2nd or Revelation 21 and 2nd
Peter chapter 3 that's the the two passages a new heaven and
a new earth and again it this is after After the great white
throne judgment the judgment is passed now all things have
been declared all things the reality that's what judgment
is you know the final judgment is not going to determine anything
and because by then everything's already been determined. But
what the final judgment's going to do, it's going to declare
before the whole universe that Christ is king, that he's Lord,
that he's the savior of his people. The scripture says every knee's
gonna bow and every tongue's gonna confess that Jesus is Lord.
And that includes the unbeliever. The unbeliever, not in salvation
now, but in forced submission. will bow the knee to Christ and
acknowledge that he's right in his judgments even in damning
them. In other words, they'll say,
we're getting what we deserve. But then we have the comfort
of the people of God who come before him, those who are judged
out of the book of life, that one single book, whose record
and account is found wrapped up in the Lord Jesus Christ,
washed in his blood and clothed in his righteousness. So that's
what the judgment has done. Well, after that in chapter 21,
he says, and I saw a new heaven and a new earth, brand new. For the first heaven and the
first earth were passed away. Now we're gonna see here in just
a moment in 2 Peter, how it passes away, but it's with a burning. I've often sort of, gested with people about this
issue of global warming. I always say, well, I believe
in global warming. Read 2 Peter chapter 3. It's going to burn
up with a fervent heat. And that's about the hottest
warming you can find. But we know that what's happening
here is the Lord is making all things new. He says that the
first earth, that's this fallen, sin-cursed earth. Now the heaven
there is referring to the sky. that surrounds this earth. The
Hebrews spoke of three levels of heaven, not talking about
a hierarchy or something like that, but they talk about the
sky and then above the sky space and then they talk about the
dwelling place of God. They were not being astronomers
or trying to be scientifically correct. They were just talking
about the glory of God and how all things are arranged theologically
and how it spoke to the glory of God. But what we see now is
passed away. That's what he's saying. The first heaven and the first,
that's the first creation. It had to pass away because it's
fallen. What Adam did in the garden when
he brought the whole human race into sin and death affected this
whole creation. Romans chapter eight speaks of
the whole creation groaning for the second coming of the Lord
to be made new. And that's a metaphor, and it's
talking about the sin-cursed earth. We see the manifestations
of the curse of sin in things like what we've experienced here
in Albany in the last month with the tornadoes and the destruction,
the earthquakes, things like that. Those are manifestations
of a cursed world, and it's damaged. It's under the curse of God.
So not only does, when we talk about salvation, we're talking
about the salvation of sinners by the grace of God in and through
the Lord Jesus Christ, we're also talking about the salvation
of this earth and the heavens as they will be made new. This
will pass away and all things will be made new. And then he
says there was no more sea. Now, understand now, I don't
believe what he's saying there is there be no oceans in the
new heavens and the new earth. Maybe not, I don't know. I know
in the creation before the fall, most people believe, and I kind
of agree with this, that the earth, it never rained before
the flood of Noah. And the earth was covered like
a greenhouse. You had the water that came from
up and the water like a mist that came from below that watered
the earth. And so when God talked to Noah and said, I'm gonna bring
a flood, it's gonna rain. Well, they'd never seen rain
before. And I think it was a total shock
to those in unbelief. So is this saying there's not
gonna be oceans on the new earth? I don't know for sure, but the
sea always in the Bible represents a place of death, a place of
trouble, a place of evil. And you can understand that,
you know, they didn't, you know, you think about going out into
the ocean back then, you know, a lot of us are afraid to do
it even today, you know, with all the technology we have. But
think about it back then, it was a place of trouble, storms,
a place of death. But it was also the place where
the great dragon, Satan, metaphorically is said to be hidden, and the
dead, the abode of the dead, and the center it was the center
of commerce for the unbelieving nations in other words it was
all negative it was all in opposition to God that's the way they looked
at it and that's what it used as a metaphor there well that's
all going to be gone everything that opposed the Lord of Glory
will be gone all trouble will be gone and so now what he's
talking about here is the establishment of the new earth and the new
heavens. And look at verse two, he says,
I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem. Now that's the abiding
place of Christ and his church. We're citizens. If you're a believer,
if you're a sinner saved by grace, washed in the blood of Christ,
clothed in his righteousness, you're not a citizen of this
earth. Even though you dwell on this earth, you are on this
earth. But this is not your citizenship.
