The Hope of Heaven – Revelation 21–22:5 (May 31, 2026)

Well, if you would go ahead and open up your Bibles to the book of Revelation.

If you haven't been with us or you're new with us, we are making our way through the last book of the Bible.

And we have now come to the last two chapters of the last book of the Bible.

This morning we have the privilege of looking at Revelation 21 and then the first five verses of Revelation 22.

If you don't have a Bible with you, no worries.

There should be a Bible under a chair around you.

We'd love for you to grab that and use that this morning.

You can also find the passage in your bulletin.

You've already seen it.

It's there.

We would love for you to have your eyes on the text as we work our way through what I think might be one of the most amazing passages in the entirety of Scripture.

This morning, we're gonna look at the hope of heaven.

You know, when I was in college, I worked in the admissions office, and uh that meant I'd had a variety of tasks and jobs, but most prevalent was to give sort of campus tours to new students or prospective students and their parents.

And one of the things that we did on these tours is we guided them as we walked backwards.

Uh so there is a real sentence in which I spent a decent amount of my college career walking backwards as people were following me, telling them of things that were happening.

And let me tell you, it took a little while to get used to.

I don't know if you've walked backwards for any amount of time, but it is unsettling.

You have no idea what is behind you, and I had many buddies in college that wanted to make the most of that.

And so there was real fear, even sometimes.

It really did feel like you're like living in half a world.

That there's this like whole world that you have no idea what's happening behind you.

You know, I think that's what living the Christian life feels like when we lose sight of heaven.

I think it's a little like walking backwards.

It's not just disorienting, though, it's it's actually debilitating.

To ignore heaven is in some ways to only see half the picture.

It's to be oriented to this life in this world alone.

You know, it's to think that this world is all there is.

It's to miss what scripture calls the prize, the goal, the finish, the victory.

You know, I just think about how many people in our world feel like their lives sort of is like a hamster wheel.

Just constantly spinning and going nowhere.

See, to lose sight of heaven, I think it's to lose sight of hope.

We need hope, friends.

Proverbs 13, 12 says this hope delayed makes the heart sick, but desire fulfilled is a tree of life.

To lose hope is to be sickened to the very core of who you are.

But to gain hope is to gain life.

There's a real sense in which to hope is to live.

I wonder if you feel hopeless this morning.

Maybe not completely, maybe not utterly, but it is lurking around in your heart.

It could be that you are simply tired from constantly battling sin and temptation.

It might just be that you are wearied of worldly stress, what feels like unceasing growing busyness, or just burdens upon burdens.

It might be that you're just exhausted.

It could be from suffering, it could just be from life in general.

See, I think sometimes we will make the joking remark, when it rains, it pours.

You ever said that?

But deep down, what you really want to say is, I don't know if I can handle much more of this.

Do you need hope this morning?

Well, I think if we do, we need to remember what hope is.

And I think sometimes for us, hope feels a little bit nebulous.

It's abstract, it's a broad word.

It feels like it can be used and mean a lot of things, but it really isn't that hard to understand.

Hope is simply thinking or believing that things are gonna get better.

That there is some good ahead.

Now you can see why it is so easy for us to lose hope in our world.

All it takes, here's what hopelessness is it's just to say nothing's going to change.

This sin, this sorrow, this suffering, that's it.

That's hopelessness.

Now, that's really important to understand, but what we also need to understand is that worldly hope is dangerous.

And it's out there.

It's very easy to try to put our hope in this world.

You know, sometimes we want to put our hope in ourselves.

Honestly, sometimes we just want to put our hope and hope.

There's a lot of people that are just hoping and hope, but let me encourage you in this failed hope is devastating.

If you lose the thing that your hope is in, it's hard to get back up.

In fact, I think there is nothing that is more destructive than putting hope in the wrong place.

Friends, we need a real hope.

We need a hope that is built on that which is certain and solid, and I would argue, even magnificent.

We need the hope of heaven.

I love this definition.

It says this hope is the confidence of heaven carried into everyday life.

Hope is the confidence of heaven carried into our actual daily life.

That's the hope we need.

And that's the hope we have in Christ.

That's what we're gonna see this morning.

Our main idea is to know the hope of heaven is to know hope now.

To know the hope of heaven is to actually know hope right now.

So look at chapter 21, verses 1 through 8 with me.

I'm gonna read these first eight verses.

We haven't read these yet.

They're a sort of like a pronouncement of which the rest of this chapter is the explanation of.

So let's look at this.

It says, Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth.

For the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.

I also saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared like a bride adorned for her husband.

Then I heard a loud voice from the throne.

Look, God's dwelling is with human vanity, and he will live with them.

They will be his people, and God himself will be with them, and will be their God.

He will wipe away every tear from their eyes.

Death will be no more, grief, crying, and pain will be no more, because the previous things have passed away.

Then the one seated on the throne said, Look, I am making everything new.

He also said, Write, because these words are faithful and true.

Then he said to me, It is done.

I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.

I will freely give to the thirsty from the spring of the water of life.

The one who conquers, the one who remains faithful, will inherit these things, and I will be his God, and he will be my son.

