HEAVENLY LIVING
Rev. 21
Big Idea: God’s ideal of community in not something we simply wait to happen at some future point – it is a something we strive to create here and now.
INTRODUCTION
I must make a confession to you this morning. While engrossed in the exegesis for Rev. 21 I awoke early one morning with the text rolling through my mind. I still remember my first thoughts and words. Before I ever got out of bed I said (to myself) “Drats! Heaven is a city!”
Not only is it a city – it’s a HUGE city. It is approximately 1500 square miles (and 1500 miles high!). That is a footprint equivalent to half of the U.S.A. From Boston to Kansas City is right at 1500 miles. From Kansas City to Los Angeles is right at 1500 miles. From New Orleans to the Canadian Border is 1500 miles! The New Jerusalem is huge! It can hold a lot of people … very possibly more people than have ever lived on the planet (remember it is also 1500 miles high). Did you know that the Time Warner building in New York City only covers 3 1/2 acres? Did you know it is only 1700 feet high and hosts over 40,000 people a day!? That helps put the size of the New Jerusalem in perspective.
I was very sad when I discovered heaven was a city. That may not sound like a big deal to you but, as sad a commentary as it might be, I was genuinely disappointed. I don’t want to live in “the city.” I, like many of us who live here on the north side of the Adirondacks, have made deliberate life choices precisely because I do NOT want to live in “the city!”
The city offers a different lifestyle than we have here in our North Country college town. Rural environments like ours, particularly ours, offer a serene and pastoral setting. It offers time to reflect, enjoy the river, the mountains, and a rhythmic pace of life. It offers a degree of personal space that is not available in the city.
I really wanted Heaven to be a garden – more accurately, a state park.
The city represents evil
When I think of city life I think of dirty streets and murderous alleys, adulterous bedrooms, corrupt courts, hypocritical synagogues, commercialized churches, thieving tax-collectors and traitorous friends. I think of things like fragmentation, stress, poverty, fear, division, violence, insecurity, and loneliness. I think of things like guilt, frustration, disillusionment, hate, and bitterness. When we hear news from “the city” we hear of fraudulent commerce, blasphemous words, and corrupt politics. These daily bruise our ears. You name a negative human emotion-a human experience-and it is found in the city.
Then there is the hubris! Cities constructed by human beings are at worst idolatrous expressions of human pride. It is exacerbated by all the noise and self-assertion, forgetful defiance of God, the battering and abusive persons. The first city, Enoch, was built by the first murderer, Cain, and destroyed in Noah’s flood. The second city, Babel, was built in an arrogant attempt to storm heaven and was abandoned in a tangle of broken languages. When St. John gave us his vision of judgment, it was a CITY that was destroyed: “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great!” (Rev. 18:2).
Babylon contrasted to the New Jerusalem
And that’s when it hit me; when I think of the city I think of the Babylon of chapter 18. John’s contrast to The New Jerusalem is Babylon. Chapter 18 is intended to be in contrast with these last two chapters.
John describes Babylon’s depravity well doesn’t he? It encompasses all this is wrong with modern cities.
Then he gives what is the most picturesque vision in his book – the New Jerusalem. Here we discover that sin and corruption have all passed away; have all been sanctified and transformed. Verse 5 of chapter 21 began to make sense. God was not making all new things – he was making all things new!!!!
Finally I realized that this is precisely why God expresses the concept of Heaven as urban. It teaches us very important truths about being the people of God and the kingdom of God.
• Cities require dependency and interdependency – Babylon corrupts this while the New Jerusalem perfects it
• Cities create a specific and unique communal identity – Babylon corrupts this while the New Jerusalem perfects it
• Cities create specific obligations for its citizenship – Babylon corrupts this while the New Jerusalem perfects it
• Cities create privileges and conveniences – – Babylon corrupts this while the New Jerusalem perfects it
The New Jerusalem and the People of God
Few images are better equipped to show us what it means to live as the people of God than a city. Urban living is relational living. It requires cooperation and community to function properly. Have you noticed all the relational language in chapter 21? It is not a coincidence. Heaven is a holy city living in harmony; heaven is a virgin bride, alive in intimacy with God; the city and bride are us.
But it is more than living in harmony with God. Urban living (HEAVENLY LIVING) also requires us to live in harmony with each other!
And hear me -- with John’s use of the present active particle (coming down), John implies that arrival of the New Jerusalem-at least in some preliminary way-is a present reality.
The Revelation is all about meeting real needs of real people like you and me and it is true for us right where we are.
The idea of this future city is not designed to make you long for the day of its arrival – it is to motivate you to create it here and now. It should be manifested in your relationships in real time. In the church, God is coming to dwell with man.
There is a day of consummation coming, I truly believe that, BUT WE ARE NOT EXPECTED TO WAIT FOR THE SWEET BY-AND-BY. WE ARE INTENDED TO; AS MUCH AS IT IS POSSIBLE WITH US, MAKE THIS A SWEET HERE-AND-NOW.
