Revelation | May 13, 2026

Start your day with a short, Scripture-centered devotional from Paul Michael. In about seven minutes, you will hear the Word, reflect on its truth, and be encouraged to live it out in everyday life.

Revelation | The New Jerusalem, Part 1

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Transcript

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Welcome to your daily devotional with me, PMV. We are down to our last four teachings through the book of Revelation. And as this series ends, I plan to take a break from the daily devotionals and do one each Monday on a weekly basis for a while, at least for a month, while we reset and look at approaching this ministry a little differently. My desire is to get even more content out in the future, but we want to make sure that we're doing it in the most efficient way that reaches the most people. Okay, with that being said, now on to Revelation. Previously, we saw the death of death. At this point, everything that is sinful or harmful has been thrown into the lake of fire. And all that remains is the new creation, God's new creation, and that includes us, those who have believed in Jesus Christ. We will finally be free from the decay of this world and will have resurrected bodies and a new earth to dwell in as we live in the light of God's glory forever and ever. Revelation chapter 2, verse 19 reads, 21, verse 19 reads, Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls filled with the seven last plagues came to me and talked with me, saying, Come, I will show you the bride, the Lamb's wife. So if you remember, back in Revelation chapter 6 through chapter 16, there were three cycles of judgment. First, there were the seven seals that were opened, and with each seal there was a judgment of God. Then we saw the seven trumpets, and finally the seven bowls that were poured out upon the earth. These were three cycles of seven of God's judgment that was being poured out upon the earth. Well, when we come to Revelation 21, 9, which I just read, it's saying that one of the angels who poured out one of the final judgments of God now tells John to come see the bride, the Lamb's wife. So as we've seen in multiple places in Revelation, Jesus is the Lamb, and the church is his bride. We are the bride, he is the bridegroom. Next, Revelation 21, verses 10 through 11 read, and he carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me the great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God, having the glory of God. Her light was like a most precious stone, like a jasper stone, clear as crystal. Well, as we saw last week, God will create a new heaven and a new earth. The new earth will not have anything in it that harms us or causes sin. Death will be done. There will only be eternal life. As God creates this new heaven and this new earth, he then comes down to dwell with us in it. Thus, his presence is truly what makes it heaven. As the new heaven that is created of, it speaks of this heaven and earth. The heaven that it's probably speaking of just refers to the sky, the literal heaven that is above us in this new heavens and this new earth. There will be a new earth, there will be the atmosphere above, and God will come to dwell in our midst forever. So what's happening here is the presence of God dwelling in the midst of his people symbolizes the new Jerusalem. In order to understand this symbolism, though, you have to understand a little bit of the history behind Jerusalem. Jerusalem became the capital city of King David. David was chosen by God to be king over the Jewish people. And yes, David had his faults, but he was described as a man after God's own heart. And he wrote many of the Psalms that are found in the book of Psalm. And God made a promise to David. God called it the, well, it was called the Davidic covenant. And it was that his family line would endure and that he would never like someone to sit on the throne. Well, Jesus came as the ultimate fulfillment of the Davidic covenant. And Jesus' earthly lineage comes from the line of David. And he is the one who would come in the line of David to fulfill God's promise, the one who will always sit on the throne. He is King of kings and Lord of Lords, and he is that way forevermore. So this new Jerusalem that we see in Revelation 21 actually points back to the Davidic covenant, but it also points to the temple that was in Jerusalem. God allowed David's son Solomon to build the temple. During the time of Moses and onward, the children of God worshipped God in the tabernacle. It was a tent-like structure. But Solomon, he built this magnificent temple for God that was nothing like the world has ever seen before or since. It was a temple that was truly about the glory of God. And in this temple was a place called the Holy of Holies. That's where God's glory would rest. The Holy of Holies was the innermost part of the temple. It was separated from the other parts by this thick, heavy curtain. And inside the Holy of Holies was where the Ark of the Covenant was. It had the Ten Commandments, and on top of the Ark was something called the Mercy Seat. It was the image of two angels with their wings spread over the ark. So once a year, a high priest would enter the Holy of Holies, sprinkle blood on the mercy seat as a way of providing atonement or a covering for the sins of the people. The Holy of Holies was symbolic of God dwelling in the midst of his people. And at one point during the tabernacle, the wilderness wanderings, God's presence literally rested over the Holy of Holies. And it was there that the high priest would go in, he'd make the sacrifice, and God would still meet with his people, even during the time of Solomon. So it represented God's presence. And it was where God's presence would literally be in the midst of his people, in Jerusalem, in the temple, in the Holy of Holies. So when Revelation speaks of a new Jerusalem coming down from heaven, we now have a little bit of an understanding of how significant this is. This new Jerusalem represents the promises of God fulfilled. This new Jerusalem represents the presence of God in the midst of his people. This new Jerusalem is what we've been waiting for and what the expectation of hundreds, if not thousands, of prophecies have been about. In a good story, there's a plot line that you can follow. There's usually a beginning that sets up the characters, the background, kind of the introductory information that you need to know. Then comes the problem to overcome. Something happens. There's a goal to be met, or characters set out on a quest. Then comes the climax. This is the moment that everything has been building up towards and from which everything else changes. After the climax, we see the resolution. We see how now the situation is different or the characters are different, how things have changed. Have you ever noticed, though, how violent Disney movies are? There's usually some terrible death or tragedy right at the beginning of a Disney movie that sets the main characters on a quest for self-discovery. Think about it. What happened to Bambi? His mother was shot. What happened to Cinderella? Her father died, and she was a slave for her wicked stepmother. What happened to Snow White? Well, her wicked stepmother tried to kill her because of her beauty. They do it with modern movies as well. These quote, kid movies begin with some awful tragedies. But that's what makes a plot line so captivating in a story. They use tragedy to draw you in and get you rooting for the main character. So next time, as we continue through Revelation chapter 21, I want you to think of this kind of last part of Revelation in this way: this plot line. God is bringing things to his conclusion. God created the world, then tragedy struck. Man sinned against God. God's perfect world fell under the curse of sin and death and the power of Satan. But since then, God has been on a quest to redeem it. He is in the process of making it all okay again. And when Jesus came to this earth to die for the sins of the world, to rise again, that was a major climax in the storyline of God's redemption. Everything has been changing and has changed from that moment on. But we are still stuck in time, and it seems like these 2,000 years have passed since Jesus was here and died and rose again. And now we're just waiting, we're waiting for God to bring this story to his conclusion. But God's timing is always perfect. And in his time, one day he will bring that resolution to his story, that ending that we have all been waiting for. And that ending is the new Jerusalem. It is God dwelling in our midst. Thank you for God. Thank you for joining me today. I look forward to that day when we will all be in God's presence forever. But for now, may you live for him. May his glory be seen in your life. For more information, you can go to pmvministries.org. As always, I hope you have a good time.