We talk about citizenship today. I know we have a citizenship
in this country. I know that. But ultimately and
eternally, our citizenship is not on this earth, it's in heaven.
Paul spoke of that in Philippians chapter three, when he said,
our conversation is in heaven. What is that? Philippians 3.21,
I think. Our conversation is in heaven. That word conversation
is literally citizenship. Remember, it speaks of Abraham.
who didn't have a home here on this earth, and he was looking
for one not on this earth, but in heaven. And so the New Jerusalem
is the dwelling place of Christ and his church, that holy city,
it's separated from this earth. It's nothing like physical Jerusalem. Paul made that, by inspiration
of the Holy Spirit, Paul made that distinction in Galatians
4. And you remember when he was
talking about the two covenants, one represented by Hagar, that
was Abraham's bondmaid. And remember they had the son
Ishmael by Hagar and he used her to represent or symbolize
the covenant of Sinai, which was a conditional works covenant,
which they failed. And so it was bondage. You see,
if salvation is ever conditioned on the sinner, the Bible says
that's bondage. That puts you in bondage. So
what conditions do you have to meet? Well, some say faith, all
right? Well, we know saving faith is
the gift of God. I'm gonna be preaching on that
in the next few messages. Saving faith's a gift of God,
and faith looks to Christ. Faith does not look to itself.
A lot of people have faith in their faith. That's just as legalistic
as if you come up and said, well, I'm gonna be saved by keeping
the law. Some people say it's faith plus repentance. Some people
say it's faith plus repentance plus obedience or perseverance.
Either way, it's bondage. Because if at any time God ever
puts salvation or justification or righteousness on your shoulder
or on my shoulder, that puts us in bondage. Now some people
say, well, faith lightens the load. Well, God cannot lighten
the load. You know why? Because he's God. He can only require perfect righteousness. I'll never forget years ago,
I was having lunch with a young man whose father-in-law was going
to this church, and the father-in-law was trying to talk to him about
the gospel, and the young man just didn't see it, so he wanted
to have lunch with me. So I went out and we had lunch,
and he was talking about a lady who had died, and she was in
the hospital, and a local pastor had gone in to see her, and she
died. The local pastor came out and
said, well, I know she's in heaven. And this fellow said, well, how
do you know that? And here's what the pastor said. He said,
well, she's done that which was required. She did that which
was required. And I asked the fellow, I said,
well, what is required to get in heaven? And he looked at me,
he said, you know, really, I don't know for sure. I said, I can
tell you one word. He said, what? I said, righteousness. He said, righteousness. And I
said, yes, perfect righteousness. And he said, well, nobody can
do that. And I said, that's why salvation
is by grace and not by words. You see, it's not unreasonable
for God to require righteousness because he is righteous. And somebody said, well, that's
unfair. Well, God has provided a way of righteousness, but it's
not in you and it's not in me, it's in Christ. It's the merits
of his obedience unto death. So that's this new Jerusalem. Look at verse two. And I, John,
saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven.
That's, you know, a lot of people in movies and books, you know,
they talk about, they have a whole city just descending and all
that. That's not what it's talking about. When it talks about coming
down from heaven, you know what it's saying? Same thing Jonah
learned in the belly of the whale. Anybody know what that was? Salvation
is of the Lord. It comes from God. Salvation
doesn't come from the earth up. I tell people a lot of times
when they have wrong interpretations of the Bible, I say, well, you're
reasoning from the ground up instead of from heavenward down.
