When the Darkness Ends
We are continuing our Apocalypse Now series today. We are going to be in Revelation 21 today, as we just read.
Psalm 73:28 says “But as for me, it is good to be near God. I have made the Sovereign Lord my refuge.”
Psalm 42:1-2 says “As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God?”
Psalm 63:1 says “O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.”
Psalm 84:1-2 says “How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of hosts! My soul longs, yes, faints for the courts of the Lord; my heart and flesh sing for joy to the living God.”
It is so evident that throughout church history, we have seen Christians that are longing for Heaven. Through the centuries, that desire to see God, to be in God’s presence, to enjoy God forever, that desire, that there is nothing in the world that can satisfy, has been on the hearts of believers.
Most Christians are, to some degree or another, more interested in laying up treasure on earth than in heaven. They’re more concerned with their investments and their retirement package and their own future on earth than they are with heaven.
I suppose most Christians sacrifice the eternal blessing of glory on the altar of temporal gratification. We don’t talk about heaven much. We don’t sing about heaven much, because we’re really not that interested. This past week as I was studying for today, I was thinking, “Man, I don’t really think about heaven at all.” Like how often do you actually think about heaven and being in the glory of Jesus?
And because followers of Jesus do not have heaven on their minds, they waste their lives, they hinder the power of the church, and they are consumed with fading things.
But today, we want to look to heaven. I want to take a moment and point our attention to the redemption of all things. The title is “When the Darkness Ends” for today. There is going to be a day when all of this is gone. There is going to come a time when the world as we know it is gone, all the darkness, all the sin, all the temptation, all the brokenness.
John Bunyan writing in the Pilgrim’s Progress, which demonstrates such genius in making the Christian life into a graphic illustration, has a conversation between two pilgrims who are on their way to the celestial city, which, of course, is heaven. One of the two pilgrims says to the other, “When do you find yourself in the most wholesome and most vigorous spiritual state?” to which the other pilgrim says, “When I think of the place to which I am going.”
If you are like me, like I just shared, I don’t think about heaven enough. I don’t think about eternity. I get lost in this world.
But I would argue that the person who looks to eternity, the believer who is hopeful and expectant of this new heaven and new earth, the believer who knows that his destiny is glorious, that is the believer who lives a radically different kind of life. One that is filled with love, servanthood, sacrifice for the gospel.
A life that someone would look at and say, “what is so different about them?” In a world filled with darkness and sin, they would ask “why are they hopeful”?
Paul said in Colossians 1:3–5, “We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven.”
It's the assurance of the hope of heaven that releases the radical, risk-taking love that makes people look at your life and "ask a reason for the hope that is in you" as Peter says in 1 Peter 3.
I think when we do this, it lifts us to be
Better parents
Better spouses
Better co workers
Better neighbors
Literally changes every aspect of our lives when we fix our minds on heaven
Perhaps, the greatest movie of the Lord of the Rings Trilogy, The Two Towers, the second movie. If you disagree we can talk after. But at the very end of this movie in particular, you get this great scene where Frodo is absolutely done, exhausted and tired.
If you're unfamiliar with Lord of the Rings, Frodo, along with his trusted companion Samwise, has been tasked with carrying this ring across middle earth to destroy it in the fires of Mordor, a vile place. With carrying this ring comes hardship, suffering, constant turmoil, and all around them, Sauron the evil spirit, is destroying all things. The world they know and live in is becoming darker and darker, evil closing in continually.
Frodo says “I can’t do this anymore, Sam.”
Sam responds with one of the greatest lines in the entire trilogy.
“I know. It’s all wrong. By rights we shouldn’t even be here. But we are. It’s like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were. And sometimes you didn’t want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened?
But in the end, it’s only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something. Even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back only they didn’t. Because they were holding on to something.”
Frodo would go on to ask, “What are we holding on to, Sam?”
Which Sam would respond with “That there is some good left in this world, Mr. Frodo, and it is worth fighting for.”
In a world like ours, where it seems all is lost, do you trust that all things will be made new? Do you live your life for the eternal glory you will experience? Are you filled with the hope to come?
Do you believe that Romans 6:5 is true…”For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.”
This is what I want us to think about this morning. What is that going to be like?
So now, let’s look at Revelation 21. God is making “all things new”. As he sits on his throne, the throne of the universe, He is making everything new.
I want to look at the FOUR WAYS the newness is coming.
Now remember, as this chapter opens – let me just give you a fast review, and we won't go into the whole of the Book and I would actually encourage you to go back and watch our whole series on Revelation that we did last year – but, as this chapter opens in the chronology of end times:
all the sinners of all the ages, demons and men, including Satan, the false prophet, the Antichrist, and everybody else, are now in the eternal lake of fire.
They are out of the presence of God and the saints and the holy angels forever.
They have been dismissed into their own disconnected, isolated place of eternal punishment.
They are gone from the presence of God, the saints and angels forever.
Additionally, the whole universe as we know it, the entire universe, all the way out to endless space all of it has been destroyed. All of it has been reduced to energy. All the matter that makes up the entire universe has been reduced to energy.
