Order in the Eternal Kingdom

Transcript

GR 2060
12/02/2018
Order in the Eternal Kingdom
Revelation 22:1-5
Gil Rugh

We sing about heaven, we’re studying about heaven. What a glorious future. It won’t get any better than this. All that Scripture contains telling us of the glories God has promised for us, He pulls together in a fuller and greater way than He has in any other part of Scripture. How fitting it is, in the closing chapters of the last book, which is the last revelation He has given for us as His people, so we’re in Revelation chapter 22 we are ready for as we come here. We’re going to move around a little bit. The description has come from chapter 21, really the opening nine verses; eight verses gave just an overview contrasting. If you’ve been here for the study in chapter 20 verses 11 to 15, He talked about the final eternal destiny of all of those who have not been redeemed through faith in the salvation that God has provided, the death and resurrection of Christ.

Then when you come to chapter 21, we are ready, we have moved through the first phase of the eternal kingdom called the millennium, the 1,000 years. Christ has ruled on earth. It has been a time when the curse was lifted from the creation. The Son of God was present, enthroned on the earth but there was a rebellion at the end of those 1,000 years, and then a final judgment of all unbelievers from all time, the great white throne judgment. Then the new heavens and the new earth descend. The new Jerusalem, the bride city comes down out of heaven to the new earth. It is new, it has a connection to the old, but it is new and transformed in every way. The holy city in chapters 21, 22 is the holy Jerusalem. Jerusalem, the city of such prominence and importance in Scripture, but now realized in the fullness of what God intended.

It is heaven come down to earth, so beginning with verse 10 and following of chapter 21 He’s describing the city, the new Jerusalem. It is the dwelling place of the redeemed, the redeemed in glorified bodies. We looked in Hebrews chapter 12. Remember there are distinctions even into eternity and in the new Jerusalem. In John 14 Jesus said, “In My Father’s house are many dwelling places . . . I go to prepare a place for you,” prepare a dwelling place for you. In the new Jerusalem, there’ll be a special place for the church as well as Old Testament saints, Israel and so on. Angels will reside there, but the church has a place of prominence. It’s described as the bride of Christ in chapter 19 and this is the bride city, which shows something of the preeminence. It’s a beautiful city, a city characterized, and again a connection to what we identify with, precious stones, a city of gold, streets of gold. Verse 23, ah verse 22, “I saw no temple in it, for the Lord God, the Almighty, and the Lamb, are its temple.” We note the connection the Lord God and the Almighty.

They don’t need the sun here or the moon. The glory of God, remember God is light, in Him is no darkness. It fills the city, with light. There are nations outside the city, redeemed people living in physical bodies, as Adam and Eve did in the garden of Eden. These are people who have come through all preceding matters, have not died or been martyred but they have their faith in Christ. They’ll go into the eternal phase of the kingdom after the 1,000 years. The indication seems to be they’ll have children, and it will be like Adam and Eve before the fall, with the exception.

There are only two heads of the race in the bible, Adam in the garden and the second Adam, Christ as He is delineated. All of us have descended from Noah, but Noah is not considered a head of the race because he didn’t begin it. It goes back to Adam, in the garden, and then Christ as the one who could bring the redemption for the race and the creation that had been corrupted by the sin of the first Adam.

So there are nations here and kings. They’ll walk by the light of this city. A tremendous city, we noted it’s 1,500 miles square and high, a cube. We noted all that preceded the tabernacle in the Old Testament, the Book of Exodus and then followed by Solomon’s temple, a more permanent residence, but within that, there was a cube 15 by 15 in the tabernacle then 30 by 30 in Solomon’s temple. That’s where God’s presence resided among His people. Within that place was the ark of the covenant and the mercy seat, and that was the place where God manifested His presence among His people. We’ll say more about that in a moment. In this city the nations, the kings, they’ll all bring their glory into it to worship the God who resides there.

