Warning! I’m Under Construction – What We Will Be Like When the Building is Complete - Revelation 21:1-7
Today we are finishing up a series that we've been doing called "Warning! I'm Under Construction". The first week we considered how God builds our character.
Then we looked at how God builds our faith. Last Sunday Pastor Jan spoke to us about How God Build Relationships. This week, as promised, we're going to consider what the building looks like when it's completed.
One day we'll no longer be under construction, one day we'll no longer have battles to face. All of the complexity of our lives, all of the messiness and strife in the world around us, all of the unanswered questions and queries we have, will cease. Until then, we’re under construction.
These things will cease, but you will not cease.
1 Corinthians 13 says: 8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away.9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears…12 For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
There’s a now and there’s a then. There’s the PART that we’re living now, but then completeness will come. And the PART that we’re living now, God wants our full engagement in. He wants us to care.
Now, something you used to hear was that Christians are so heavenly minded that they are no earthly good. It is still believed that to have a belief in anything after this life, somehow that belief distracts us from living this life well. From caring as we should.
But you don’t have to look very hard with an unprejudiced eye, to see how people who believed deeply in the life after this one helped to transform this world in critical ways.
William Wilberforce was largely responsible for the abolition of slavery in England. He was a Christian.
Abraham Lincoln, who through out his life became more and more convinced of the Christian faith, brought about as one of his final accomplishments, the end of slavery in the U.S.
Martin Luther King Jr. was an American civil rights activist, lightning rod and leader who worked for the desegregation of schools and of society in general, the dismantling of the social barriers, rooted in racism, that remained a hundred years after the American civil war.
There are hundreds, thousands of examples of people who were committed Christ-followers who understood that the living out of their faith involved tackling the evils in this world that did not reflect the values of God’s Kingdom.
So we are and we’re called to be ‘earthly good’. And in fact, the way that we are, and the way that we can increase our commitment to making a true difference in this world, is by having our hearts set on heaven. More than that, it’s by realizing that...
Who here has a passport? If you’ve travelled to the U.S. in recent years of to any other country at any time, you have a passport. What does that passport say about your citizenship?
It probably says that you are a citizen of Canada. That’s a fair assumption to make...although if you’re from elsewhere...we’re glad you’re here!
Well, our passports, if we have them, or for whenever we may get them, reveal something of the tension that we live with. Our passports say that our citizenship is in Canada, or in some other temporal place. The Bible says that our citizenship is in heaven.
Philippians 3:20 But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, 21 who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.
What this means is that if you are a follower of Jesus Christ, your true home is not here. Your true home is in heaven. Heaven is your home, and currently, we are all what’s called ‘sojourners’ on this planet. Not “just passing by”, but we’re here on purpose, by God’s will and design, to do the works he created us to do.
“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. Ephesians 2:10
But, what will it be like when we are, when you are, complete? What will the final state of our existence be like? Once God has completed his work on our character, once He has built our faith, once our relationships are sorted out?
No Clouds to Dance On
As with most subjects, when you begin to explore the Scriptures, you can find that there are ‘conventional ideas’ that we can hold to, that don’t hold up particularly well in the light of the Bible, which is our only actual authority on heaven...and anything spiritual as a matter of fact.
So we might think of heaven as a place of clouds, a little like the Philadelphia Cream Cheese commercials that use to run. That’s not accurate. We also might think of heaven as a place of passivity and green pastures to lie down in. That’s not accurate.
We may imagine that heaven is the dullest place we could imagine and that, like certain rock bands like to sing about, that heaven is boring and hell is the ultimate extended party with all your best peeps.
That’s really, really not accurate. Not even a little.
The Biblical picture of heaven is FAR MORE interesting, far more compelling and far richer than any such notion. It is a picture that is hard to represent visually because it speaks of a relationship more than a place, a state of being more than something material.
Let’s look at today’s Scripture passage:
Heaven is the New Jerusalem
21:1 Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. 2 I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. 4 ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes.There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”
So the first thing we see is that something happens to this earth, to the sea and to the skyscape, the heavens. It passes away. There is an end to this material world as it is now. “The first heaven and the first earth had passed away”.
