Revelation Chapter 21: 9-21
“Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls filled with the
seven last plagues came to me and talked with me, saying, ‘Come, I will
show you the bride, the Lamb’s wife.’ 10 And he carried me away in the
Spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me the great city, the
holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God, 11 having the glory
of God. Her light was like a most precious stone, like a jasper stone,
clear as crystal.
12 “Also she had a great and high wall with twelve gates, and twelve
angels at the gates, and names written on them, which are the names of
the twelve tribes of the children of Israel: 13 three gates on the east,
three gates on the north, three gates on the south, and three gates on
the west. 14 Now the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and on
them were the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. 15 And he who
talked with me had a gold reed to measure the city, its gates, and its
wall. 16 The city is laid out as a square; its length is as great as its
breadth. And he measured the city with the reed: twelve thousand
furlongs. Its length, breadth, and height are equal. 17 Then he measured
its wall: one hundred and forty-four cubits, according to the measure of
a man, that is, of an angel.
18 “The construction of its wall was of jasper; and the city was pure
gold, like clear glass. 19 The foundations of the wall of the city were
adorned with all kinds of precious stones: the first foundation was
jasper, the second sapphire, the third chalcedony, the fourth emerald,
20 the fifth sardonyx, the sixth sardius, the seventh chrysolite, the
eighth beryl, the ninth topaz, the tenth chrysoprase, the eleventh
jacinth, and the twelfth amethyst. 21 The twelve gates were twelve
pearls: each individual gate was of one pearl. And the street of the
city was pure gold, like transparent glass.”
A lot of us know about Hell, but so few of us ever spend any time
researching the New Jerusalem, our permanent home for eternity.
So, we
will explore this some more; and when you think of your new home, you
will have some good mental pictures to enjoy.
I grew up in Barbados; it is one of the most beautiful islands in the
world, at least to me. Beautiful sandy beaches, colourful flowers, fruits
of every kind, good food, colourful people and bright sunshine mark my
country. I remember running on the beaches with my dad, swimming,
body-surfing, enjoying the sunsets and on and on. I pretty much gauge my
life by that beauty. What if we had a good view of our new home, then
maybe the cheap trinkets of this world would not be so enticing, and we
can be more loyal to our true citizenship.
Lets talk about the sheer size of the place. The earth, we are
told in the earlier verses of the chapter, will be just land, no more
sea; thus, there will be plenty of land to house this, our new home. If
the place is this big, it must hold a lot of people. This is one of the
things that keeps ringing in my head. Plus, there must be a lot of
stuff. I mean, we see streets of gold, gates made of pearls, foundations
made of what we deem, in our time, to be precious stones. I think that
is the thing that can bring this life into perspective. The very things
that we work so hard for and strive for are the lesser things in Heaven.
Jesus spoke this very concept to the apostles and the disciples that
followed Him.
Matthew 6:19-21 “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where
moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal; 20 but lay
up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust
destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your
treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
Notice the very last words, verse 21, “where your treasure is, there
your heart will be also.” This is the stuff that plagues the modern New
Testament church. The people to whom Jesus was speaking in the first
century were mostly the poor; some of the ruling class did come to see
Jesus, and some were saved. But the vast majority of people were poor.
They longed to have some financial freedoms, and there is nothing wrong
with that. But if your heart is consumed by being rich with the world’s
riches, then you will not be ‘heaven focused’ as a lifestyle.
So, what
does God do? He tells us that the very things that make men rich here on
earth are the baser things of heaven. If we can keep this perspective,
it will help us to live as citizens of Heaven and not as citizens of
earth.
Lots of Room for Lots of People, verse 16
The sheer size of this city is breathtaking. The ISS
(International Space Station) is approximately 220 miles or 350
kilometres above the earth. The New Jerusalem reaches 1,500 miles into
space, so more than 6 times higher than the space station, into space,
or what we know today as space. Let us put the amount of space into
perspective for our finite minds; I did a little math. Using 2,500
square feet as an average home, you can get over 2,000,000,000 (2
billion) homes on the ground floor of the New Jerusalem and still have
1,500 miles of height to play with. At 3 persons per home, you can put
just about the entire word population on the first level. This should
give us an idea of just how many people are going to be in Heaven.