You can see, heaven has come down to earth. The dwelling place of God, who is omnipotent, where He manifests His personal presence, will be on the new earth in the new Jerusalem. That’s what makes it heaven. That’s why the new Jerusalem comes down out of heaven. Nothing unredeemed will ever enter this city. They have no part, verse 27 of chapter 21. Only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life and we noted, all humanity is divided into two groups, redeemed and unredeemed. There are only two destinies, eternal hell and eternal heaven. All the unredeemed have already been sentenced to eternal hell. This’ll be a place where only the redeemed, whose names were in the book of life, can come.

I want to take you back to 1 Corinthians 15. I’ve alluded to this passage but I don’t know that we’ve really looked at it. First Corinthians chapter 15. First Corinthians 15, many of you are familiar, is the great chapter on bodily resurrection in the bible. It makes clear we will undergo a resurrection of our physical bodies, a transformation. Something like the body of Christ when He was raised from the grave after three days. We will get resurrected bodies but I want to point to what happens after this. Verse 20 says “now Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who are asleep” the guarantee of a coming resurrection. “Since by man came death,” that was the first Adam, in the garden of Eden in chapter 3 when he rebelled against God. “By a man also came the resurrection of the dead.” Jesus Christ is God, but He is also fully human, fully man, so Adam brought death by his rebellion. Christ brought life by His coming and dying on the cross to bring salvation to those who believe in Him. “Each in his own order; Christ the first fruits, after that those who are Christ’s at His coming, then comes the end,” so here you have a condensed summary of prophecy, just taking major steps. Christ is raised from the dead. We will be raised from the dead, and “then, comes the end,” verse 24.

Now note this, “when He hands over the kingdom to the God and Father, when He has abolished all rule and all authority and all power, for He must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet. The last enemy that will be abolished is death.” We’ve seen this in our study of Revelation. When we get into chapter 21, what happens? At the end of chapter 20, “death and Hades are thrown into the lake of fire,” and chapter 21 tells us “there will be no more death. No more tears no more suffering.” It’s been dealt with so the last enemy that will be destroyed is death that happens after the 1000 years, the first phase of the eternal kingdom.

Death is done away with, He will reign until He has put all enemies under His feet; the last enemy that is abolished is death. “For He has put all things in subjection under His feet,” but when He says, “All things are put in subjection,” it is evident that He is excepted who put all things in subjection to Him. One of those sentences you say, I have to read that again. Basically, He is saying God the Father put all things in subjection to God the Son, so when I say all things, Paul’s writing, are put in subject to Christ of course that excludes God the Father. Remember Jesus told His disciples what we call the Great Commission, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth,” so God the Father here.

Look at verse 28, “when all things are subjected to Him, then the Son Himself also will be subjected to the One who subjected all things to Him, so that God may be all in all.” You don’t want to have any misunderstanding of this passage. What he is saying, we know from fuller revelation, particularly what we’ve seen in the Book of Revelation and the closing part, chapters 20 and 21 and now we’ll look into 22.

That first phase of the eternal kingdom, the millennium, the 1,000 years, is where Christ finally defeats and brings to their ultimate end all unredeemed, those who have been in rebellion against God. That’s when Satan was cast into an eternal hell with his demons in Revelation 20.

Then those who have joined in the rebellion of Satan are called into judgment at the great white throne, so if you back up to verse 24 of chapter 15 of 1 Corinthians, “then comes the end when He hands over the kingdom to the God and Father, when He has abolished all rule authority and power.” Satan’s power is gone. All power, all authority, now has been assumed by Christ. Then He hands it over to the Father, the work of redemption is fully completed. It’s done, there’s nothing more to be done.

All rebellion has been removed in the spirit world and in the human world. Sin has been finally dealt with and eradicated from the creation. There are those in hell but that’s their fit destiny, so verse 28 says “when all things are subjected to Him,” that is the Christ, “then the Son Himself also will be subjected to the One who subjected all things to Him. He too will be subjected to God the Father, so that God may be all in all.” Now I want to be careful here. This does not mean that Christ is inferior to God the Father. He is God the Son but there was order in the Godhead, there always has been an eternal order. God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, we talk about there is one God eternally existing in three Persons and there is order in the Godhead. Now this is the battle going on.