So the universe as we know it is gone, and all the ungodly are gone. And God then takes the holy angels and the godly of all the ages and creates for them a new universe, which is to be the eternal dwelling place of the redeemed and of the angels who worship God.
Ephesians 1:7-10 points to this when it says, “In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in Christ, things in heaven and things on earth in him.”
This is it. That is summing up everything. “As a plan for the fullness of time”. This is the eternal state that will exist forever and ever.
Now, let’s look at the opening of verse 1. Three very small, simple words.
“Then I saw.”
That little phrase is a technical phrase; it’s been used since chapter 19, verse 11. Chapter 19, verse 11: “I saw heaven opened” and then Christ comes.
It’s a very important phrase, because I think it is used to take us step by step through the chronology of the coming of Christ.
It is used when the Lord returns.
It is then used at the defeat of Antichrist.
It is then used to introduce the banishment of Satan at the outset of the kingdom.
It is then used at the introduction of the kingdom
It is used at the opening of the release and the destruction of Satan.
It is used to introduce the scene at the great white throne.
And it is used to introduce the new heaven and the new earth.
It’s a technical phrase that introduces each of the sequential events from the return of Christ.
“I saw a new heaven and a new earth.”
And what did he see?
This is where we see the four ways newness is coming.
The New Creation (v.1)
Spiritually and Morally New (v.2)
A New Relationship With God (v.3)
Physically and Bodily New (v.4.)
Let start with the first of the four
The New Creation
V.1….”Then I saw a new heavens and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.”
This is the point of verse one: That God is making creation NEW and GLORIOUS.
As John pens down this vision that he is seeing, he is actually pulling right from two references in the prophet Isaiah back in the Old Testament.
Isaiah 65:17, “For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth; And the former things will not be remembered or come to mind.
Isaiah 66:22, “Just as the new heavens and the new earth which I make will endure before Me,” declares the Lord, “so your offspring and your name will endure.”
What Isaiah had predicted, is now coming to fruition through the vision John is having.
The earth we live in is temporary…it is disposable. We are not to preserve it…that’s pointless. I am not saying go out and make it your trash can…or pollute the world with everything you can imagine…and destroy it. But what I am saying is that eventually, it will all be gone. Entropy, decay, breakdown, tending towards disorder is in effect right now.
God does not intend for our disposable planet to remain. He will make everything new. Paul puts it this way in Romans 8. Look at verse 21,
“The creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and obtain the liberty of the glory of the children of God.”
Now what’s interesting about that word “new” is that I am assuming, like myself, that you read it as new as opposed to old, right? That would be the Greek word neos.
I am a creature of habit…I only buy vans. That’s it. And typically it’s the exact same model and style. So when I get “new” vans, they aren’t really different…just new.
But here, the writer uses a different word in the Greek for new. He uses the word kainos. This word actually means “new in quality”. So it is not just new in the timeline, or new to the calendar, or a new pair of the same thing. It is fresh…it is something different.
There’s coming a different heaven and earth. Yes, it is new in terms of chronology; but the point that the writer is making here is that it is new in terms of kind, it’s different. The quality of it is completely different from the one we now know. And we won’t even have any remembrance of the one that now exists.
There will come a new heaven,
a heaven with no more tempests
a heaven with no more storms
no more fierce winds
no more thunder
no more rain
no more demons and devils roaming.
And there will be a new earth,
with no miseries of godlessness
no longer living under the curse.
An earth whose forever hills will flow with holiness and the river of salvation, and whose eternal valleys know only the peace of the paradise of God
Do you ever just think about that? How glorious and beautiful it is going to be. I don’t even think that you or I can comprehend or imagine it. The psalmist puts it this way in Psalm 102:
Of old you laid the foundation of the earth,
and the heavens are the work of your hands.
They will perish, but you will remain;
they will all wear out like a garment.
You will change them like a robe, and they will pass away
but you are the same, and your years have no end.
The children of your servants shall dwell secure;
their offspring shall be established before you.
We will dwell secure in the new heaven and the new earth.
So he starts with the new heaven and the new earth, but then he moves on to the next point of newness…the bride of Christ in the new heaven and new earth. Look at verse 2,
“And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.”
The second point of newness is this
2. Spiritually and Morally New
God is going to make us, His Church, His bride, into something new and glorious.
I would say one of the greatest frustrations of this age is that we still sin. Right? I mean we have talked about this in the past few weeks, but sin is obviously detrimental in our lives.
It runs rampant.
It devours.
It destroys.
It manipulates.
It tarnishes.
Romans 7 highlights for us, painfully, the reality and truth of sin.
Romans 7:14-25, “For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.
So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!
This war is the most frustrating thing for the disciples of Jesus.
We want to be holy, but we will always fall short of that holiness.
We want to love but we say hurtful things
We want to worship and we feel cold
We want to walk in peace and we feel anxiety
We want to be pure in thought but impurities take captive our minds
My wife and I have four little kids, 10 and younger, and this is a constant conversation we are having with them. How do we manage this tension? Seems like a constant conversation…hey our hearts are evil and sinful and they lead us to do stupid things. My son just the other day told me he knows in his mind he shouldn't act the way he does, while in the tantrum, but even so he continues to do it. He tells himself to stop but he can’t. What a vivid picture that sin engulfs all things. No one is exempt from its disastrous hold in our lives.
