Revelation Study 25 Chapter 21:1-8
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A New Heaven and New Earth
A New Heaven and New Earth
What we’ve seen from chapter 19:11 to 21:1, with the words, “Then I saw”, has been 7 visions, a complete number of visions.
Vision
19:11-16, Jesus on the White Horse come to rule the nations.
19:12-18, A call to gather for a harvest/supper of destruction
19:19-21, The fall of the beast
20:1-3, Satan bound for 1000 years
20:4-10, The saints reign for 1000 years, ends with the release and defeat of Satan
20:11-15, The final judgment
21-22, The beginning of the New Creation, the final, complete, vision. It is finished. Shalom, complete, wholeness, peace, also the Sabbath rest
So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for whoever has entered God’s rest has also rested from his works as God did from his.
Let us therefore strive to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience.
So, in reality, this world has been living in day 6, the Bible is the continuation of day 6, chapter 2 of Genesis to the Sabbath rest that comes in chapters 21-22 of Revelation.
We are awaiting day 7, the Sabbath,
So, the visions of doom and gloom, death and destruction, judgment and punishment are over.
No more chaos, no more dismantling of creation.
All has been made right, all evil has been accounted for, all the sealed will be victorious.
Now the glorious vision of what’s to come. The hope, confident assurance of what’s to come.
But before we dive into Revelation 21...
Did you all watch the Bible Project video?? Thoughts??
What is or was the purpose of creation? To experience God, His love, grace, His goodness, enjoy Him and what He’s created for us.
“God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.”
If God is love, abounding in steadfast love, then that love needs to be expressed, on someone, something.
So God creates, out of His love, making all things good, really good, so that we, the pinnacle of creation, the one’s created to fully experience His love, can experience it, can know this God who is good, who is love.
This goodness and love received is then reciprocated, Adam and Eve enjoying creation, soul satisfied in and with God, and loving God and enjoying being with Him.
That’s the original Eden, the intent of Eden.
Where did it all go wrong? Genesis 3
Rejection of living under God, living in His kingdom, rejecting His goodness and His love, and creating man’s own kingdom, one w/o God so we can be god.
Then banished from Eden to live in a world outside the spiritual realm and presence of God.
Now God is everywhere, so its not as if God’s not there or everywhere, but this is not the dwelling place of God, this is not His created kingdom, this is not where spirit, man, and God’s good world were united and dwelling together.
Not only does man suffer consequences but so does creation.
The Lord God said to the serpent,
“Because you have done this,
cursed are you above all livestock
and above all beasts of the field;
on your belly you shall go,
and dust you shall eat
all the days of your life.
Cursed livestock and beasts.
And to Adam he said,
“Because you have listened to the voice of your wife
and have eaten of the tree
of which I commanded you,
‘You shall not eat of it,’
cursed is the ground because of you;
in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life;
thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you;
and you shall eat the plants of the field.
By the sweat of your face
you shall eat bread,
till you return to the ground,
for out of it you were taken;
for you are dust,
and to dust you shall return.”
Cursed is the ground, thorns and thistles, God’s beautiful creation will now have insidious invaders, weeds, thorns, thistles,
Pain and toil for Adam, and now also for the livestock and beasts who will have to work it with him.
But also in Genesis 3 God put into motion the redemption plan, not only of us, but of creation as well.
I will put enmity between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and her offspring;
he shall bruise your head,
and you shall bruise his heel.”
And the Lord God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them.
Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand and take also of the tree of life and eat, and live forever—” therefore the Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken. He drove out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life.
We have a tendency to only focus on us, God’s redemption of us, but He is and has also redeemed creation, it too has been longing for its redemption.
For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.
One day man will return to Eden, both redeemed, made new.
What we see in Revelation 21 & 22 is the return to Eden, but even more glorious than the original.
All things made new and better, not just afternoon walks with God, but living in His presence, physically with Jesus 24/7, all good, nothing that can no be good.
We are seeing the reuniting of Heaven and Earth.
The earthen tabernacles and temples were temporary, they were glimpses back to Eden and also forward to the New Eden, the New Jerusalem.
My dwelling place shall be with them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
The circumference of the city shall be 18,000 cubits. And the name of the city from that time on shall be, The Lord Is There.”