The creation reflects the character of God; we were created in the image of God. We’ve talked about this on other occasions. What happened when God created man in His image? He created them as male and female, and there was an order established from the beginning when there were only two, Adam and Eve. Adam had the role of leadership and authority. Eve was subjected to him. That’s God’s plan throughout His creation. That creation in rebellion against Him is constantly fighting. That’s why as we’ve talked about Romans 13 where rulers, God has appointed rulers. He’s put them into place at all levels and when you rebel against the ruler He has appointed, you are in rebellion against God.

We see that reflected throughout our society in the world. The constant turmoil, the constant battle, the constant rejection of authority and leadership, so it pervades. There is that order in the Godhead. Back up to 1 Corinthians 11 since you’re here, verse two of 1 Corinthians 11. “Now I praise you because you remember me in everything, hold firmly to the traditions just as I delivered them to you.” Now that’s not traditions like we talk about today. Those traditions are what are recorded in the Word, what Paul has delivered to them. The Word of God, what they should be practicing. Note this, “but I want you to understand that Christ is the head of every man, the man is the head of a woman, and God is the head of Christ.” God the Father is the head of God the Son. There is an order in the Godhead.

Then he goes on to talk about that was established at the creation, verse seven. “Man ought not to have his head covered since he is the image and glory of God. The woman is the glory of the man. The woman was created out of the man. Man does not originate from woman, woman from man. Man was not created for woman’s sake but the woman for the man’s sake.”

In the Godhead, God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit are eternal because that’s one of the attributes of God that cannot be altered but the order within the Godhead is reflected when God does the creation. It was reflected in the angelic realm and we have indications of that in various places of Scripture where there was order. I am emphasizing this because we’ve come to where we say equality is sameness, so we rebel at the idea of authority, and we as believers battle with it and some who claim to believe the bible try to explain away the Scripture and all of us struggle to live in obedience to it.

We get political rulers we don’t like, we tend to be disrespectful, which God said is being disrespectful to Him because He appointed that ruler. Children have problems obeying their parents but Scripture says they’re to obey their parents, this is right in the Lord because that’s the order that God’s established. The manifestation of sin and sin’s rebellion against God. Wives have a hard time, submitting to the husband’s authority and in all these areas, we have good reasons for our rebellion, but we don’t have any acceptable reasons before God. All that to say, here submission does not imply inferiority, otherwise Christ could not be God.

Come back to Revelation chapter 22. Some of this will help prepare us. You’ll note chapter 22 opens; we’ve seen this in previous sections, in verse 22 of chapter 21. “I saw no temple in it, the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb are its temple,” so you see, the temple is the place where God resides, where God is worshiped, and Christ the Lamb who brought about the redemption, is God. He’s in the temple where God resides to be worshiped.

When you come down to chapter 22 verse 1, “then he showed me a river of the water of life,” we’ll talk about that in a moment, but look, “coming from the throne of God and of the Lamb.” It’s not from the thrones of God and the Lamb, but now there is one throne. That was not true in the first 1,000 years. God was enthroned in heaven, Christ was enthroned on the earth, ruling over the world during that 1,000 year kingdom, sometimes called the Mediatorial kingdom, because God the Father is ruling through God the Son, but there are separate thrones.

Now here you see they have one throne. That’s why, in 1 Corinthians 15, when the work of redemption is finally completed through its final phase with the judgment and removal of all sin, death is over because death is the wage of sin and when there’s no sin, there’s no more death, it’s been dealt with. We have the final work of redemption. He turns it over to the Father and now you have the glory which was His. Remember Jesus prayed, “Restore unto Me, the glory I had with You before the world was.” Isaiah had a picture of the preincarnate glory of Christ in Isaiah 6. “I saw the Lord, lofty and exalted, sitting on His throne in His robe and the glory filled the temple.” In the Gospel of John, chapter 12 tells us that Isaiah’s vision was of the preincarnate Christ, so here you see the throne of God and the Lamb. The kingdom is turned over to God the Father. Now God is all in all, but even in that, there is order, the eternal order, not inferiority but order.

