Now I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. Also there was no more sea. (2)Then I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. (3) And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying “Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and he their God. (4)And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away”. (5)Then He who sat on it the throne said “Behold, I make all things new.” And He said to me, “Write, for these words are true and faithful.”
The book of Revelation is believed to be written by the apostle John. John received his revelation about the victory of God in the face of terror and evil during a period of great persecution for the church. John wanted Christians of Asia to know of God’s ultimate victory to encourage them to perseverance and faith in the midst of persecution. The subject today is a “new heaven and a new earth”. The Messianic judgments are now followed by the last of the last things: the new order and the bliss of the redeemed, which is really the end of our pilgrimage – the pilgrimage of the church of Jesus Christ as well
In a sense we have here what we might expect for paradise lost in Genesis to paradise regained in Revelation, chapter 21. So this is likely to be about the eternal state of the the heavens and a new earth. John’s writing of this witnesses to the fact of man’s immortal longing includes such a vision of the future. The new heaven and new earth is a result of the atoning work of the Lord Jesus Christ. The dream of a new heaven and earth is witness to spiritual man’s faith in God.
God shall dwell among men and they shall be his people describes the story of Scripture: God in His marvelous grace through the Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. We love God because He first loved us. C.s.Lewis writes that “The sense that in this universe we are treated as strangers, the longing to be acknowledge, to meet with some response, to bridge some chasm that yawns between us and reality, is part of out inconsolable secret. And surely, from this point of view, the promise of glory, in the sense described, becomes highly relevant to our deep desire. For glory means good report with God, acceptance by God, response, acknowledgement and welcome into the heart of things. The door on which we have been knocking all our lives will open at last.”