Welcome to The MHB Podcast. This is Michael Baun. And welcome to my 168th episode. In this episode I want to return to our study of the book of Revelation. We are in chapter 21. We’ve finally come to the moment where the old broken world has passed away and the new has arrived. Up to this point Revelation has been a combination of beautiful promises and terrifying judgments. In so many ways the Scriptures have been reflective of life as we know it up until this point. Life is filled with moments of prosperity, happiness, and joy. But there’s also no shortage of pain, suffering, and evil. We see this dichotomy reflected in the Scriptures through and through, but these final chapters are different in that they give us a glimpse into God’s perfect and new creation.
This chapter shows us the dawning of a new era which shall never end. There will be no more sin, no more grief, and no more evil in the perfect kingdom of Jesus Christ. This chapter reveals the perfect an triumphant state of the Church in heaven. This is the promise of perfection that all servants of God will see and enjoy in the future. You should keep this happiness and holiness in mind when serving Christ feels difficult in your own life. Sometimes your service will go thankless and unrewarded in this world – but your eternal home in heaven will never be taken from you so long as you trust in Jesus. This chapter gives us an introduction to the vision of the new Jerusalem as well as the contents of the vision itself. Let’s read verses 1-8:
Rev 21:1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, and there is no longer any sea.
Rev 21:2 And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
Rev 21:3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is among the people, and He will dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be among them,
Rev 21:4 and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.”
Rev 21:5 And He who sits on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” And He *said, “Write, for these words are faithful and true.”
Rev 21:6 Then He said to me, “It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give water to the one who thirsts from the spring of the water of life, without cost.
Rev 21:7 “The one who overcomes will inherit these things, and I will be his God and he will be My son.
Rev 21:8 “But for the cowardly, and unbelieving, and abominable, and murderers, and sexually immoral persons, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, their part will be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.”
This passage gives us a view of the church as it will be in heaven. Again I’m not going to claim perfect knowledge of what heaven will be like, but we can do our best to describe it. This place will be a new creation entirely – a new universe. But I don’t think it’s accurate to say this place will be newly created so much as it will be newly opened. It will be populated by those whose names are written in the book of life – those who are sons and daughters of God through Jesus Christ. When we get to heaven we will have glorified bodies which means no part of us will be disordered. Right now we live in a space where our temporal, physical nature is easier to apprehend than our eternal, spiritual nature. But in heaven this distinction will be gone and we will experience the full rapture of spiritual existence. Scripture speaks of pure, expansive mansions which make up the living spaces God the Father has made ready for us. When this new universe is opened the old one – with all its troubles, grief, and pain – will pass away.
The apostle John was given a vision of this new universe and in it he saw the holy city Jerusalem coming down from heaven. We can think of the new Jerusalem as a place but I think another accurate understanding is that it represents the body of Christ’s followers. It is the church of God in a new and perfected condition. When we are in heaven we will be perfected with wisdom and holiness – so that we may bask in the presence of Jesus Christ in the full array of His glory. In John’s vision this presence is celebrated and proclaimed by a great voice from heaven which says: Behold, the tabernacle of God is among the people, and He will dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be among them. God walked with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden before the Fall – and the aim of His entire redemptive work since that moment has been to restore us so that we may walk with Him once again. In John’s vision of heaven God walks among His people and His holy presence glorifies the church.
Right now we experience the presence of God when we’re in the midst of worship, prayer, or just connecting with Him in some profound way. I’ve often heard accounts of believers feeling closest to God when they are alone in nature. But as much as we try these moments of euphoria are fleeting in this life. It’s never long before the sinful world breaks through again and creates barriers between ourselves and the holy presence of God. But in heaven the presence of God will be uninterrupted in perfect clarity and He will dwell with us continually. Right now the faithful live in a covenant relationship with God, but in heaven this covenant relationship will be fulfilled. Heaven is as indescribably perfect as it is because we will be fully assimilated with the entirety of God’s love. Your spirit will experience love, honor, and delight which reaches far beyond comprehension by comparison to anything you’ve felt on earth. The holiness of the image of God which shapes your spirit will be perfected and you will rest in His immediate presence as if you had belonged there the entire time. You will finally be home.