God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, this will be mentioned down in verse 3 as well. There will no longer be any curse. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it and His bondservants will serve Him. The throne of God and the Lamb will be in it. The Holy Spirit is also God but as is characteristic of Scripture, He is not given the prominent attention in revelation. Talking about God’s revealing Himself, not just the Book of Revelation, He is also God, but here the focus is on God now enthroned. That’s why Christ turns over, there is no longer a separation, with God the Father ruling from heaven, God the Son for example, ruling on earth. God is all in all, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, so there is one throne, so don’t get confused and think well then Jesus is less than God is. No, this is the work of redemption is complete, now He will sit enthroned.

That’s why the throne room in chapters 4 and 5 we saw Christ being honored, and exalted, and worshiped, and praised because He brought about the redemption that had brought the corruption of sin to the creation. His work enabled it to be brought back to where it could realize the fullness of what God created it for, to be holy as He is holy. To be devoid of sin and so on.

So we’ve really come to the ultimate and you see the power and wonder of the salvation that Christ has provided. This is going to enable us, remember Adam and Eve before the fall into sin; they walked in personal fellowship with God. He came and walked with them in the garden of Eden. When the new Jerusalem comes down onto the new earth, you know what? God will be there, and remember the gates of this city are never closed. There’s no separate temple because God and the Lamb are the temple. That was chapter 21 verse 22; “the Lord God, the Almighty, and the Lamb are the temple.”

What is the temple; it’s the place, where God manifests His presence. I have to take you back to Ezekiel chapter 47. Alluded to this, we talked about the various manifestations of God’s presence among His people. You take the tabernacle and we’ve talked about that in the Book of Exodus and among Israel. Remember they were to construct the tabernacle, in the tabernacle there was this, we’ll call it a sanctuary. When it becomes permanent, they’ll call it a temple, but it had an outer area, just limiting it to the sanctuary area within called the holy place and then within was the holy of holies and that’s what I referred to a little bit earlier again, it was a cube. In the tabernacle, that portable tent structure, it was 15 by 15. In that, there was the ark of the covenant and the mercy seat on top. What was the ark of the covenant with the mercy seat on top? That’s where God came down and manifested the glory of His presence among His people.

Then when Solomon built a more permanent structure, the temple, it was a little larger. The holy of holies, where God’s presence would be manifested, was 30 by 30 by 30, a cube. Within it was the ark of the covenant and the mercy seat where God would meet with His people. And there was a second temple built under Ezra but jump to Ezekiel. Ezekiel, once Jerusalem was destroyed, the temple was destroyed by the Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzar. The ark disappears. Now we have the millennial temple. You know you have a lot of discussion going on. I saw some on the news about Jerusalem and the temple and some of that here not too long ago, but there is a future temple going to be constructed on the earth. There’s going to be one in the Tribulation.

We talked about that, but now in the first 1,000 years of the eternal kingdom there is going to be what we call a millennial temple. That’s described in Ezekiel chapters 40 to 48. I encourage you, if you haven’t read that, just read through it. We don’t have to do a detailed study, but you’ll get something of the description. I want to take you to chapter 47. We don’t have time to do a study of this millennial temple. This is a millennial temple, the description of it makes clear it’s not the same thing as what we’re talking about in Revelation chapters 21 and 22. Its size will be much smaller. The description, there are similarities, there are differences. We want to pick up some of the similarities because, remember, each of these, the tabernacle under Moses and up until the temple, those were just miniatures. They’re called a shadow, a pattern made after the one in heaven.

The new Jerusalem is what the pattern for these earthly structures are. That’s why God gave Moses the pattern of how it should be constructed and what should be in it. Then the temple under Solomon is modeled under that. Now this temple in Ezekiel, and we’ll get more details than we got prior, and other things will be added. This is the millennial temple. It will be in existence for the first 1,000 years when Christ rules on the earth. You know we’re not going through all the details, but when you read through, note there are two things missing in this millennial temple, the ark of the covenant and the mercy seat that was on the top of the ark. Now what were they? They were the place where God would come down, manifest His presence among His people, and meet with His people.

