The New Heaven & the New Earth
Hal Molloy · Jun 29, 2003
Major Bible Themes (2002-03), No. 52
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/4826225638513

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

So guess what? We're on our last session of major Bible themes. And this morning we're going to be looking at the new heaven and the new earth. Notice a little note up here? If you've been doing your homework, you're done. It's like finals week or after finals in school. It's all over. Okay. Remember this?

When we started out, we talked about God's eternal purpose was to declare His glory and to share His very glory. Let me ask you a question. How does God declare His glory? What's one of the ways or several ways which He declares His glory. The word declare means to announce, to demonstrate His glory. So how does He do that? Creation, so the heavens declare the glory of God.

How about sharing His glory? How does He share His glory with us? And we're talking about We're talking about his present plan on earth, or his purpose in fulfilling his eternal purpose right now on planet earth. And there you are. So how does he share his glory? Okay, we're seated in the heavenlies with him.

The verse that comes to mind immediately is John 17, 22, when the Lord Jesus Christ is praying to the Father, and he says, Father, the glory that you have given me, what? I have given them. It's a perfect tense. It means completed action. The moment that we've trusted in Christ, The very glory of the Lord Jesus Christ as a man was given to each one of you and to me. I mean, I think that's incredible.

So he shares his glory with us. He reveals his glory. How does he reveal his glory to us? One of the ways, two of the ways, three of the ways? Through scripture. And that's the main revelation of his glory. When the Lord Jesus Christ was here, he revealed his glory through the Lord Jesus Christ. And then in return, God's eternal purpose is to be glorified.

Here's the question. You can turn in your Bibles to Revelation 21. And in verse 1, here's what verse 1 says, and John says this, And I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away, and there was no more sea. Okay, so here's my question.

Will God's eternal purpose continue in the new heaven and the new earth? Here was his purpose. Will it continue in a new heaven and a new earth? Now, one of the things I was going to do this morning, and decided not to because I knew that we wouldn't have time, is to ask the question when it says, new heaven and new earth, is God going to annihilate this earth?

Is this earth going to go poof? and there's going to be a brand new, a new earth, new in time, new in quality. Let me give you what I think the answer is in terms of going through scripture. It's taught both ways. I've seen it taught mostly that this earth is going to be annihilated and we're going to have a new heaven and a new earth. I don't think so. for the following reasons. As you get into 2 Peter chapter 3, it goes into great detail how this earth is going to be purged. It's going to be purged with fire. It's going to be purged with heat. So there's going to be a purging.

And then there's a promise that God made to Israel. What was one of the promises that God made to Israel? concerning their land. Would be theirs forever. And in the book of Genesis, he put the boundaries on the land. River Euphrates over to the Mediterranean Sea and north he established a border and south down to the river of Egypt. He established a border and he said that this is your land forever. It's an eternal possession.

So that's why I believe that he's going to hold true to his promise. That piece of real estate is going to be theirs. And it's going to be purged. It's going to be purged of everything that man has done. And it's going to be recreated. But we're going to have the same earth. You know, it's very much like the analogy is to you and to me.

We are what? A new creation in Christ. What does it say? Therefore, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creation. What? What's passed away? Old things are passed away. Behold, all things become new, or new things have become. And so I think it's the same thing there. Now, when it says that that that the old has been passed away, is anything. Have you been annihilated? Has has the old man been annihilated?

No. So anyhow, it's something to ponder on. OK. And again, I didn't want to. spend much time on it, but something for you to think about. Yes. Yeah. Genesis chapter 15 and around verse 17. That's it around. Genesis 15. Yeah. And he says it over and over. And I think he repeats it in Genesis 22.

OK. Now, I just want to take this. Keep us here for a minute, as opposed to the new heaven, new earth. Just keep us here for a minute. And and I just want to kind of say, you know, as you take a look at God's eternal purpose for the present heaven and earth, is that this is how he fulfilled it. Is that out of focus for you? Tell me, just say, ah. There? OK. Boy, that looks blurry to me. OK. Let's go back just for a moment. Let me just go back before creation for a moment. Let's go back to eternity past.

He had got the Father. God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. That's all there was. And you had this eternal fellowship between the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. And this circle of love and communion and fellowship between the three. And back somewhere in eternity past, God said, let us create man in our image, in our likeness. and bring him into the fellowship that we enjoy, right? I mean, that was God's purpose, to bring us into that very circle of love that the Father, the Son, and the Spirit have, I don't want to say experienced, but have had for all eternity. And so he created man to bring into that fellowship. Now He didn't create man as a robot, right? He created man with a free will.