There is not even so much as a hint of escapism in St’ John’s heaven. This is not a long (eternal) weekend away from the responsibilities of employment and citizenship, but the intensification and healing of those responsibilities. Heaven is formed out of Babylon’s corruption!
"Behold, I am making all things new."
A city? Yes.
But a holy city.
The biblical heaven is the transformation of the city by the city. We enter heaven’s door not by escaping what we don’t like, but by the sanctification of the place in which God has placed us. The old will remain a constituent part of the new, but it will be fiercely transfigured. Through Christ’s church God wishes to make all things new.
This model of heaven coming down here and now making all things new and God dwelling with man via His church is an answer to the prayers of God’s people throughout the Revelation.
It is also answer to the prayer we were taught to pray by Jesus:
Our Father, which art in heaven,
Hallowed be thy Name.
Thy Kingdom come.
Thy will be done in earth,
As it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
As we forgive them that trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
But deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
The power, and the glory,
For ever and ever.
Amen.
The holy city is God’s answer every request of that prayer.
In John’s mind, heaven is not what we wait for until the rapture or where we go when we die. It is barely out of the range of our senses. We are now able to look upon the events around us not as a hopeless morass of pagan deception and human misery, but as the birth pangs of a new creation and a beckoning to participate in God’s remaking of God’s creation. Again, what John is doing is giving us a vision of the future so we can be remade into Christ’s image here and now.
The New Jerusalem represents the true fulfillment of the ideal city, a city truly worth belonging to. It is “manifested life” and “fellowship.” The “manifested life” of God in Jesus constitutes, or brings together, a “fellowship” of those who share his life.
WRAP-UP
“Heavenly Living” is intended to empower us to mutually support each other.
We need you!
You need us!
That is what the Kingdom looks like!
We are intended to give each other mutual support, love, fellowship and cooperation. We are designed to facilitate justice, service, sacrifice, and joy.
• All the things that the renewed city of God will encompass.
• All the things that the people of God in every age are to encompass.
• All the things that a local church is supposed to encompass.
I know you can finish this adage for me by now but let me simply remind you that all – ALL – Christians needs need three types of relationships.
• You need a mentor – someone further along the journey than you.
• You need a fellow traveler – someone to journey with
• You need a mentee – someone in whom to impart your experiences and spiritual insight
Some of us, however, are so acclimated to North Country living that we have forgotten how much we really need each other. As I have told you many times before, people like you and me are grossly over-individualized. We have glorified the North Country’s “rugged individualism.” We have made it a spiritual virtue when, in truth, it hinders us from being the people of God. I think we have talked about personal salvation and individual salvation and “me” and “my” and “my inner life” until we have isolated ourselves to the point of error. Oh, of course we know we ought to be nice to each other and love each other, but what really counts is “my personal relationship to God.”
I’m not saying that our relationship to God is not personal and unique. I’m saying that we are over-individualized and that the average western Christian’s concept of private piety and faithful living cannot be justified with the Scriptures we read. Go back and re-read Pastor Joe’s sermon from last week. There is no way that an authentic reading of Acts 2:42-47 justifies the private piety most western Christians embrace.
The vertical line of God-ward relationship and the horizontal line of human relationship are not two lines but one line in a continuum. It all belongs together. I’m not talking about what ought to be or what would be nice if it were-I’m talking about God’s reality about the way He has constituted the life we have with Him. Our life with Him is tied to, is one with, our life with our brothers and sisters. It isn’t “Jesus and Me” it is “Jesus and we.” There is room for Jesus and the whole redeemed community in your salvation experience.
And if you are like me, when you are burdened and weary and sad you need Jesus but you also need someone to be Jesus to you-someone to bring His healing presence to you.
And when we discover that we will begin to get a hint of why Heaven is a city. A heavenly city that is to be embodied in the hearts of God’s people in the here and now.
He who has an ear, let him hear.
(Revelation 13:9)
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** Special thanks for the inspiration provided by the writings of Dr. Reuben Welch and Eugene Petersen's book, "Reversed Thunder: The Revelation of John and the Praying Imagination."
This sermon is provided by Dr. Kenneth Pell
Potsdam Church of the Nazarene, Potsdam, New York
www.potsdam-naz.org
The Kingdom Way
Luke 17:20-21, Matthew 5 (portions)
Leader: Once, having been asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied,
People: “The kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation, nor will people say, ‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is within you.”
Leader: “Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me.
People: Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
Leader: “You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again?
People: “You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. … Let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.
Leader: “You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’
People: But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.
Leader: “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’
People: But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven.
Leader: Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.
People: “The kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation, nor will people say, ‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is within you.”
Responsive Reading – The Core Values of Jesus
Mark 12:28-33 (Portions)
Leader: Of all the commandments, which is the most important?
People: The most important one is this: Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God
Leader: With all your heart
People: With all your soul
Leader: With all your mind
People: With all your strength.
Leader: The second is this:
ALL: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” There is no commandment greater than these.”