There’ll be a millennial temple, but you won’t need the ark of the covenant and the mercy seat. Why? Because the Son of God will be present on earth in Jerusalem, so the One in whom all the fullness of deity dwells in bodily form will dwell on earth among His people, so there is no mercy seat. There is no ark of the covenant. Put in other ways, the description and you’ll see here it is again, a miniature of heaven, and we have much more detail, it’s of the new Jerusalem.

Look at verse 1, “then he brought me back to the door of the house; and behold,” note this, we’re going to see it in Revelation 22, “the water was flowing from under the threshold of the house toward the east.” We just want to pick up the water was flowing here. Now there was water in the garden of Eden. The rivers are mentioned there and how they flowed, but here you have water flowing from the temple, the house of God. Telling you how it faced at the end of verse one, “the water was flowing down from under, from the right side of the house, from the south of the altar.” So coming out from the altar comes this water indicating its water that comes from God. It is life-sustaining life-giving water, as we’ll see, and he’s brought out. Ezekiel is in a vision here and the angel showing him and they start to walk in the water and the further they walk the deeper it gets until it gets to the point they had to go back to land because Ezekiel said we couldn’t cross it anymore, it got too deep so you can read the details. Now the water goes down to the sea. Well this is not the new Jerusalem because, remember, on the new earth where the new Jerusalem is there is no sea, so you don’t want to confuse this temple with the eternal, new Jerusalem that will come down out of heaven after this temple, after the 1,000 years.

Come to verse 12 of Ezekiel 47. “By the river on its bank, on one side and on the other will grow all trees for food. Their leaves will not wither their fruit will not fail. They will bear every month because their water flows from the sanctuary their fruit will be for food their leaves for healing.” So, this water coming from the throne sustains trees that have monthly cycles during the millennium, and those trees provide food, and it is an unfailing supply because the water that sustains them comes from God, so that picture.

Jump over to chapter 48 while you’re here. We looked at this before. Verse 30, there are exits of the city on the north and then on the four sides you have described here and remember in the new Jerusalem there are gates on each side. Three gates on each of the four sides and you have the picture so there are things alike because each of these places—just limiting it to the three we talk about, the Old Testament tabernacle, Solomon’s temple and now the millennial temple. They are all patterned after what is true in heaven, which we find in Revelation, is the new Jerusalem, so when the new Jerusalem descends after the 1,000 years there’s no place for this tabernacle. It is again totally inferior because it is just a model.

You know I used to have some models. They were great and if they were of a car the more detail they had the more I could find out about the car, but you know I had some models of some great cars but I never had the car. There’s a distinction but there is a similarity. You could look at the different features and the more details. I had a man show me a model he had constructed of a car, a car that was very rare and very well—and everything was down to the detail in this little car that could be set in a room here a small room and just like you know a decoration. But he said everything down to the last screw and bolt is exactly like that, so that’s a model that is very much like it, but it still wasn’t the car. You know the reality was so much more I couldn’t get in that. You know you can put your finger in, you could remove the door, but you couldn’t get in. That’s the new Jerusalem; it is the realization and you have dimensions here of the millennial kingdom Jerusalem, and temple. It’s nothing, the new Jerusalem that comes down, here now we have the reality “that city whose builder and maker is God” that we talked about from Hebrews.

All right come back to Revelation and as we start chapter 22, “He showed me the river of the water of life, clear as crystal, coming from the throne of God and of the Lamb.” That’s why we talk so much about that throne on which God and the Lamb, they are sovereign here even though the order within the Godhead they rule over all. The water of life is coming from there. Where did the river, the life sustaining water come from in the millennial temple? It came from within the holy of holies from the altar from where God resides. It comes from the throne of God and of the Lamb. Here, this is the water of life now.

In the garden of Eden we had the tree of life. We had the river there that would have been sustaining even though it’s not called the water of life, but you see some of the similarity, but now we’re getting greater detail. In the millennium we had this river coming out from the presence of God. Now we have it called the water of life from the throne. “In the middle of the street, on either side of the river, was the tree of life bearing twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations,” so a picture here and you can read commentaries if you want to try to figure out. You have this river flowing out from the throne of God, so He’s the source. What is the source of life? Well God, He’s the author of life. He’s the Creator of life. He created life out of nothing. He created the dust of the earth and out of the dust of the earth he created man and then He breathed into man, so the man could become a living being, so we have the water of life, we have the tree of life.