And man and Adam fell. And he couldn't enter into that fellowship. Question, did God's purpose, eternal purpose, ever change? Was it thwarted because Adam fell? No. I mean, that was his purpose. And it wasn't thwarted because Adam fell. So God had a plan in place. Adam's fall wasn't a surprise to God. God didn't say, oops, and start biting his fingernails and say, what are we going to do now? God had a plan in place. to bring man into fellowship with him so that we can enjoy him, and we can enjoy him forever. And so here's how he worked out his plan to carry out his eternal purpose.

He created man, man fell, but the moment that man fell, And Roger went through this last week, in Genesis 3.15, or was it last week or the week before, in terms of the judgment on Satan.

And Satan was judged, and man was judged, and because of one man, sin entered into the world, and the word, this is Romans 5.12, has talked about the sin, the sin nature entered into the world, and death by sin. So death passed upon all men because all have sinned. So that man is born separated from God, but God's plan and God's purpose was not forged.

He had a plan to bring man to himself, to reconcile man to himself. Of course, we know that he was going to do it through the cross, and revealed in Scripture is that he was going to send his son to reconcile man to himself. So that Old Testament people looked to the cross, we look back to the cross, we're all saved by faith. in the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. So, his eternal plan, or his eternal purpose, was being fulfilled.

Now, the Gentiles were so unrighteous that he had to judge them. And, let's see, 1600 years, about 1600 years after creation, God said, man is evil continually. He says, I'm going to destroy him. And he gave man, how many years did he give man? Well, Noah built the ark. 120 years to change his mind. It was only eight souls that were saved during that flood. After the flood, the earth populated, and man came together and said, we're going to be just like God, and we're going to reach God. And they built the Tower of Babel. And God says, we've got to do it again.

We've got to judge man. They judged him by confusing their tongues and separating them so that man was separated. Once man gets together, he's in trouble. This is not a political statement, but the United Nations is trying to bring all nations and all people together. God doesn't want them together. He separated them for a reason.

So anyhow, then he chose one man. And he says, through this one man, I'm going to have a people for my name. And he chose Abraham, right? And he chose the nation of Israel. Well, here comes the word Jesus Christ, who's their Messiah, who God promised, who was going to be their king and set up a kingdom and a throne. And Israel, because of the hardness of their heart, rejected their very Messiah.

So that says, choosing other people. And that's you and I, the church, the called out ones. And so he chose, so he's working through the church today to fulfill his purpose, to share his glory, to reveal his glory. And think about it. You are the only one, and I, you and I, are the only ones in which God today manifests His glory. There is no other vehicle for God manifesting His glory. Isn't that interesting? In other words, an unbeliever really can't see Christ unless he sees Christ through you.

Do you believe that? I'm working with a guy who's an unbeliever, and I asked him, I've been working with him several months, and I asked him, I think the question I'm asking, because we're going through scripture, I'm trying to show him that the scripture is the word of God. And I asked him a question in terms of, how do you know? How do you know that this is true? You know what his answer was? He says, I can see it in your life.

But the thing is, that's the way God reveals the Lord Jesus Christ. So through us. What a privilege it is. In our study, this is what we've been through together. We've been through all of these doctrines. Every single one of these doctrines that we've gone through communicate how God either declares, shares, and reveals his glory, and in turn is to be glorified. You pick one. You pick any doctrine, any doctrine that we've been through, and it either declares or shares or reveals or reveals the glory of God. And so that's what's been so tremendous about this study. So that's where we've been. Okay, so my question, let me get back to my original question.

What do you think? Has God fulfilled his eternal purpose in the new heaven and the new earth? Anybody want to take a guess? Anybody brave enough? How many think, how many think that, let me do it this way, nobody's going to raise their hand, how many think that in terms of his eternal purpose in declaring and sharing and revealing his glory, that now we have the new heaven and new earth, that's been completed? Okay. How many say it's not completed? And the rest of you are too chicken to raise your hands. Let me tell you what I think. So let me tell you what I think.

That God's eternal purpose for the new heaven and new earth same. If it's eternal, right? If it's eternal, it's eternal. And so now the question is, how? How does God declare His glory in the New Earth? How does God share His glory in the How does He reveal His glory? And how is He glorified? So, we're going to take a look. Isn't that pretty? So, you're in chapter 21 of the book of Revelation, right? And look at verse 1. And I saw a new heaven and a new earth.