But the cowards, faithless, detestable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their share will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.

Three things that I want to look at this morning: the look of heaven, the life of heaven, and the Lord of heaven.

First, let's look at the look of heaven.

And when I say heaven, what I'm talking about is the uh final, the new heaven and the new earth.

Because look at verse one.

The first or current heaven and earth, it says will pass away.

Now, I think that language is so important.

This world is not gonna end like the death star in Star Wars.

I think that's sometimes how we imagine it, just this like pulverizing blast destruction.

But that's not how the Bible talks about it.

What does it mean to pass away in Scripture?

It means to die.

The Bible pictures this world as taking part in a death and resurrection similar to what we will.

See, what is described in this passage is the new heavens, the new earth is our final forever world.

It's a renewed world, a resurrected one.

It is a heaven, a heaven coming down to earth.

And the way that it's described most primarily is as a new Jerusalem.

Look at verse 2, or you could look at verse 10.

They say the same thing.

Both describe this new heaven and new earth as a holy city, Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God.

Now, remember, Jerusalem, if you're not familiar with it, in the Old Testament is like the premier city, maybe even like the capital city of Israel or of the promised land.

It's where the king sat on the throne.

God's king sat on the throne of his people in his land in Jerusalem.

It's also where the temple was, where God dwelled with his people.

So why is heaven pictured as a new Jerusalem?

Well, you gotta remember, and we've said this so often, but I think sometimes we forget it here.

Revelation is full of symbols.

That's what Greg mentioned this morning.

And this passage is so prevalent with them.

We have to understand.

He's trying to describe heaven in any way to get us to even be able to begin to understand its greatness.

And so Jerusalem here symbolizes both a people and a place.

Now, I think the idea of a place we get, but a people, is this a picture of a people?

Well, look at verse 9 right in the middle.

It says that this new Jerusalem is the bride, the wife of the Lamb.

Well, from the rest of Revelation and the New Testament, we know that the bride of Christ is the church.

It's the people of God.

So there are parts where we see this city described, there are ways in which we should understand this to describe not just a place, but a people.

If you were to ask, what does heaven look like?

One key answer would be to say, it looks like a people.

A grand people.

The rest of Revelation tells us a people from every tribe and tongue and nation, a people that our passage tells us is prepared for their groom, Jesus, a people.

Look at verse 11.

So incredible.

Arrayed with God's glory.

Continues on to talk about it shining, this people shining radiantly like the most precious of jewels, like jasper and crystal.

You know, this is us, church.

It's describing us.

One day we will be completely and perfectly what Jesus called us to be: a light or a city, and here a shining city on a hill.

That's how this is described.

And one day we will be that people.

We will shine with the very glory of God.

We will be made holy and righteous and spotless by Jesus, our Savior and King.

You know, there's a reason why there's so many twelves in this passage.

There's a lot of twelves or multiples of twelves.

Just look through it.

It's because that's a picture of the people of God.

I think we can see that really clear when we look at the 12 gates, verse 12.

What are they named for?

The tribes, the 12 tribes of Israel.

And the 12 foundations in verse 14, what are they named for?

The 12 apostles.

Now think about this.

This is a city that is founded on 12 tribes and 12 apostles, the Old Testament and the New Testament, people of God.

It is what Paul says in Ephesians 2.20, the people that are built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus Himself as the cornerstone.

See, the Bible talks about the people of God like a building.

And here we see the people of God as a city.

This amazing temple of God in one sense.

This is the church, theologians will say the church triumphant.

The church in all its beauty.

If you were wondering, why are there so many jewels?

There were 12 that I'm so glad Matthew had to read and I didn't in verse 19 alone.

That's a lot of jewels.

What's the point of all of these jewels?

Well, they are symbols.

They're symbols of majesty and of beauty and of glory.

Do you remember Paul in Ephesians 5, that pretty well-known passage about marriage?

Paul tells us that Jesus is going to present us, his church, his bride, in splendor.

That's what we see here.

We are dressed in God's glory.

That's what heaven looks like.

You might think about this.

Ladies, you might think every once in a while we'll hear some, I hear ladies say this to each other, they'll say, You're glowing.

Maybe they've got a new dress or uh they've got their hair done or for a host of different reasons that they might say, you're glowing.

Guys, we don't really say that, but maybe somebody's like, that's a sharp suit, it's a good haircut, it's like we gotta make that a little less um beauty aspect.

But we know what that feels like, don't we?

We get a sense of what that feels like.

That's what's being pictured here, but so much more.

Friends, because this isn't a beauty that's mere appearance, it's not clothes.

We're talking here about true beauty.

We're talking about a people that glow from the inside out, no ugliness of sin, a truly, fully, clean heart.

We're talking about a whole person radiance.

We're talking about an almost unimaginable soul makeover.

This is the greatest thing we can imagine.

You know, I wonder if you've maybe experienced this.

Has the Lord ever worked in your life?

I imagine that's the case.

Do you know what it feels like to know or see God's grace in you or through you?

It's amazing.