That tree of life carries us back to the garden of Eden. It bears twelve kinds of fruit. Remember that in Ezekiel’s temple the trees were bearing fruit every month. Well don’t confuse it, of course it’s similar. We just got more detail; they didn’t have that as part of prior revelation for the tabernacle. It would have been hard because that was a temporary moveable structure. You can’t plant trees when you’re going to be moving next week and then the temple, again it wasn’t the final, so certain things are true in each of these but now more is added. So we saw in the millennial temple you would expect more to be there, because the model has grown and become more clear. The details have been expanded to clarify, even though the holy of holies, I believe, in the millennial temple is still 30 by 30 as it was in Solomon’s. Now we’re going to jump to 1,500 by 1,500, it’s a huge change. They bear 12 kinds of fruit and that yields fruit every month.

I read a commentary and it’s a very good commentary, but the man said well, this couldn’t be months because we’re in eternity and in eternity, there won’t be any time. What does it mean there won’t be any time? Of course there’ll have to be time, we’re created beings. Even if God dwells in the eternal present, which I think may not be the best way theologically to look at it, but time is just basically one thing happens after another. All created beings live in time. They do one thing and then they do another, do another and do another. Well that sequence. Why can’t there be months? It says there will be every month and there’ll be 12 months because there’ll be 12 kinds of fruit, a different one each month. Why would you say well this can’t really be months because there’ll be no months in eternity? Who said? You ever been in eternity? Me neither. You know the only one who dwells in eternity, you know what He says, there’ll be 12 months.

Now how we keep track of these months after 47 trillion years, I don’t know, but I’m finite, so are you but He says it and the leaves of the trees were for the healing of the nations. Now wait a minute we said all sin’s been done. There will be people coming into the eternal kingdom, this phase after the 1,000 years in physical bodies. Now I noted, it seems the indications they’ll have children. The national identities are continued, as will be Israel’s identity and so on. What do they need healed from? This is where it’s translated healing, like our word therapeutic. This is where we get the word therapeutic from this word. It’s their health. In other words, you can come and eat of the tree of life. You know the only tree that Adam and Eve were told you are not allowed to eat from was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They could have stuffed themselves with fruit from the tree of life, but they chose to rebel.

You know sometimes like us when we’re told don’t do that. All of a sudden, I think I’ll do that. You know it’s like you want your kids to go to school in the morning, tell them they’re not allowed to go to school. Oh, I think I’ll go to school today. I don’t want to go tomorrow but I’ll go today. That’s what happens; it was put before them and Satan came to push them. They weren’t yet sinful but Satan was. Oh, there’s a lot of advantage to eating of this tree. You’ve got to do it soon. Well, I take it it’s the health of the nations. In other words, what we’re saying, here’s the water of life, here’s the tree of life, you just come in and drink and eat all you want.

That pictures the life that is there is, the life of God is now. There are only two Adams so there will not be a repeat of the cycle. Adam and Eve were in the garden in what we call untried holiness where they hadn’t been confirmed in that holiness and so when they rebelled, they fell. Then God put an angel with a flaming sword and He pushed them out of the garden and said you can’t come back and the angel was there to make sure. Why? Because if you come back in and eat of the tree of life you’ll live forever as a fallen being like Lucifer perhaps. The redemptive work of Christ, the second Adam, now when we are saved we are confirmed in our holiness, even though it’s not brought to completion in our experience until a future time.

When we move into the eternal phase after the 1,000 years, the sin nature will be gone. It never was part of the original creation anyway. Adam and Eve didn’t have one and they would have been confirmed in holiness just like we are today. Our sin nature has not been removed but we’re confirmed in our holiness. You have a salvation which you cannot lose, you cannot give up, so there we will have the eternal dimension, so the fruit, the provision in the new Jerusalem.

