New Jerusalem: A Lifetime Ahead
Updated: Jun 25
New Jerusalem: A Lifetime Ahead
Rev 21:1-3
I saw a new heaven and a new earth. The first heaven and the first earth had disappeared, and so had the sea. 2 Then I saw New Jerusalem, that holy city, coming down from God in heaven.
People love to travel. The world in which we live is filled with wonder and diversity and if you can travel to these places your experience of life is enriched. People are offered luxury, history and cultural tours. People dream of traveling the world and there are careers that allow you to travel. Now in the world in which we live God is revealed in creation. The Holy Scripture declares he is God.
The future world promised us in scripture is filled with wonders and beauty, enrichment beyond our ability to comprehend. The Holy Word indicates that just as our new bodies will correspond with our old bodies so will the new earth correspond to the old earth. We will be able to walk and talk and explore just as we do now but…the cosmos will be our playground.
Our current earth and heavens will be reordered and recreated in a condition beyond anything we can now relate to. The decay, disasters, disease and pain we experience now is a temporary curse that God put on creation. “The creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope.” God did not curse the creation with futility as his final word. He did it “in hope.” Romans 8: 19-20.
We have a hope in heaven and beyond. The secular and scientism view of a meaningless and pointless life is founded in our fallen, sinful human viewpoint. This drives the human goal of a Theory of Everything or the Atheist proclamation of there is no God. This sin, this hubris plagues us and keeps the glass darkly ever before us.
Our lives are short and yet we must traverse the length and breadth of life (a life unique to us) with all of its joys, happiness, sins, travails, disappointments and sadness before we enter the narrow road and eternity.
When we die our souls/spirits will be disembodied until a time when we will be given new bodies on a New Earth and we will live in New Jerusalem.
New Jerusalem is also called the Tabernacle of God, the Holy City, the City of God, the Celestial City, the City Foursquare, and Heavenly Jerusalem. It will be literally heaven on earth.
John records that the city is nearly 1,400 miles long, and it is as wide and as high as it is long—a perfect cube. It will be lighted by the glory of God. It will have twelve foundations and twelve gates bearing the names of the twelve tribes of Israel. The streets will be made of pure gold.
Think of this fact, someday, which will not be bound by Time as we know it, you and I will be living, walking about in a completely different world and environment. We will not experience the decrepitude that we now feel in our bodies, aging and disease will cease. We will have energy and clarity of thought. We will see our Lord frequently and our loved ones. This is beyond our comprehension now which is why we must imagine and dream.
It is the place that Paul spoke of: “In the coming ages [God] might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:7). The New Jerusalem is the ultimate fulfillment of all God’s promises. The New Jerusalem is God’s goodness made fully manifest.