All Things New

Opening Prayer

Let’s open with prayer. If you have a prayer concern, just offer it up out loud in this space. It can be a situation, a need, a family member or friend. When I sense we are finished I will close out our prayer.

Lord God, the friend of those in need, your Son Jesus has untied our burdens and healed our spirits. We lift up the prayers of our hearts for those still burdened, those seeking healing, those in need within the church and the world. Hear our prayers that we may love you with our whole being and willingly share the concerns of our neighbors. Amen.

Introduction

I know for many, Revelation is a confusing, bewildering, even frightening portion of Scripture. You can certainly read it that way, and perhaps it does warn us about the future. But I also know Revelation was written for the people of that time. People who were facing an uncertain future, just like us. Written around the close of the 1st century, Christianity had been looked upon by the Roman empire as a sect of Judaism and therefore left Christian alone. But now this was changing. Christians were beginning to face persecution and even death. There own countrymen, seeing them as apostates to Judaism, began turning them in to the authorities. To be a Christian was to often be shut out of the labor guilds because of their unwillingness to show proper allegiance to Caesar, which meant their livelihoods were being threatened. They were viewed with suspicion because they refused to participate in the decadent Roman society in their art, theater, and games.

And so John, exiled on Patmos, receives a revelation from Jesus to encourage these Christians to be faithful in the midst of a beastly empire. From beginning to end their is a single refrain that is repeated throughout: the Lamb has won, Jesus is Lord!

This makes Revelation timely for any generation. I don’t think I need to spell out all the ways we face an uncertain future. Yesterday I officiated the funeral of my friend who died of COVID. His wife now faces an uncertain future without her husband of many years. Soon we will begin to hear stories of torture and death of Christian missionaries and natives left behind in Afghanistan.

Where do we look for hope in the midst of uncertainty? What is the hope for those who suffer, who are in pain, who are oppressed and despised? This is the answer offered by Revelation. The certain hope that how the world is now is not how it will always be. The Lamb has come. The Lamb has won. And the Lamb will reign over a restored creation. “See, I am making all things new.”

New heaven and earth.

Throughout his description of what happens in the end, John makes numerous allusions to the original creation account. His point is that what God began in Creation, what was damaged by human sin, he is now bringing to completion in a new creation. “New” doesn’t mean “brand new” but renewed, restored, recycled. God does not throw out his creation, he restores it. He makes it better than it was before.

And this has application for you. In the end, God doesn’t make all new people. He remakes you. He restores you through your own resurrection so that you too take on the glorious image of the resurrected Christ.

The sea was no more.

The sea in ANE mythology represented a place of chaos, fear, and death. It represented something beyond human ability to control. It was seen to be ruled by an evil god (Yam), and those who ventured out on it took their life in their hands.

Looking back again to Genesis, where in the original creation God subdues the sea, bringing its chaos to order, now in the new creation he has utterly removed it. We need to remember that Revelation in apocalyptic literature, so everything in it is metaphorical. It is inspired truth, but it is truth given through metaphor and symbol. Here what John is expressing is not that in the new creation there won’t be oceans. He’s using the sea in an ANE way, and he is saying that in the new creation there will be none of the chaos of the old order. That which has any ability to harm or cause fear will be utterly eliminated.

Our Christian hope is that the things that bring chaos and destruction into our lives and the lives of those we love are removed forever, being replaced by the eternal peace and wellbeing of God’s presence. Life will not always be hard.

The holy city

Like the garden Temple of Eden, the city-Temple of Jerusalem will sit on a high mountain. This is the image of heaven and earth being fully reunited. The city’s size (here the NRSV let me down) - 12,000 by 12,000 stadia, or 144,000 square stadia. This is roughly the size of the known world in the 1st century. It’s height is 144,000 cubits high. 12 represents the reign of God’. By multiplying the numbers he is pointing to the fullness of God’s reign. The point is that there will be no place in the coming future where God’s rule and reign does not exist.

Later is says of the city that her gates will never be shut. Quoting Isaiah’s prophecy about the future reign of God, John is describing a place of safety and abundance, a place where only righteousness is done, and where there is room for all. Revelation is giving us an imagination for when the reign of God is fully realized under the Lamb.

The point of the vision

The point of all this new creation is captured in verse 3: “See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them as their God; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them;” (Revelation 21:3, NRSV)

This phrase captures the entire biblical storyline. It is repeated in some form or another 13 times in the Old and New Testament. It is the reason for creation, and it is the goal of new creation. Just like in the garden of Genesis, we will walk with God again. He will be “God with us”. In his presence all the old pains and aches of this life are healed. Our tears are dried. Death will no longer have any authority over us, because the Lamb has taken the keys of death and Hades.

What I want you to hear this morning is that God’s great desire is for you. Not what you can do for him, not what you might accomplish for his name, but you. Yes, he might call you to pursue certain kingdom vocations, but it all begins with his calling you to his presence. Your worth to God has nothing to do with your accomplishments, or lack thereof. It is in his presence is where you become a human being instead of a human doing.

Participating in the kingdom now

Let me tell you what I believe with my whole heart. It drives how I read the Bible and how I negotiate the world. I believe Jesus is Lord. Not someday but now. He reigns now, and even right now he IS putting all things under his feet. Because I believe this, then I know that the hope of Revelation isn’t only about the future. It is something we participate in now. Looking back to Jesus’ encounter with the woman at the well whom he offered living water, so now everyone who thirsts, everyone who is dissatisfied, everyone who is weary and worn out, everyone who is sick of the sin in the world AND in their own life, God says come and He will let you drink the water of life. You can start to live in light of the coming kingdom now.

“Blessed are those who wash their robes, so that they will have the right to the tree of life and may enter the city by the gates.” (Revelation 22:14, NRSV)

We can say ‘yes’ to God’s invitation now. I’m not only talking about becoming a Christian. I’m talking about living a kingdom lifestyle now. We can, by the power of the Spirit, live as if the kingdom were a current reality.

I know the pragmatist will say, “No way, this isn’t possible. This won’t work in the real world.” But I believe Jesus did it. And I’m foolish enough to believe that in the power of the Spirit of Christ, we can too. We can walk in this new creation life. We can walk in victory over sin. We can walk in his power and authority. We can walk in light of the reality of God’s kingdom where Jesus is already the reigning Lord.

“The Spirit and the bride say, “Come.” And let everyone who hears say, “Come.” And let everyone who is thirsty come. Let anyone who wishes take the water of life as a gift.” (Revelation 22:17, NRSV)

“See, I am making all things new.”

Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.

Communion

We come to the table seeing it as a sign of a future hope. A day coming when all that is broken is mended, all that is lost is found, all that has died is revived. Jesus said at the last supper, “I tell you, I will never again drink of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.” (Matthew 26:29, NRSV)

In saying this, he implies that a day will come when he will drink with us again. But in the meantime, he has commanded that we continue to drink as a testimony of our faith.

Christ has died.

Christ has risen.

Christ will come again.

Join me in the kingdom prayer Jesus taught us...

The Lords Prayer

Words of Institution