How it’s arranged, some would take it coming out the water that comes down the middle of the street. Then you have on either side, the street and between the street and the edge of the water, you have trees, so you can walk down there. You can read the different ones and some of you are artistic, you can make your own picture, but it’s clear. It’s very similar to Ezekiel, because remember in Ezekiel, we’re in the kingdom, so you would expect the model would be a clearer model of what’s it’s going to be like when we cross out of the 1,000 years. Now at that point Ezekiel didn’t know anything about something beyond that. There’s more revelation to come. You’re told in verse 3 “there will no longer be any curse.” The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and their presence on the new earth, and you’ll note it’s the “throne of God and the Lamb,” so when Christ turns it over to God the Father and is subject to the Father, the order in the Godhead is now complete and full. The work of redemption is done and there is one throne, the throne of God, occupied by the Father and the Son.

Now I take it even though the Spirit doesn’t go into it, since He’s not usually the One focused on, He is also God. We saw Him earlier in Revelation manifested, so there can’t be any curse, any cause of judgement. That word for curse means “something that brings condemnation or judgment.” None of that will be present anymore and that word bondservant translates in our English bibles, the word doulos. It’s simply the word slave and His slaves will serve Him. That word serve is the word often used, not always but often of priestly service of spiritual service.

So, what are we going to do? Well lay around in a lounge chair under a tree and eat fruit. No! We are going to serve Him. We are His slaves. Take all the negative connotations out of this. We are slaves of the living God. By His grace, we were slaves of sin but now we’ve become slaves of righteousness. Now you have the work of salvation complete. We are holy as He is holy. He said we are to be holy as He is, but now we will see it all accomplished firmly finally forever. His slaves will serve Him. We’ll be ruling with Him, we’ll be reigning with Him. We’ll see that in a moment.

They will see His face and we’ve seen glimpses in Scripture. We not only will see God the Son, we will see God the Father manifesting His presence. Daniel got a glimpse of the glory and presence of God. Well Moses was told, “No man can see My face and live,” but part of that evidently has to do with the corruption of sin.

When we saw earlier in Revelation we are transported to the throne room scene, those in heaven saw God the Father sitting on the throne, so no problem. You know, when the angel came, the father of John the Baptist had a question about what he told him about the birth of a son that was going to happen. He says, “I’m Gabriel I serve in the presence of God,” one who serves in the very presence of God before Him, so we will, we will see Him. We will see His face. His name will be on their foreheads. The name we were told, we’ll have the name from Christ we’ll have the name of the Father. The name of God is on us. You know what that means He belongs to us.

You take a trip you take your luggage and they say put your name on it. Why? That shows it belongs to you that’s what the name indicates. It connects you. You belong there to that. We have you know a little bit of a family name. Well, I see somebody with a young person with this name I say oh, are you—yeah that’s my, those are my parents. You know the name connects you. That’s what it means, His name will be on their foreheads. Our position is secured, settled for eternity. It’s like, now our names are written in the book of life, that’s our security. Here they’re written on our foreheads. We all belong to Him is the idea.

There will no longer be any night. They will not have need of the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, because the Lord God will illumine them; they will reign forever and ever. The question comes, is this only within the new Jerusalem, or will there be day and night outside the new Jerusalem? There will be months. When God created the world before sin, He created night and day, evening and morning, so darkness in and of itself is not sin, because God didn’t create something sinful with the original creation because He pronounced it all good, acceptable, consistent with His character. He did not create--so we want to be careful, darkness becomes a picture of sin because that’s where men cover their sinful deeds and do the deeds of darkness. To be hidden in the darkness and God is light and in Him, there is no darkness, but as far as darkness as part of creation in that day and night, it’s not bad.