There will be no suffering, no trouble, and no sorrow in heaven. All of these are referred to as the former things which will have passed away. God Himself will wipe away every tear and every sign of sadness from your life on earth. The effects of sin will be expunged forever and you won’t even remember the things which bring you sorrow right now. I suspect it will feel something like waking up from a dream or a nightmare. The reality of your suffering will become a distant thing of the past which no longer has any effect on you beyond making the present moment all the sweeter. In heaven there shall no longer be any death, pain, crying, or mourning. God Himself will cause these things to pass away forever.
You might think this sounds too good to be true, but the truth and certainty of this future is ratified by the word of God Himself. He will do it on His own authority which means there is no stopping it. When He declared these promises He ordered that they be committed to writing as a matter of perpetual record. I think this chapter is arguably the most important chapter in the entire Bible. The promises found here and in the final chapter – Revelation 22 – are promises so great that I don’t think you can survive as a Christian without knowing them. So many people in this world are living as if their brief time on earth is all they have. There are even many Christians who do this. But imagine the peace which would wash over you if you really lived your life in light of eternity. Imagine if you truly connected with these divine promises of the heaven which is to come. How would your life change if you had proof that this was your future? Would even want to be alive on earth anymore? I’m convinced of the importance of this revelation because these promises come directly from the mouth of God and they are ratified by none other than Him. We’re not meant to walk through the trials and challenges of life bereft of the promises of God. We’re meant to lean into these promises and use them for encouragement and remembrance that He is working for the ultimate good.
When God makes a promise we might as well consider the thing already done. God’s word is the most faithful and true foundation upon which we may build our lives. The culture changes from generation to generation and trends come and go – but the word of God is eternal and will never change. Alongside God’s promise in this passage is a presentation of His titles – Alpha and Omega – which means the beginning and the end. This is meant to give us perspective that God resides outside of time and He has been in full control of His redemptive project from the beginning to the end. We don’t have to worry about whether the work will be finished because God is the One who gave rise to it in the beginning for Himself and He will also finish it for Himself.
God is the beginning and the end. He is the first cause of all things and the end of all things is aimed at His glorification. Humanity often sets out on grand adventures to build or create things which either end in failure or never come to completion. But God’s counsel will never pass away and His designs will come to fruition just exactly as He planned them. We might not be able to describe precisely what heaven will be like – but we certainly know what it feels like to be missing it. Every person on earth carries inside of them a lingering sense that the world is not the way it ought to be. This sense is probably the primary motivating factor which drives all of our attempts at progress. This desire for a holy and heavenly place – this desire for eternity – has been placed in our hearts by God Himself. C.S. Lewis thought our longings are reflective of the structure of reality. We have a longing for food and food exists. We have a longing for sex and sex exists. We have a longing for relationship and relationships exist. We also have a longing for meaning and he thought this longing would not be part of our being if we truly lived in a meaningless world. God has made our hearts to desire heaven and eternal life, and since God is good we can be certain he will give us to drink from the fountain of the water of life freely.
When we think about this too-good-to-be-true future in heaven our natural human inclination is to assume we must earn it. After all, that’s how we operate with each other in the world we live in now. But I think the differentiating factor between ourselves and God is that we humans only have limited resources to offer. We can’t work for free because we only have so much time in the day and we need to be able to survive ourselves. We can’t give away all of our goods and services because our supply depends on revenue. None of these things are a problem for God. Everything already belongs to Him and He has unlimited resources to work with. The sacrifices God asks us to make in life are not so that we can earn His favor, rather they are meant to shape our own spirits into the Christlike ideal. When it comes to salvation and our eternity in heaven, God has done the work for us and He gives us this future freely because He loves us. But since we live in a world where we can’t avoid having to earn good things in order to survive, we must always guard our hearts against the false notion that God’s love is one of these good things we must also earn. To live as if you must earn God’s favor will crush you – but to truly understand God’s grace and infinite love will set you free.