Sing and rejoice, O daughter of Zion, for behold, I come and I will dwell in your midst, declares the Lord.
If you study them, their designs, they are loaded with Edenic imagery.
This was also the subject of prophecy, Isaiah 65
“For behold, I create new heavens
and a new earth,
and the former things shall not be remembered
or come into mind.
But be glad and rejoice forever
in that which I create;
for behold, I create Jerusalem to be a joy,
and her people to be a gladness.
I will rejoice in Jerusalem
and be glad in my people;
no more shall be heard in it the sound of weeping
and the cry of distress.
“For as the new heavens and the new earth
that I make
shall remain before me, says the Lord,
so shall your offspring and your name remain.
But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.
One more O.T. passage to give Rev.21 some light.
He will swallow up death forever;
and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces,
and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth,
for the Lord has spoken.
So much of what we will read in Revelation 21 is rooted in the O.T.
Revelation 21 is broken up into 3 sections,
verses 1-8 are a thesis or opening statement,
and then the rest of the chapter expands on this in verses 9-21 and 22-27.
Now let’s look at Revelation 21:1-5
English Standard Version Chapter 21
The New Heaven and the New Earth
21 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.”
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.”
“Then I saw”, after John is given a glimpse into the courtroom of Heaven He is now seeing the future world, the 7th and final vision.
Heaven and earth reunited
And the see was no more, is there symbolism here? No more chaos, no more fear, no more dwelling place of evil.
Within this new Heaven and new earth is what? The holy city, a new Jerusalem.
Coming down out of Heaven is probably symbolic, the arrival of something new, something come from God.
What does it mean that the new Jerusalem is “prepared as a bride adorned for her husband”?
Awake, awake,
put on your strength, O Zion;
put on your beautiful garments,
O Jerusalem, the holy city;
for there shall no more come into you
the uncircumcised and the unclean.
We will see that the holy city, adorned with jewels and gold, etc. is being referred to as the bride, as the church is the bride
So in the symbolic nature of Revelation, the Holy City, the dwelling place of God is both a place and the people of God, the Church, the dwelling place of God.
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.” 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, having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal.
God has come again to dwell with His people, the Bible has come full circle, a return to Eden, but better.
Verse 3, the voice from the throne is?? God speaking, in the third person, remember Ezekiel 37:27 and Zechariah 2:10
Verse 4 is a direct reference to Isaiah 25:8 and 65:19
Verse 5, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Isaiah 65, 66 and 2 Peter 3 verses above.
He made/created in the beginning and He will make/create all things new once again.
John is commanded to write this down, once again. Why? Because the trustworthy and true One is speaking them. We can count on this, it is guaranteed.
Verses 6-8 contain a promise and a warning
English Standard Version Chapter 21
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.”
V6, “It is done!” It is finished,
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!”
The 7th bowl was the culmination of the judgment plan of God, which included the post judgment plan of God.
This is now the redemption of creation, all things made new. This is being told to John some 2k years ago, as if it was coming to fruition then.
I am the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. This brings us back to chapter 1 of Revelation
“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”
This is the eternal God, the One who began the beginning and can end this age and begin the new one.
Now the promises
To the thirsty,
Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, 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.”
and...
On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’ ”
and also,
“Come, everyone who thirsts,
come to the waters;
and he who has no money,
come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
without money and without price.
Another promise…
V7, the one who conquers, how does one conquer? Either by persevering until the end, or by being martyred for their faith.
His heritage, his inheritance??
In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory.
I will be his God and he will be my son, the final realization of our adoption as sons.
But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God,
For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!”
But also the warning...
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.”
We’ve seen this before, but for those seduced by the beast, they will perish with the beast and the dragon.
Not courageous but cowards, and without faith. It takes both faith and courage to persevere, to be obedient, to be victorious.
thoughts on the first death/second death and resurrection
The first death can be spiritual and therefore the second death has no power over us, because we experience the first resurrection, spiritual and born again, and the second resurrection is of our physical bodies, believers
but for those who haven’t experienced the first death and the resurrection, the second death is both physical and spiritual, non-believers
Or,
The first resurrection is spiritual and the second resurrection is physical, our bodies in heaven, these are believers
The first death is physical and the second death is spiritual/eternal separation. These are non-believers
I’ve read both and think they both are feasible.