From Adam until now, we have 6,000 years of believers, then the
believers that come through the Tribulation, and then those that come
out of the Millennium. But, in particular, this city is called the
“Bride, the Lamb’s wife.” This city is going to house billions of people
– billions of people addressed as the Bride of the Lamb. One of the most
encouraging things to learn and see, especially in the time that we
live, where Christianity is under attack and it seems that we are losing
ground, we can see that the New Jerusalem is massive, a place built for
a gazillion people, and this does not include those that will live
outside the city – those that are redeemed but not a part of the Bride
of the Lamb.
In addition to people, there will be the heavenly host of angels. I
cannot imagine how many of them there are. But there are at lease
millions. Think about this: in 2 Kings 6:15-17, the Lord allows Elisha’s
servant to see the armies of the Lord surrounding the armies of the
enemies of Israel, and he is blown away:
“Now when the attendant of the man of God had risen early and gone out,
behold, an army with horses and chariots was circling the city. And his
servant said to him, ‘Alas, my master! What shall we do?’ So he
answered, ‘Do not fear, for those who are with us are more than those
who are with them.’ Then Elisha prayed and said, ‘O LORD, I pray, open
his eyes that he may see.’ And the LORD opened the servant’s eyes, and
he saw; and behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire
all around Elisha.”
This would be hundreds of thousands of angels, and they are just a small
set of what the Lord has. We will see people in the gazillions and
angels in the gazillion as well, this New Jerusalem is going to be busy
and maybe loud.
No Limitations, verse 16
We will be able to travel between earth and space. There is a New Heaven
and a New Earth as we learned in the earlier verses. Since we can show
that the New Jerusalem is about 1,500 miles out into space, then we can
see that we will be able to travel and see things that we have never
seen before. We will understand things and appreciate things that we
have never seen or gotten before. We will be able to explore things and
exceed our normal human limitations that keep us bound right now.
Imagine the progress that man has made with our sinful and finite minds.
Imagine what we can do with perfect bodies, perfect minds and little, if
any, in the way of limitations. Things that used to confound us will now
be simple and make sense. We will begin to even understand the Word of
God, an eternal document, in ways that our finite minds could not.
As
such, I cannot even begin to tell you what life will be without
limitations. Remember, Jesus was able to walk through walls after He
resurrected.
John 19:19 “Then, the same day at evening, being the first day of the
week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled, for
fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst, and said to them,
‘Peace be with you.’ When He had said this, He showed them His hands and
His side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord.”
He could whisk away at a moment’s notice. In Luke 23:30-34, Jesus
disappeared in a moment when the disciple’s eyes on the Emmaus Road were
opened (see verse 31). “He vanished.”
“Now it came to pass, as He sat at the table with them, that He took
bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were
opened and they knew Him; and He vanished from their sight. And they
said to one another, ‘Did not our heart burn within us while He talked
with us on the road, and while He opened the Scriptures to us?’ So they
rose up that very hour and returned to Jerusalem, and found the eleven
and those who were with them gathered together, saying, ‘The Lord is
risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!’”
We are told that we do not know what we will be like, but that when the
Lord appears, we will be like Him. We will have limited limitation, if
any at all, and we will do things that we can only imagine in the movies
right now.
This place is bright, verses 17-21
This place is going to be bright. Look at the materials used to build
the place. Gold clear as glass, jasper, chrysolite and the other
materials all reflect light and make things brighter. God is already the
light of this place and there is no need for the sun. But His light is
going to be magnified by the building materials that are used, and this
place will be brighter than anything that you have ever seen, ever.
Imagine that if there is no sun, then this city is bright enough to
light the whole earth and parts of space. It will not be a city that one
can miss.
I don’t think we can comprehend the amount of brightness that will be
here. It will be blinding, and only those with perfect bodies and
perfect eyes and perfect brains can handle this kind of light. It will
almost be tangible, it will be so bright. This kind of light means that
there is no fear anywhere in this city.
Most of us have some fear of the dark. For kids, it may be the
‘boogieman’ in the closet when it gets dark; for someone out camping
(not me), it may be the sound of an animal in the dark; for some, it is
the dark basement that brings fear; for some, the dark recesses of our
minds can cause fear. But in the New Jerusalem, there will be no fear,
no darkness, light to the nth degree and no need to be afraid. What
freedom that will be to so many; some of us have our minds as our
greatest enemies. No matter; this light can penetrate the deepest
corners of our minds and scare away our fears. Oh, what joy that will
be!
Come with me and see a place. See our New home, our permanent abode, our
place prepared for us by our Loving and Beautiful Saviour, Jesus. Jesus
is the Way, the only Way, and in Him and Him alone there is eternal
life.
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Missionarybaptistchurch76@yahoo.ca