And by the way, the word new is for all of you in the Greek class, is the word that we've had in our Greek class, kainos. And we've never really defined it in our Greek class in terms of what it means. But it's always talking about something that's new in quality. Not new in time, but something that is new in quality. We are a new creation. We are a kainos creation. We're totally new in quality. The old has been passed away, all that we were in Adam, and new things have become, all that we are in Christ.

OK, so he says, I saw a new heaven and a new earth for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away and there was no more sea. Interesting. How about lakes and rivers? Now, let's interpret literally, there's no more sea. Why would you think that there's no more sea? The only reason I could think of is, what divides the nations today? As one of the languages divide nations today, the seas divide nations today, although with our mode of transportation today, in terms of 747s and et cetera, There's, you know, the sea is no longer a big division, but it used to be a big division between nations, right? And rightly so, because God wants them separated. But in the new heaven and new earth, I think there's no need for God to have divisions between nations.

And the Gentiles, are going to be inhabiting the earth. Israel is going to be inhabiting the earth. And we'll see that in a minute. But notice here in the book of Revelation, there's just this one verse concerning the new heaven and the new earth. And then, starting in verse 2, John says, And I saw the holy city. the New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people. And God himself shall be with them and be their God."

So I have the wrong reference here, don't I? No, okay. Okay, never mind. But as you get to verse 10 and 11, look what he says. He carried me away in the Spirit to a great high mountain and showed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending down out of heaven from God, having the glory of God. So, this city is having the glory of God. This is declaring, this is telling of His very glory, demonstrating His very glory. just at the New Jerusalem alone.

Okay? And her light was like unto a stone most precious, even like a jasper stone, clear as crystal. Interesting, as you go through this passage in Revelation, it talks about this being so many cubits by so many cubits, but it appears like it's a cube. And if you multiply out what a what we think a cubit was, this comes out to be anywhere between thirteen hundred and fifty to fifteen hundred miles. OK, miles.

So if the Mediterranean Sea is no longer there, it will fill up. I mean, this length will. fill the entire Mediterranean Sea if it comes down, and if the Holy City comes down on Earth. Now, we don't know if it's going to hover above the Earth or settle down on Earth. We don't know. But it's huge. And it's the same height. It's 1,500 miles high.

You couldn't go into a normal spacecraft and be above the city. Normal spacecraft orbits at about 100 miles or 120 miles, perigee, apogee. There are some spacecrafts that are synchronous, which are 22,000 miles. If you're in a synchronous spacecraft, you'd be above the city. But normal spacecrafts, what's the space station? So anyway, as you go through the description of this city, it's almost indescribable.

We can't understand it. It's so glorious, and it declares the very glory of God. How about sharing His glory? In Colossians 3.4 it says this, When Christ, who is our life, and Christ is our very life, He is our life, and He shall appear, then shall you also appear with Him in glory.

So we're going to be with him. We're going to be with him face to face. And then in verse 3, which I just read in Revelation 21, where John says, I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, behold, the tabernacle of God is with men. And he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them and be their God. Think of this for a minute. God is going to be dwelling with each one of us. We're going to be tabernacled, tabernacling with God, tenting with God, face to face.

Your children who are at home, tabernacle with you, they tent with you. When they dwell with you, do they share in the very glory, in your glory? When we're talking about glory, the word glory means one's essential essence, who they are. When their tabernacle, when their home with you 24-7 or whatever, do they experience, do they come to see who you are?

Unfortunate. I was wondering if someone was going to say that. And they come to see who you are, because your very essence is being shared with them 24-7. And that's the same thing here. We're going to be with God. So He's going to be sharing. That glory is just going to be apparent. And He's going to be sharing with us. We're going to see who He is, face-to-face.

And in Revelation 22 verses 3 to 5, there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God, and a lamb shall be in it, and his servants shall serve him. And they shall see his face, and his name shall be on their foreheads. True identification with the Lord Jesus Christ. and they shall reign forever and ever."

Now it didn't say that we're going to reign with him. Mostly it says that we are going to reign forever and ever. It's like, I don't want to get back into the book of Romans, but it says, but in talking about the difference between the one man in Adam and the one man in Christ, is that we reign. We reign right now. And we will reign for all eternity.

How does he reveal his glory? Are these beautiful pictures? This gal, Pat Marvenko, I guess. Pat Marvenko Smith. She has gone through and depicted a lot of the things in the Book of Revelation. And it's incredible. But it talks about that there are 12 gates in the city, right? named after the twelve tribes, each of the twelve tribes, and there's three gates on each side of the city. Don't you find it interesting that here you have this holy city that is with three gates on each side named after the 12 tribes.