Salvation has to be revealed from God. It has to be given
from God. It has to come down to us. That's what Christ did
when he became incarnate. See, he came down, he did the
work, and then he ascended unto the Father. And this new Jerusalem
is not a product of this earth or the works of the flesh. This
new Jerusalem is totally the work of God in Christ on that
cross, in his death, burial, and resurrection. And it comes
down. But now the saints of God are
always represented as coming down from heaven because that's
where our origin is. And look here, it says, the New
Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a
bride adorned for her husband. Now that tells you exactly who
the New Jerusalem is, it's the church. It's the church of the
living God. If this is a literal city, how
could that literal city be prepared for her husband? Adorned for
her husband. That's talking about the bride
of Christ, that's his church. And notice it says she's prepared.
Who did the preparation here? God did. We're created in Christ Jesus
unto good works, not because of, see? And what is she adorned
with? She's adorned with the righteousness
of her husband. That's the imputed righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the wedding garment. Now
there are other garments the Bible speaks of in Isaiah 61
or 62. I've got it listed here, I think.
But that's the garments of salvation that adorn her. Obviously this
is not a literal garment like I'm wearing this coat. That's
metaphorical language, symbolic language talking about what Christ
has given to his people by the way of righteousness. We stand
before God in Christ. Verse three, John writes, 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 notice the tabernacle of God there is a he. Not an it. All right. That's a person. And
it says, and he will dwell with them. Who's he talking about
here? Christ. John 1 14. The word was made flesh and dwelt
tabernacled among us. The tabernacle. You remember
the tabernacle in the wilderness. That was the dwelling place of
God. And everything about that tabernacle was the gospel of
how God justifies sinners through his grace by the blood of Christ,
the righteousness of Christ. That's what the Ark of the Covenant,
that's what the blood of the Lamb, the high priesthood, the
tabernacle, all of it. That's the dwelling place of
God. Now you cannot contain God in a building. Paul said that
in Acts 17. So what do you mean the dwelling
place of God? What that means is this, this is the greatest
and most honorable revelation of God's nature and character
and glory and work that can be found. Now there's a lot of places
you can find God's glory. You can find it in nature, creation. Psalm 19, the heavens declare
the glory of God. Look at the stars. We were looking
at the stars last night, you know. You look at the sun, the
glory of the sun, and you think about the power and the wisdom
of the one who created that, this earth, the human body. David said, I'm fearfully and
wonderfully made. How every little thing in this
human body has a purpose. that God had put it there for
and all works together in systematic mechanization, you might say,
to keep this human body alive, the heart, the lungs, all of
that. And the wisdom of the one and
the power and the majesty of the one who made that. But here's
the point, where is the greatest manifestation? of the glory of
God. Not in the human body, not in
the son, it's in Christ. In him dwelleth all the fullness
of the Godhead bodily. And you're completing him. It's
in his blood, his righteousness. And that's what he's saying here.
This is Christ dwelling with his people, the new Jerusalem.
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. That's that eternal union of
God's people with Christ. It cannot be broken. It can never
be broken. And then in verse four, listen
to this. We'll conclude in Revelation here and then we'll go to 2 Peter
3 just for a moment. God shall wipe away all tears
from their eyes. There'll be no sorrow. There'll
be no more death. Death will be conquered. Hell
and death. Neither sorrow nor crying, neither
shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed
away. Everything that's connected with
sin, everything that's connected with the curse, everything that's
connected with condemnation to the people who are found without
Christ, be gone. Now we'll pick up there next
week, but look over at 2 Peter 3 now. I want to show you something
here. The Apostle Peter, in this passage,
is answering an objection. Now every true believer, every
true sinner saved by grace, believes that Christ is coming again,
that God's gonna bring judgment down upon this world, that God's
gonna destroy this earth, that he's gonna make a new heavens
and a new earth, and that's gonna be when Christ comes again. But,
he hasn't come yet, has he? He hasn't come yet. And so the
scoffers or the unbelievers, they say, well, where is the
promise of his coming? He's delaying his coming or he's
not fulfilling his promise. God promised, he threatened to
destroy this world, but he hadn't done it. And one of their points
is that, well, look, things are going on just like they always
have with no problem. Now, wait a minute now. Peter
says, now, that's not true. He goes back and he says, you
remember that God reigned on this world and caused a flood
and destroyed this earth. And then we see other things
happening, but don't think that things are just going on with
no problem. Of course, anybody who'd say with no problems is
just a fool. I mean, you know better than that. But here's
what he says, look at verse nine. Now this is a verse of scripture
that a lot of people misinterpret. He says, well look at verse eight,
he says, but beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that
one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years is
one day. Time means nothing to God. God is the God of time. Ecclesiastes three, he appointed
the times. He's not subject to time. God
is not. So what we think is a long delay
is not to God. Everything's happening right
on schedule to God. And so he says in verse nine,
the Lord is not slack concerning his promise. Christ is coming
again, see, as some men count slackness. In other words, we
look at things and we say, well, it's just delayed or there's
a problem or or God's not faithful to his threat. No. That's how
we count things. We're impatient. When the Bible
speaks of patience, you know what it means. It means endurance.