Those are ten words that explain in succinct terms what must be a massive upheaval. Imagine everything that we know about this planet and the stars ceasing to be. That’s a really big deal.
And then, as John’s vision says, into the absence of what we know as this world, the Holy City, the New Jerusalem descends.
But then the language changes, and becomes purely about relationship. The Holy City is like a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. This is not to say that there will be no environment for our relationship with God to take place in.
A little later in chapter 21 John describes the habitat of the New Jerusalem, what the new city will look like:
The great street of the city was of gold, as pure as transparent glass. 22 I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.
Street of gold and…no churches in heaven. No places of worship in heaven. Why? Because God the Father Himself and Jesus the Lamb of God Himself, the first 2 persons of the Trinity, ARE the temple, the church of the city.
John says in Revelation 5:6
“And between the throne and the four living creatures and among the elders I saw a Lamb standing, as though it had been slain…
There will be no crosses hanging in places of worship, no crucifixes adorning churches that show Jesus ON the cross. Why? Because the Lamb, Jesus Himself, will be there, bearing the marks of His suffering, the price of our salvation, eternally.
There will be no place to “go” to church in order to connect with God. We will be in a constant state of joyful connection, of fellowship with God. We’re under construction now, we need the church as a place to belong now.
We sometimes drift in and out of closeness to God now - and we can feel that - boy can we feel that - but, a huge difference once we’re complete is that we will live in unbroken communion with the living God.
Let’s read on:
23 The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp. 24 The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it. 25 On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there. 26 The glory and honor of the nations will be brought into it.27 Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.
Our Sun has a limited lifespan. Sometime over the next 5 billion or so years, the sun will burn the last of its hydrogen, bloat up like a red giant (JPG) and consume Mercury and Venus. Long before that, all life on earth will have ended.
No one knows, of course, when this will happen. But the good news is that we won’t need the sun or the moon reflecting the sun’s rays in order to see. Why? God’s glory will give everything light.
Right now, while we’re all still works-in-progress, we do have light – light that we need to be able to come to faith in Jesus and to begin to grasp something of the glory of God.
2 Cor:4 6 For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ.
When we want to glimpse at the glory of God, when we want to see into the eternal, when we want to get a sense of what is coming for us as believers, we need go no further than to look to Jesus. Jesus reveals to us who God is, how God thinks, how God acts.
Colossians 2:9 says:
9 For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, 10 and in Christ you have been brought to fullness. He is the head over every power and authority.
This is why the study of the Bible is so important for believers. When we read about Jesus in the Scriptures, we are learning about the One with whom we will spend eternity.
When we study the Word we are familiarizing ourselves with God’s thoughts, with God’s ways, with the things that God truly cares about.
And this is why worship is so important. When we come to church, we meet with other believers, and we enter into the worship of God. We enter into a place where the ground is holy because of the presence of God.
That’s because Jesus is here. He is in our midst. He is here to heal, to console, to forgive, to bring light and understanding. But really, mostly, and the thing that’s the most for our good, is that He is here, Jesus is here, God is here to receive our worship.
In a very profound way, when we enter into genuine worship, when we forget about ourselves and just glory in the beauty and majesty of the living God...when we do that we are connecting with eternity.
In a real sense we’re connecting with our futures. We’re being in the presence of the One who is building our character, our faith, who is strengthening our ability to be in relationship with others. We’re touching and being touched by the heart of God even as we exalt His name and proclaim His praise.
Put up but don’t read again: Revelation 22:1 Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb 2 b2 down the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. 3 No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city, and his servants will serve him. 4 They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. 5 There will be no more night. They will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give them light. And they will reign for ever and ever.
God’s Dwelling Place is With Us
Here is the heart of the matter, the most important thing about when ‘the building is complete’, about your eternity, if you are a follower of Jesus Christ. The most important thing about heaven is also the most important thing about hell. It is to do with the presence of God.
God will be entirely absent from hell. That is what will make hell hell. God will be entirely present in heaven. That is what makes heaven heaven. It is the uniting of redeemed humanity with the Redeemer, the profound intimacy of God with the people of God.