This doesn’t mean there isn’t progress towards glorification because of the work of the Holy Spirit, that sanctification process, but if you are like me, I want it now. I want deliverance from my bent toward sinning.
But again, this is the beauty of John’s vision here. He promises that deliverance…GLORIFICATION. When all things are made new, and the new heaven and earth are created, you are made new too. We will be made spiritually and morally new, and not just partially, but wholly.
Verse 2 here is a picture of the church prepared and beautified for Christ. We are made spiritually and morally beautiful for Jesus. If you were to jump ahead to verse 9-11, we see this described.
“Then came one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues and spoke to me, saying, “Come, I will show you the Bride, the wife of the Lamb.” And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great, high mountain, and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God, having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal.”
Underline in that verse 11, “having the glory of God”.
Want to know how He gets the bride ready? You and me? With His glory. This glory purifies us so deeply and makes us clear as crystal.
Do you long for that day? When all shame is gone. All sin is gone. All impurities are gone. Glorified like Christ. I personally can not wait for that day.
3. A New Relationship With God
Verse 3 reads, “And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.”
We believe the Lord is with us always. We trust that He will never leave us or forsake us, that He is with us until the end of all things. His Spirit dwells within us. But Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5:6-7, “So we are always of good courage. We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord, for we walk by faith, not by sight. Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord.”
So even in this, there is this painful reality that we are still not home with Jesus. Again, we 100% believe that His Spirit dwells in us, but we also believe that being home with Him is far better. Being in his presence, visibly seeing the Lord. Can we even comprehend how wonderful that will be?
We are away from the Lord and we do not see as we will one day see. It will be different. Jesus actually promises that in the Beatitudes for the pure in heart…that they will see God. That is a promise. There is something greater coming for all of us in our relationship with God.
John MacArthur says it this way, “The Immanuel God with us is really with us, not just in human flesh in the form of Jesus Christ; but now Immanuel is with us in all His fullness, no more veiled in flesh, no more in a Holy of Holies in a tabernacle or a temple, no more in a cloud by day or a pillar of fire by night, no more is God transcendent. God comes and makes His home with us. Now this is the Father’s house, and we’re all in it together. That is the amazing reality of heaven. “Blessed are the pure of heart, for they shall see God.”
Here is the encouragement for me and I hope for you:
God spoke to the prophets audibly and personally.
God led His people by day and by night with His presence.
God showed them His glory.
God came in the flesh of Jesus Christ
God has come to believers in the form of the indwelling Holy Spirit.
But this is God’s presence like no other occasion. And this then is the supreme personality of heaven.
We want to be there because God is there.
Jesus in John 17 prays for this exact thing. Remember, this is the prayer of Jesus for His Glory, For His Disciples and for those who would come to believe in Him…that’s you and me. We are who He prayed for. He prays this,
“Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world.”
What a prayer. There will be no more fear, no more restraint. We will be in the presence of the Lord forever. So unimaginable, but the promise of heaven none the less.
4. Physically and Bodily New
This is our final point on the newness, and really I just want to touch on this quickly. Physically and bodily, we will be made new and glorious.
Look at verse 4, “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”
This is probably one of the most popular verses in Scripture. I feel like when we think of heaven this is one of the main ones that people look to as hope. You hear it at funerals, and eulogies. It’s filled with the hope of being made new and perfect, right?
I want to be so clear that the Bible never teaches that at the end of all things, we would be just a bunch of spirits. We believe that our bodies will be made new.
No more pain
No more tears
No more death
No more decay
No more brokenness
Our bodies are wasting away here, but in the end, our bodies will be made completely new, no flaws.
Now Paul says in Philippians 3:20-21, “ But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself.”
Our bodies will never die again. They will never hurt again. I think for many, they believe they didn’t get the best luck this side of heaven with their physical health. People deal with countless things, some painful, some frustrating. If you are like me, we have lost people to worldly decay of the bodies in a bunch of different avenues. But this chapter reminds us that God has no intention of leaving anyone like that. God has no intention of keeping you the way that you are, if you trust Him. I do believe God has his purposes for the ways we are born and the ailments we deal with and the suffering we go through.
The blind man in John 9 solidifies that for us.
(blind man comes to jesus and the people around ask was it the mother of father who sinned for this man to be born blind and Jesus responds with he was born blind so that the works of God might be displayed…Gods Glory ultimately.”
But God has no intention of leaving anyone with pain who trusts in Him. He will make our bodies new and glorious.
Usually there would be some phenomenal application points here. Do all these things to experience all of this…but if I am honest, I don’t think there is one here. I think for all of us, it’s an encouragement to just remember and bask in the reality of where we are headed. Like I said in the beginning of this message, I don’t think about Heaven nearly enough. I don't think about being in His Presence enough. If I am not careful, my thoughts drift to our fleshly world and I am consumed with the sin and brokenness that I forgot the hope I have in my eternal home.
Psalm 73:25, “Whom have I in heaven but you?
And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you.”