Do you remember back in the Old Testament when God told Moses to build the tabernacle and they encamped and they were on their wilderness journey? And when they encamped, do you remember what the formation of the tribes of Israel was? with respect to the tabernacle. They had the tabernacle in the middle, and they had three tribes on each of the four sides of the tabernacle. So in order to go and worship the Lord in the tabernacle, what did you have to do? You had to go through one of the twelve tribes of Israel.

Isn't that interesting? Isn't it interesting that that same picture here, picture, that is carried over for all eternity? So in covenant theology, where it says that the church is now Israel, and there's no distinction between the church and Israel? Really? Here we have eternity. And we have a distinction between Israel and the Church.

And there's a distinction in the sense that in order to enter into this holy city, you have to go through one of the twelve gates that are named after the twelve tribes of Israel. I find that very interesting. Each one of those gates it says, as it describes it in scripture, is a pearl. One pearl. Can you imagine? And the gates are never going to be closed. That's one pearl. And so here's a depiction of that gate. We'll see how accurate that is when we get there.

In Revelation 21, verses 22-23, I saw no temple therein, for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it. And the city had no need of the moon to shine in it, for the glory of the Lord did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof. Do you think that's a revelation revealing the very glory of the Lord? I can't imagine it, but yeah, I mean, just the Lord Jesus Christ and God the Father are going to illuminate that city, the revelation of His glory.

And the thing is this, when we get there, We are still going to be involved by the Holy Spirit. We're going to be involved by the Holy Spirit forever and ever. And we're going to continue to learn. We're going to continue to learn about the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's going to be for all eternity.

And we're never, ever going to stop coming to know Him. Isn't that incredible? So, no end of coming to know him. I mean, isn't there some point in time when we really come to really know him? Why is there no end? Why won't there be any end in coming to know him? He's infinite. He's infinite. Can you picture that? Wow. Wow. Okay.

Last but not least, in terms of the New Earth, God is going to be glorified. As you look in Revelation 21, It says, "...and the nations of them saved." Notice, it says, "...and the nations of them which are in the light of it," talking about the holy city, "...and the kings of the earth." Isn't that interesting? There are going to be kings on the earth at that time. And look what they do. They do bring their glory into it. Now, would that communicate the fact that they are not dwelling in the Holy City, but they bring their honor into it? So, let me ask this question. Who is in this Holy City? Who is dwelling there?

From what we read this morning, we know of at least certain the Lord Jesus Christ, right? And God the Father, right? The light of it. It's their eternal abode in this city. We've got to be there, right? Wherever He is, we are. So when this heavenly city adorned as a bride, comes down. We are already in this city. And Lord Jesus Christ said what? I go to prepare a place for you, a place for you, I will come again to receive you unto myself that where I am, there you may be also. And so our place, here's our place for all eternity.

So the church will be, the dwelling place of the church will be in the heavenly city. the Gentiles in Israel will dwell in the land, and bring their honor into it. And the gates of it shall not be shut, for there shall be no night there, and they shall bring the honor of the nations into it." They're going to honor the Lord for all eternity. They're going to continually come into the Holy City, they have access to the Holy City, but they're not dwelling there. So the Gentiles are going to be glorifying God on earth. They're going to be glorifying God on earth. We are going to be glorifying God in the Holy City. Does that generate any questions? OK.

To cut this a little short today. And to ask you guys a question, you guys put up with it for one year, believe it. And in this, we've covered these, we've covered 52 things. Here's my, if, if we were to do this again, how we'll first, what we'll first let, we want to ask you, what do you think that was too much material to, at one time? We didn't, we, same time, double time?

There's some feedback in terms of it in here. I'd say you don't have to actually run it to get the theory. There were just a few chapters I thought maybe you should look into more. Okay. There's a couple of topics, but there were a few that you have to finish. Oh, okay. So would you... Okay. All right. Do we have... Okay. And we weren't able to cover it in class? Right. On to a different subject. Next question to you. Did the notes help?

In terms of covering those, some of them didn't cover. Or did it? Well, let me say, depending upon the chapter, some of those chapters, Roger, would you agree, some of these chapters have so much teaching in part that there's not enough people covering it. We've had search selectors. So we were not thorough with everything that we're not So if we were, two years. But, you know, probably too long. And so Marlon, so there are things that we did not cover. Let me tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to close this off, close the prayer. I don't want to put this on tape. So let's just close.

Father, I'm thankful for you and your grace in this time together and I just thank you Father for the class and we thank you for your work and Father, knowing that there's going to be eternity, how exciting that's going to be. And we just give you thanks in Christ's name. Amen.