The Lord promised through the prophet Isaiah, "See, I will create new heavens and a new earth. The former things will not be remembered, nor will they come to mind." (Isaiah 65:17) In today's passage this promise is fulfilled.
"Then I saw 'a new heaven and a new earth,' for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea." (Revelation 21:1) It is the Greek word "kainoj" which is translated as "new". According to Strong's Greek Concordance, this word means "fresh, of a new kind, unused". I don't know whether the earth as we now know it will be destroyed and remade or whether it will simply be transformed. Scholars are divided in their opinions on this.
The word John uses for "heaven" is the Greek "ouranoj" which is most often defined as "the sky", meaning the atmosphere that surrounds the earth. So now that sin is no more and death is no more, the world and the atmosphere around it become a paradise that resembles the Garden of Eden but is far superior because now the Lord dwells physically with His people forever, and His people live forever, and never again will a tempter enter paradise, and never again will mankind fall from grace.
This remaking of the earth includes the elimination of the oceans. The majority of the earth is currently covered in water, and the habitable land contains a population of 7.7 billion as of September 2019. But in the eternal kingdom the whole world turns into habitable land. As we discussed yesterday, all the graves are empty by this point in Revelation and another grave will never be dug, so now that sickness and death no longer exist there is no need for things like cemeteries, hospitals, nursing homes, doctor's offices, and pharmacies to take up space. If the amount of usable land we have today is supporting 7.7 billion people, just imagine how many redeemed saints of the Lord will eternally inhabit a world that contains nothing but good usable land.
"I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband." (Revelation 21:2) We will discuss the new Jerusalem in further detail when John describes it later in Chapter 21. Since Christ returned to earth, He has been ruling over it from the old Jerusalem. The old Jerusalem is the city where He was rejected by most of the religious leaders of His day. The old Jerusalem is where He was put on trial, beaten and mocked, condemned to death, and nailed to a cross. The old Jerusalem is where He was placed in a borrowed tomb until He rose in victory early on Sunday morning. Christ isn't going to rule over the earth eternally from the old Jerusalem. He's going to be enthroned forever in a completely fresh and new Jerusalem where His blood was never shed and where no one ever blasphemed His name.
"And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Look! God's dwelling place is now among the people, and He will dwell with them. They will be His people, and God Himself will be with them and will be their God. 'He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death' or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away." (Revelation 21:3-4) The voice from the throne quotes a passage from Isaiah 25 where the Lord speaks of a new day in which He will rules over a world from which death has been abolished.
Have you ever cried or mourned? Have you ever been sick? Have you ever lost a loved one to death? Have you ever thought about or feared your own death? Well, imagine a world where these things don't exist. Imagine a world where such things never enter our minds. Imagine a world where we eternally behold the face of the One who loves us so much that He gave Himself for us so that we could be with Him forever in immortal bodies that are impervious to illness and death. Of course we won't shed any more tears; there will be nothing to cry about.
"He who was seated on the throne said, 'I am making everything new!' Then He said, 'Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.'" (Revelation 21:5) This world we live in often feels like a weary wilderness filled with woes. Just yesterday in the United States we solemnly remembered all those who lost their lives in the 9/11 attacks. No wonder the Lord tells John, "Write this down," when He speaks of the day in which He will make all things new. He knows we need a hope to hold onto. He knows we need reassurance that things won't always be like they are today.
"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 water without cost from the spring of the water of life. Those who are victorious will inherit all this, and I will be their God and they will be My children.'" (Revelation 21:6-7) What makes us victorious? Our faith in Christ. This is the only real victory there is. Faith in Christ gives us victory (forgiveness and mercy and redemption) over our sins. Faith in Christ gives us victory over death, for we who are His will live eternally with Him. Faith is what makes us the children of God and guarantees for us an awesome inheritance: "Now if we are children, then we are heirs---heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ." (Romans 8:17a)
I don't fully understand how Christ is going to help us come to terms with the things in our lives that have hurt us, or how He will help us to forgive and forget everything that's gone wrong in this present world, or how He is going to make all things new and set everything right. But a family member posted the following quote sometime back and I saved it because it reminded me of Revelation 21. I'd like to close our passage today with this quote. The person who penned this quote doesn't understand how the Lord is going to do all the things He's promised, but he believes the Lord will do all these things, so he says: "I believe, like a child, that suffering will be healed and made up for, that all the humiliating absurdity of human contradictions will vanish like a pitiful mirage. In the world's finale, at the moment of eternal harmony, something so precious will come to pass that it will suffice for all hearts, for the comforting of all resentments, for the atonement of all the crimes of humanity, for all the blood they've shed, that it will make it not only possible to forgive, but to justify all that has happened with men." (From The Brothers Karamazov.)
No comments:
Post a Comment