Remember, God came and walked with Adam and Eve in the cool of the evening in the garden, so that cycle perhaps outside Jerusalem may be going on, and that would fit, Jerusalem, the new Jerusalem where glorified saints reside. There’s no night, there’s no need for it. Angels reside there. There’s no need for the night. Outside the city, perhaps there’s that cycle and you see something of the splendor of this magnificent huge city that is never dark. I mean it would be seen from everywhere. That’s the point, if it becomes like the light of the whole earth that won’t, you know, shatter me but it seems perhaps the emphasis here is on what is in that city, and that would mean people could come up any time. If you’re a night person and want to come up at three a.m., come on up. The gates never close kind of thing, so part of the finality of how this is, I can just go back to the garden of Eden. There’s certain things true there, there will be certain things not, like Adam won’t, you know they’ll be no more sin instituted because there’s only two heads of the race. Everyone who has not been redeemed and become identified with the second Adam has been cast into hell, so there are no sinful beings left. The redemption has provided a complete cleansing and you’ll note what they’ll do, at the end of verse five.

They will reign forever and ever. The end of verse three said, “His slaves will serve Him.” What will we do? Well one of the things we’ll do is reign with Him. This is an eternal kingdom. We talk about this being the eternal aspect. That doesn’t mean there can’t be time, but there are no time markers. Another thing like, well in a 100,000 years people, something will, there’s no time markers like that after you leave the 1,000-year millennium. We will serve Him. Well, what about when you run out of room and things to do? We have an infinite God. We can never exhaust the knowledge of Him. Again, with our finiteness and limitedness, but this, this is to make an impact on us. Just let me read a portion of verse six and seven and then we’re done. “These words are faithful and true;” there’s no doubt about the truthfulness of what has been said. It’s exactly true. It is faithful, it’s true. These are things which must soon take place in the plan of God and then, as He puts it, after that you know, don’t take this literally. Well what are you supposed to be doing with it then? “Behold, I am coming quickly.” Verse seven, “Blessed is he who heeds (keeps does) the words of the prophecy of this book.” Well how can I do it when this is the future? I live in light of it. Set your minds on things above where Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father, the new Jerusalem, that God has prepared for us.

It’s amazing, you know. If you’re building a new house or remodeling an old one, you want to go there. You want to know about it. What are the details, what’s it going be like, so this, that, all the details. Well I act like I don’t care. As long as I’m going to heaven, that’s all right. What do you think God put it here for? “Prophecy is a motivation” John wrote in his epistle. “Everyone who has this hope in himself purifies himself, as He is pure.” Knowing this, you know if you want to memorize Scripture, memorize chapters 20 to 22 of the Book of Revelation. Get down the details of what God has promised. When I say chapter 20 as well because it’s good to know what the alternative is. It’ll help burden us for our friends our family. You know where I’m going. This loved one, his departure causes me tears and sorrow and the separation is painful. It’s all temporary.

If I tell you on this snowy day I’m getting on the plane after this service and I will be landing in Hawaii and I have a place right on the beach, not where the volcanos are and, but don’t feel sorry for me. I wouldn’t expect you to be going out crying. Why? Well you’re not going to be here tonight. I know some people would be. What’s so great, somebody going to heaven? You note that’s what ameliorates and softens our pain. I’ll miss that person when I don’t see them. We cry when people leave for a time, but it’s short. Fix your eyes on heaven, and consider is this where you’re going? Not everybody’s going there. Heaven will be a wonderful place, but hell will be a terrible place.

There are only two destinies. Everybody in this room, everybody who hears me, everybody in the world can be simply divided into two groups. Are you going to heaven or are you going to hell? Well I don’t know for sure. You’re going to hell because the only way you can go to heaven is to hear and believe the truth that Jesus Christ died to pay for your sins, was raised from the dead and you’ve placed your faith in Him alone. If you don’t know that, you’re not on your way to heaven. If you haven’t responded in faith to that message, you’re not on your way to heaven. We have a glorious future. By we, I mean we who have received the free gift of life through faith in Christ. Let’s pray.

Thank You Lord for the riches of Your word. How gracious You are, not just to promise us a wonderful something, but Lord to tell us something of the wonder of the place that has been prepared for us. Something of its beauty and splendor and Lord these great prophetic truths are not just to provide interesting information that are not practical for our lives, but they are truths that are to shape our lives, shape the way we live, the way we think. What we live for, how we live. May these truths be a blessing an encouragement and a challenge, we pray in Christ’s name. Amen.