But we're impatient. But he says, the Lord is not
slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness,
but is longsuffering to usward. Now, he's talking about the longsuffering
of God. And when you think about the
long-suffering of God, it simply means God suffers long. For example,
when Adam fell in the garden, why didn't God just bring judgment
down upon Adam and this world and destroy it right then? Why didn't he do that? Because
the wages of sin is death. Why did God allow this world
to go on? The long-suffering of God. He
suffers long. He puts up with a lot. That's
what He's saying. But why does He do that? Alright,
look at it. He's long-suffering to usward.
Who are the usward there? That's His children. That's His
elect. Believers. Not willing that any
should perish. Why is God allowing this world
to go on? Why hasn't Christ come back again and already? Because
God's not willing that any of his children, the usward, should
perish, but that all should come to repentance. Now people say
there, well see, God doesn't want to send anybody to hell.
God doesn't want anybody to perish. This is connected to his long
suffering. And it's the reason why Peter
is saying, as he's inspired by the Spirit, that God's allowing
this world to go on. If this means everybody without
exception, let me tell you something. If that's what it means, number
one, it means that Christ is not going to come back again
until every single individual comes to repentance, which we
know is not gonna happen. Because the Bible speaks of those
who are judged, it just spoken of those who were judged out
of the books according to their works and perish. They don't
come to repentance. The book of Revelation in several
places shows us people who perished, who even in their perishing,
even in hell, will not repent. That is in the repentance unto
salvation. Or they'll bow the knee, but
they won't repent in their hearts and their minds. So if that's
teaching that God's not willing that anybody at all perish, but
that everybody without exception come to repentance, connected
with his long suffering, I can tell you right now, Christ is
never coming back again. Because according to the Bible,
that's not going to happen. But who's it talking about? The
us word there. That all, all of his people should
come to repentance. And understand this too, both
faith and repentance are gifts from God. Now there are people
who believe in a universal salvation, who believe that everybody in
the end is going to be saved. Somebody told me one time they
were talking to a family and they thought, well, even the devil is going
to be saved in the end. But that's not what the Bible
teaches. The Bible teaches that those whom God chose shall be
saved. And he's gonna bring them to
repentance. So Christ is coming back again when the last one
is brought into repentance. How do you get to repentance?
Through faith, and we're gonna talk about that later on. But
look here, verse 10. He says, the day of the Lord
will come as a thief in the night. That doesn't mean that the people
of God will be overtaken like a thief in the night. It means
that we don't know the day and the time, but we expect him to
come anytime. In the which the heaven shall
pass away with a great noise and the elements shall melt with
fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein
shall be burned up. Seeing then that all of these
things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to
be in all holy conversation and godliness? What Peter's saying
there is this tells believers what kind of people we should
be given the fact that Christ is coming again and this world's
gonna be burned up. And we're going to have a new
heavens and a new earth, verse 12, looking for and hastening
unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being
on fire shall be dissolved and the elements shall melt with
fervent heat. Nevertheless, we, according to
his promise, look for a new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth
righteousness. And that's what's being described
over in Revelation 21. Okay.