation, all that is yet to come

“Ok, so this is how it will be when Jesus returns. What does that mean to me today?”

Or maybe you are even thinking of the old adage, “too heavenly minded to be of any earthly good”

I want to suggest that not only is that an unhelpful phrase, it is also an unbiblical one

Colossians 3:1–2 “If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.”

We are actually commanded to think about heaven, about all that is yet to come!

“Christian, meditate much on heaven, it will help thee to press on, and to forget the toil of the way. This vale of tears is but a pathway to a better country: this world of woe is but the stepping-stone to a world of bliss. And, after death, what cometh? What wonder-world will be open upon our astonished sight?” - Charles Spurgeon

We can meditate much on heaven… and it will be the strength for us to follow after God today

So as we consider these great truths about the New Creation, about the work of Jesus as both Light and Lamb, two points of application for us

Assurance

If your name is written in the Lamb’s book of life, you can’t get it out!

Look again vs 27

Revelation 21:27 “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.”

Or look at this verse from earlier in the book of Revelation

Revelation 3:5 “The one who conquers will be clothed thus in white garments, and I will never blot his name out of the book of life. I will confess his name before my Father and before his angels.”

That should be eminently hopeful for us

It is not cross-your-fingers thing - it is a sure thing

All those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life are invited and, moreover, their path to the New Creation is secure

Be encouraged by this

I know how dark my heart can be - I know the wrong motives, wrong words, wrong actions

But we can live today with great assurance because the word of Jesus does not fail and our future in the New Creation is sure

Mission

The second application of meditating much on the New Creation is that it causes us to labor for the coming of the New Creation

We work today longing to see all of that come to its fulfillment

We want to see the glory of God revealed

We want to see the darkness banished and the light to shine forever

And we want to be with Jesus in the New Creation

So we work because we do not know who is in the book of life

All whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life are assured they will be with Jesus in the New Creation

But you and me? While we can be assured of God’s saving work in our own lives, we don’t know whose names are written in that great book

So we labor… and we fight until that day

We fight for the light of God to break into our world and into the lives of those around us

There is a series of books called The Green Ember and I am currently reading through book 3 in the series with Micah

Came across this quote

“I believe you’re right, Picket,” he said, smiling through fresh tears. “I have only one desire in these painful days, to see my work matter for the mending. I know I help invent things that destroy, but they are aimed at the darkness. And I hope that, when they have blown a hole in that darkness, the light pours in.” - Emerson in Ember Rising

Conclusion

I started this morning with the idea that we all live with a filter of sin and depravity that overlays everything… including our ability to understand the New Creation

The idea of everything made new and everything made right is so hard to imagine because we don’t know how to remove that filter

But we are invited to long for that New Creation to come

We are told to think about it and yearn for it

Because on that day Jesus, the Light of the World, will reveal the glory of God to us

On that day Jesus, the Light of the World, will dispel the darkness and shine forever

On that day Jesus, the Light of the World, will reign forever as the Lamb who was slain

And until that day, we live with the assurance that our future with Jesus is secure

So until that day, we labor to blow a hole in the darkness so that the light of Jesus may pour in

Pray

Mention Christmas at the Park as one example of letting the light of Jesus pour in