XXIV: REVELATIONCHAPTER 21

In which the Eternal Citydescends upon a New Earth

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Throughout Revelation’s treatment of the Eternal State, there exists a striking, even unexpected, physicality to the depictions of Heaven’s appearance. Heaven fills with structures of measured substance, possesses a geography and a political system. What are we spiritually-minded souls to make of this physicality in Heaven?

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PHYSICALITY VS. SPIRITUALITY

The Bride, the wife of the Lamb, represents a SPIRITUAL ENTITY in the Bible;

Yet, the New Jerusalem, also called “the Bride”, seems to possess all the trappings of a PHYSICAL ENTITY, a metropolis.

They exist as one and the same entity.

QUESTION: Why so much PHYSICALITY in the Bible’s description of the purely SPIRITUAL?

WE START WITH AN AIRY POETIC SIMILE

“And he carried me away

in the spirit to a great

and high mountain . . .. . . and showed me the

Holy City, Jerusalem,

coming down out of the Heaven of God, having

the glory of God . . .

. . . her brilliance was LIKE a very costly stone, as a stone of

crystal clear jasper.”

BUT AFTER THE AIRY SIMILE,

PHYSICALITY TAKES OVER!

THE PHYSICALITY: DELIBERATE AND REPEATED

Many purely physical architectural references.

Depiction of great volume, physical bulk!

Elaborate materials’ list of physical gemstones.

Elaborate depictions of distance, movement in time and space and compass directions.

Connection between angelic and earthly measuring systems

THE PHYSICALITY: DELIBERATE

Many purely physical architectural references

Depiction of great volume

Elaborate lists of physical gemstones

Elaborate depictions of distance, movement in time and space and compass directions.

Connection between angelic and earthly measuring systems WHY?

A ‘REAL’ CITY . . . .

-

A familiar geometric shape: a cube

12 gates and a street

Thick walls and

12 foundation stones

Materials: gold and familiar gemstones

A CITY WITH SPIRITUAL MEANING

-

12 Foundation Stones = 12 Disciples

12 Gates = 12 Tribes of IsraelThe Bride Eternal consists of BOTH Abraham’s offspring:NT Saints of the Church and

OT Jewish Saints

YET PHYSICAL MEASUREMENTS ABOUND

1500 miles to a side

Walls 72 yards thick

Angels measure stuff!

And angelic and human measurements are the same.

Compass directions included

A CITY WITH IMMENSE SIZE

God must mean the immensity of the city to accommodate lots of . . . of . . . bodies? But we’re spirits, aren’t we?

Yet the city hangs somehow in close (?) relation to an apparently physical New Earth.

A CITY WITH CIVIC AND POLITICAL FUNCTIONS

Light Plays a Role in Eternity:

The Glory of God, the Lamb,

illumines this city.

The City Entertains Guests: The kings of the earth bring

their honor into it.

A CITY WITH CIVIC AND POLITICAL FUNCTIONS

The City Supports Suburbs where the earthly nations walk by its light.

The City Maintains Standards of

Holiness: Nothing unclean

enters-ever.

We get much of our sense of what ‘spirit’ means largely from Greek phrasings-but they’re pagans, for crying out loud.

Our biblical texts here challenge those Greek notions of a wispy formless spirit world with blunt, repeated depictions of physicality.

Maybe we should accept the challenge?

For thought:

Do the specificity and variety

of the Bible’s many physical

references exceed the needs of

forming a spiritual simile?

Does the sheer number of the

physical references exceed the

needs of developing a spiritual

that simile’s meanings?

“And he measured its wall, seventy-two yards, according to human measurements, which are also angelic measurements.” Rev 21:17

I think that God invites us to retool our easy

sense of what spiritual reality amounts to.

Challenge question: Angels apparently

measure walls and use rulers with increments

we understand. (Rev 21:17)

WHAT, EXACTLY, DO THEY MEASURE????

“And he measured its wall, seventy-two yards, according to human measurements, which are also angelic measurements.” Rev 21:17

A PLACE TO START:I CORINTHIANS 15: 35-48

But someone will say, “How are the dead raised? And with what kind of body do they come?” You fool! that which you sow does not come to life unless it dies; (I Cor 15: 35-36)

Physical death is a necessary transitional portal between the physical life we know so well and the spiritual existence to which God graciously and gloriously destines us. There exists no connection between the two states. We know no developmental process by which we move incrementally to attain the spiritual realm without using death’s portal.

. . . that which you sow, you do not sow the body which is to be, but a bare grain, perhaps of wheat or of something else. But God gives it a body just as He wished, and to each of the seeds a body of its own. (I Cor 15: 37-38)

We posses ‘bodies’ in both physical and spiritual states. The physical body does not make a very useful model for helping us understand what our spiritual bodies will be like.God forms our spiritual bodies’ configurations after His own pleasure.

All flesh is not the same flesh, but there is one flesh of men and another flesh of beasts and another flesh of birds and another of fish. There are also heavenly bodies and earthly bodies, but the glory of the heavenly is one and the glory of the earthly is another. (I Cor 15: 39-40)

We may assume a diversity of spiritual ‘flesh’ or

form in Heaven; we may also expect to

distinguish between the ‘glory’ of the physical

body and the glory of our new spiritual bodies.

But notice: We still speak in terms of ‘bodies”!

There is one glory of the sun and another glory of the moon and another glory of the stars, for star differs from star in glory. (I Cor 15: 41)

In Heaven, the saints are not bland cookie-cutter beings, one saint like the other in form and prestige. Reflecting the quality of our works, perhaps, or the level of spiritual maturity and service we attained to on Earth, one saint shall be distinguishable from another in graded measures of glory.

SO ALSO IS THE RESURRECTION OF THE DEAD . . .

Sown . . . Raised . . .

Perishable body

In dishonor

In weakness

A natural body

Imperishable body

In glory

In power

A spiritual body

CONCLUSIONS

CONCLUSIONS

On death, believers do not dissolve into some cosmic ‘force’ or collective entity a la Bhuddism. Neither do we reincarnate up or down the food chain.

Physical existence is at best an inexact model upon which to understand details of our spiritual existence in Eternity.

But-our present physical existence does, apparently, provide some parallels to what we shall experience in Heaven:

USEFUL PARALLELS

In Heaven, we retain our individuality, and Heaven is a place of population diversity (Nations + Bride, bodies of varied glory)

We retain an experience of ‘space-ness’ within which separate and distinct spiritual forms and structures of significant spiritual substance have their existence. Concepts of ‘here’ and ‘there’ continue to have some meaning.

We navigate among familiar physical laws with new spiritual powers.

As we work our way backwards in the book of Revelation, we come to John’s presenta-tion of the actual return of the Savior. Chapters 19 and 20 continue to maintain the end of the book’s story order presentation of events.

XXV: The Return of Jesus Christ

As we work our way backwards in the book of Revelation, we come to John’s presenta-tion of the actual return of the Savior. Chapters 19 and 20 continue to maintain the end of the book’s story order presentation of events.

XXV: The Return of Jesus Christ

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