So, in the Biblical picture of heaven, God is there. God is there. And all redeemed people, all those bought with the precious blood of Jesus Christ, who have placed their whole hope in His redeeming sacrifice on the cross for our sins, are also there.
So like now, heaven will not be about me and Jesus. Heaven will be about you and me and all believers dwelling as the people of God, and God Himself with be with us and will be our God.
There’s a ton of bad thinking, lazy thinking out there that would have us believe that we are gods. That we are preparing to become little gods. That actually goes back to the original sin in the garden when Satan tempts Adam and Eve to disobey God and eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Satan says: “You will be like God”. If you lean toward that way of thinking, I strongly urge you to lean away from it, as it is an ancient deception.
When the building is complete, God will wipe every tear from our eyes. All our losses, those we have loved, which accumulate through life and can feel at times like a terrible emptiness and aloneness, will be gone.
That’s because there will be no more death and the resulting mourning and tears. There will be no more sting from the pain of losing those we love. There will be a new order, a new way of existing, because the old order of things will have passed away.
And that new order. There is a connection, I believe with how we will live then and how we live now. Perhaps it’s the Lord’s Prayer that somehow predicts this and that connects how we live now with our future in glory:
“Our Father Who art in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth, as it is in heaven.
Jesus teaches us to pray that God’s Kingdom come, that His will gets done here on earth, the same way it gets done in heaven. How is God’s will to be done, but through His people, through His church, through His bride, which is another name for His church.
I think all messages come down, really, to one important question. That is, in the light of what we’ve heard, in the light of what we’ve learned, in the light of the love of God and the mercy of God that we’ve received as His people from the hand of God, how are we to then live?
There is a warning in our reading today, one that we didn’t actually get to yet, and one that I don’t intend to skip over. It’s a stern warning that speaks of an opposite eternal outcome to the heaven we’ve been talking about.
The passage reads:
8 “But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars—they will be consigned to the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death.”
There’s a corresponding passage in chapter 21 which speaks of the heavenly city. It simply reads:
“Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life”. Revelation 21:27
I think what it comes down to is this. God has made a way to Himself. Not 2 ways, not 10 ways, not as many ways as there are religions. That’s a popular myth. God has made a way to Himself through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. In Jesus, He has given us what we don’t deserve, He has been incredibly generous with
His grace. What we could not earn through our works, because even our best works done without faith, are like filthy rags to God...what we could not possibly ever earn, God has given us freely in Jesus.
As I am receptive to God’s grace, as I respond in understanding, in faith and in gratitude to the free gift salvation that God offers, I am then adopted by God into the family of God. I belong to God and I can have profound assurance that the final picture for me will be the ever expanding story and glory of heaven.
But, if...if I am not receptive to the grace of God, I'm headed for wrath. If I reject Jesus, who Himself said: “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life”, then I have rejected the only way to God the Father, the only way to heaven.
And, really when you think about it, we are going to spend far more time on the other side of Eternity than this side. This is over in a moment. God knows that. That’s why He has made a sure way.
When we respond in faith to Jesus’ sacrifice for us we become citizens of heaven, as we’ve discussed. Since we know that this is not our final home, and that we are sojourners in the land, ought we to live as citizens of heaven?
We’re called to live in obedience to the law of the land. The law of God’s heaven is the law of love. They are the laws of the Kingdom of God, perhaps best summed up in the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes.
I think there’s no better way to finish our series on how God builds us, and today’s message on what we’ll look like when we’re finished being under construction, that to look at what the Apostle Paul says about our earthly selves compared to what we will be for all eternity. Speaking of us bearing the image of Adam (and Eve) as we do now, and how we will ultimately be like Jesus, here described as ‘the heavenly man, Paul says: (Let’s stand and read together.
“And just as we have borne the image of the earthly man, so shall we bear the image of the heavenly man. I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.”“Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. 1 Corinthians 15:49-48
May we keep our eyes fixed on Jesus, our Maker and Builder, and the author and finisher of our faith, Amen.
