Sermon Tone Analysis

Revelation Series #29

*The New Jerusalem*

*Revelation 21*

 

Oh I don’t know when this day will come … but it IS coming!!

After 1000’s of years of history …

After 2000 + years of waiting for the fulfillment of Christ’s promised return …

After 7 years of Tribulation as God exacts the necessary judgment on those who have rejected him …

After God cleanses and calls Israel back to himself …

After the awful judgment, wars, famine, disease …

After the Bride of Christ is presented spotless and blameless ready for union with Christ …

After the glorious 1000 years of celebration with the Lord …

After the brief and pointless final defeat of Satan …

After the dead without Christ have stood at the Great White Throne …

After all without Christ have been cast with Satan, the Beast, and the False Prophet, into the Fires of Hell …

 

… John’s eyes saw something wonderful

Something New

Something anticipated

Something amazing

Something Wonderful

 

Now, Let’s Read Revelation 21 and see how much we cover today.

*READ CHAPTER 21*

 

Viewpoints: >>

 

Now we’ve had divisions we’ve grown accustomed to for most of this book, 4 of them.

Then the last chapter we have had 3 divisions regarding the 1000 years of chapter 20.

Now for these final 2 chapters there are 3 different divisions that govern our interpretation of these chapters.

These 3 are actually divided into 2 bigger groups

 

The Two Groups are LITERALists and NON-Literalists … hmmm where do you think I may fall?

The Literalists -à Take these two chapters well … pretty literally.

It speaks to a new planet and universe in one sense or another that will be created or recreated at the Close of the Millennium for (pre-mils) or at the Second Coming for some “amills” and some “post-mills”.

They believe that the New Jerusalem will be the eternal home of the redeemed

 

The Non-Literalist -à are sub-divided into two groups …

A) symbolic view– believing that the whole picture is symbolic of a nonmaterial state that we will have in heaven.

B) Spiritualists – see the New Heaven and Earth to represent the New Creation of being born again in Christ.

Thus in the New Heaven and Earth, instead of being in the Old Heaven and Earth of the Old Covenant.

For them the New Jerusalem is the Church itself with the imagery of a New Holy of Holies … That is the Tabernacle of God is with men … in the present earthly existence

 

Now some would also leave room for a bit of a combination saying that while this is definitely pointing to a future time of Eternity with God, it also can be seen as a picture of the perfection that the Church is pressing toward and becoming in Christ Jesus, here and now.

….

Well … I would say that we definitely can learn things about the hear and now by studying this passage.

Hey, I have said that our job is to be a church like Heaven, so there is much to be learned and strived for in this passage.

However, when the natural sense makes GOOD sense, don’t make any other sense or you make nonsense.

Now I will be the first to admit that the images in these last two chapters are Marvelous, Wondrous, Awesome, But they Are REAL

 

They are Trustworthy and True … When you can’t see the Shore keep your eye on the God of the Storm

When you can’t understand or imagine, know what you know, like you’ve never known it before

Believe what you’ve believed more than you’ve ever believed it

What is faith if you have a complete hold on it

Paul didn’t say he had it all figured out

 

He said I KNOW the full details of the Future?

NO

I Know how it’s all going to happened?

NO

He said “I know in whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to keep that which I’ve committed to him against that day”

So if this passage makes perfect sense literarily to believe that it is meant to be TRUE, then I know that this is what God has in STORE for me and though I may not be able to Fathom, it WHO CARES … I cannot fathom God so why should I imagine to fathom his Eternity.

I cannot fathom how he spoke this world into existence so how should I imagine to be able to Fathom how he restores it

 

NEVERTHELESS

 

I KNOW in whom I have Believed and I am CONVINCED, steadfast, standing on solid footing, know that he is ABLE to keep, and deliver to me what he has for me, what he has promised me, what I have committed to him for THAT ETERNAL DAY!

 

Hallelujah!

--- You ought to praise him like a madman!

*1.