Part of the perfection of eternity with God is the complete fullness of it. To be one with the source of all blessedness is to inherit all things. An enjoyment of God is an enjoyment of all things because God is all in all. Imagine if tomorrow you were made the most powerful human on earth. I’m not just talking about money either – I’m talking about seemingly absolute power in the human kingdom. You’d be able to do anything and everything your heart desires. Even if you were given this position you wouldn’t even be able come close to what it’s like to enjoy the all-encompassing paradise which is an uninterrupted eternity in God’s presence. That’s because the entirety of your heart’s desires – even if you had the power to fulfill them – is missing so much of the framework necessary to even understand the joys which await you in heaven. Our hearts have the in-built sense that this world is not the way it ought to be, but we are absolutely unequipped to understand just how good things can get. We don’t even know how to ask the question of how good things can be because we can’t comprehend the infinite upside of God’s eternal love. The best we can do is imagine what it would be like to have everything, but even these most beautiful imaginations fall far short of what God has actually designed for us in His holy kingdom.
If humanity needed to earn their spot in the presence of God we’d all be in real trouble. Not only are we desperately flawed, but as we’ll see at the end of this passage the human condition becomes quite terrifying when we reject the Spirit of God’s grace to indwell our hearts and sanctify us. Our place in heaven is made ready for us not because of our godly works, but because of our relationship with God through Jesus Christ. Heaven is a blessing and an inheritance which is given to us because we are children of God. Your title as a child of God is unparalleled as the most honorable title you could possibly hold. You could be homeless and living under a bridge, but if you’re a child of God you hold a position more honorable than that of a king.
You should really reflect on this honor because too often Christians chase the respect which comes with worldly ranking. But the respect which comes with being powerful in the world will be stripped away from you the moment another comes along who has more to offer the world than you do. If you seek to build your identity on the honor which comes with good standing in the world then be advised you build on shaky foundations. It’s not hard to smear a person and undermine their position in the social hierarchy. This kind of thing happens in politics all the time. Instead you should build your identity on the heavenly honor which comes from the title of being a child of God. This honor will never be taken from you so long as you are in relationship with God. This honor transcends the world and is impervious to its attacks. Not to mention that building your identity on your position as a child of God will preserve your heart from being given over to wickedness.
A child of God is characterized by the fruit of the Spirit which are: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. But those who perish are the wicked and their character is described here at the end of this passage. The traits which stand prominently at the front of this description are cowardliness and unbelief. These are those who lack the faith required to pick up their cross and follow Jesus. But it’s not as if this wickedness begins and ends at simple fearfulness. As a person continually rejects God their heart begins to morph in such a way that it becomes abominable. In full maturity the wicked heart chases after murder, adultery, sorcery, deception, and idolatry. A person who has completely given themselves over to this kind of evil does not want to be with God.
If we suppose that human beings are eternal and we suppose that God is the definer of all which is good – then what happens to those who don’t want to be with God. They willingly walk down a road which leads away from all that is good and they walk down this road forever. This separation from God is illustrated in this passage as being cast into the lake of fire which is called the second death. If you reject the Source of life and are also eternal by nature, then you consign yourself to a fate in which you die in perpetuity. You never really stop dying. Without the grace of God this would be the fate of us all because our hearts desire war with Him. But God’s desire is that not even one person would choose such a fate. That’s the point of the gospel and that’s the purpose for Christ’s sacrifice on the cross. He has taken our wickedness upon himself and imputed His own righteousness onto us so that we may be justified and enter into the kingdom of heaven. The gospel is the ultimate manifestation of God’s grace and love for us. In this world the success of the wicked aggravates the pain of their victims. But in the world to come the blessedness of the children of God will aggravate the bitterness of those who choose to walk without Him. And the misery of those who draft their own eternity by declaring themselves gods will by contrast highlight joyfulness of those who choose eternal life in His presence.
So I’m going to do this a little bit differently and break this chapter into two parts. We did verses 1-8 in this episode and we’ll do verses 9-27 in the next episode. I’ve done this before and I think doing it this way is advantageous when approaching dense chapters like this one. I never want to rush through passages in my effort to be consistent with putting out episodes on time. I think these passages deserve deep dives and careful meditations. So we will leave it there and I will begin working on the remainder of this chapter for the next episode. I should have it out to you in a few days and hopefully no longer than a week. Until then thank you so much for listening and I hope these final portions of Revelation bring hope and peace to your spirit just as much as they have my own. God bless.
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