John … saw *

  A.

*a New Heaven and an New Earth* – now there is question as to whether this New Heaven and New Earth mean completely recreated out of nothingness or whether it means restored, recreated from the same materials, renewed, cleansed.

Now there are GREAT scholars on BOTH sides, the important thing is we know God is giving us something fresh, but let me tell you why I believe what I believe

    1.

Heaven and Earth – the word for earth literally means the ground, land … and … Heaven … we know there are 3 “Heavens”.

There is the “Heavens” in which the birds fly, where the clouds are, that is our atmosphere.

Then there is the Heavens in which the Stars and planets, the galaxies exist.

And then there is Heaven that is where God dwells, where Christ is at the right hand of the Father even now.

Now, two of those three are subjected to the decay and sinfulness of man.

That would be 1st and 2nd Heaven.

2.

New – the Greek word /kainos// ~/kahee-*nos*~// /-- new, with respect to form, recently made, fresh, unused unworn … with respect to substance – of a new kind, unprecedented, /-- So this earth, and the Heavens, are going to be fresh, new, unworn, unprecedented as nothing we’ve ever seen.

3.

For the First Heaven and First Earth has passed away – First = /protos/ – first in time or place~/succession – had passed away – /aperchomai// ~/ap-*erkh*-om-ahee~/ to go away, depart, to go after/ --- This word was used for a Ship that had gone over the horizon or for a man who had passed through a door.

Now … if the question is whether the OLD earth and heaven have been Annihilated and started over, I don’t think so.

Because when someone goes through a door, they haven’t been done away with, just gone away to a different place, as it is with a ship over the horizon.

--- Can you back that up Pastor?

I’m glad you asked

      a. 2 Peter 3:5,6, 10-13 --- compares the time of the end to the Flood of Noah … look there with me.

Now the Earth Perished or was destroyed … it even changed in configuration and atmosphere, but it didn’t go away … So, the Fire of God will cleanse, renew, restore, change, things.

b.

When does this happen?

Could I offer the suggestion as being at the end of chapter 20.

The Great White Throne is where God judges all those whose name are NOT in the book of life and it says that Heaven and earth fled away?

Could it be that at the Fire of Judgment there, the earth was renewed and cleansed as well?

Could that be the day of fire, the day of purging, the day of universal renovation?

The day when sin is destroyed, the curse is destroyed?

It didn’t happen until then, because death and hades (the grave) are not destroyed until the millennium is over.

c.

One more … Matthew 19:28 – says that “…at the *renewal* of all things, when the Son of Man sits on his throne …” --- that word there renewal or regeneration … means, remaking, rebirth, it is the word /paliggenesia// or palingenesis / … re-birth … the RE – Genesis

      d.

that is what creation is waiting, groaning, longing for … they are NOT longing for annihilation in Romans 9:19 … who would be waiting for that … The earth was cursed by us and it knows that its creator will recreate it one day.

There will be a taste of it in Millennium but completion in the New Heaven and New Earth

 

There will be a time in that day of RE-GENESIS … of all things, Paul says in 2 Cor 5 … that THIS HOUSE I live in is going to be recreated and resurrected … but if it is going to be different, then where is the promise.

If I’m just going to be a completely different look and person in my new body, what hope is there for my current body.

NO … I will be recreated, restored, refreshed, renewed.

Jesus after the Resurrection was still recognizable, yet not always at first.

Why?

I think every wrinkle, laugh line, sign of the struggle of this fallen world was gone.

We were watching Kenny Rogers on TV the other day and I said to Lisa, “what is it, he looks different, his beard is different but that’s not it, his hair is a little different, but that’s not it” … then it hit us … “he’s had a face lift” … there were no lines.

IN the resurrection, I am NOT remade, out of different material, I am restored … so will this earth be, the universe,

 

  B.

* No More Sea* --- what exactly does this mean … no water?

No, I don’t think so.

But it means that it will not be like it is now.

What do the Seas do?