I would argue that true joy, at least an aspect of it, is to radiate righteousness, goodness, beauty, holiness from our very hearts outward.

And that's the look of heaven.

That's the people of heaven.

We will shine with God's glory.

And not only that, look at what else it says.

This is a pit people that span the whole earth, displaying the glory of God.

Do you remember how the Bible starts?

Humanity is created, and in Genesis 1.28, God tells them to be fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth.

They are images of God displaying his glory, and God wants them to fill the earth with his glory.

That's exactly what we see here.

That's what happens.

This is a people filling the earth.

Look at verse 16.

He measured the city with the rod at 12,000 stadia.

Maybe that's unfamiliar to you, it's unfamiliar to me.

That is a massive measurement in the ancient world.

It would be the equivalent of 1,400 miles.

And what the Bible says is it's 1,400 miles in length and 1,400 miles in width.

That is approximately the size of the known world when Revelation was written.

And I think that's the point.

Because in this resurrected world, Christ's resurrected people will fill it.

They will shine throughout the whole earth with his glory.

But the city is not just a people, it's also a place.

And it is a place with unmatched grandeur.

Look at verse 18.

Walls of jasper.

Verse 19, walls that are adorned with every kind of jewel.

Its gates in verse 21 are made of a single pearl.

Can you even picture that?

The end of verse 21, the main street of the city was pure gold, such pure gold that it was transparent as glass.

Now, don't miss the point here.

What do we do with jewels?

Pearls.

Gold.

Well, we store them, we treasure them, we display them.

What are they in heaven?

Walls, gates, streets.

You walk on pure gold.

What's the point?

Those things, the glory of heaven is such is that those the things that are most valuable to us are commonplace there.

They just line the streets.

Now, I don't think that we should necessarily picture, and I know this is gonna be hard for us, picture pearly gates and literal golden streets.

I don't know, maybe.

I don't think though that's the main point.

I think the point is this heaven lacks nothing.

It lacks nothing, not an ounce of wonder or brilliance or splendor or treasure.

Heaven is supremely worth it.

If you have any concern that what awaits God's people is dull or drab, or dare I even say boring, well, you have missed what scripture says.

Scripture could not describe the new heaven and the new earth with more glorious descriptions.

But you know what?

It just gets better.

It's not just grandeur.

I think there's something else really important about the city.

Look at verse 12.

It has a massive high wall.

Verse 17, its thickness is 144 cubits.

That's a weird thing to talk about.

Why such solid, thick, well-founded, impenetrable walls?

Because this city is safe.

This city is secure.

Jesus said this in Matthew 5, his Sermon on the Mount.

He said, Don't store up for yourselves treasures on earth.

Why shouldn't we try to store everything we can get here on earth?

Moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal.

But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven.

Why?

Where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves don't break in and steal.

The treasures of heaven can't be stolen, they can't be taken, they can't be lost.

Friends, we live in such a fleeting world.

There's a reality in which everything that we have will one day be gone.

There's a reality that I think it's hard for us, but sometimes that can be in an instant.

I think that's why we're so anxious.

We may be the most anxious people in the history of the world.

Why?

Because I think we might have more control over life than anyone else in history.

And yet, for all our efforts, we still can't control what matters most.

And I think that's why we're so anxious.

Because we can't ensure, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that nothing bad will ever happen to our kids.

We can't, no matter how much we try, we cannot determine the number of our days.

We cannot make this life what we want.

All of our control, still a mere text or a phone call, can uproot everything.

We feel hopeless.

But heaven will not be so.

There are no late-night phone calls there.

Nothing can be lost or taken.

Everything is completely secure.

Here is real hope, church.

All that God has prepared for us and what he has prepared for us is incredible.

Nothing can get it.

Not even a little bit of it is in danger.

Not moths, not rust, not thieves.

And even so, even more so, if this city is not just a place but a people, if it is us, his church, here's what that means.

Nothing can get us either.

Friends, we are safe, secure, protected in the most ultimate sense.

I know it may not feel that way and seem that way, but that is the very promise of God.

See, don't forget that what we look at here, this day will be true for us.

All that we see here, we will.

One day we know in full.

That is Christ's promise.

We will know and live life in this land.

See, to know the hope of heaven is to know hope right now.

That's the look of heaven.

Let's consider the life of heaven.

Now, interestingly, I think the description, much of the description of heaven actually tells us what's not going to be there, what's missing, what's no more.

And the list is amazing.

Much of the things that we're going to look at that won't be in heaven are the things, the very things that rob our hope here.

Now, I'm going to go rapid fire.

The rapid part maybe, but it's going to try to go.

That's what we're going to go with here.

We're going to look at eight things that are not going to be in heaven.

Verse one, number one, the sea was no more.

Now, some of you are like, that feels like a bummer.

Like, wait a second.

Like, I love the ocean.

Are you telling me there's no beach, there's no waves, there's no waters?

Now, again, that's to miss the symbolism.

We're not talking about a literal sea.

We're talking about the way that scripture uses the sea as a symbol of evil, of destruction, of chaos, of judgment.

Do you remember in Revelation, the dragon, picture of Satan stood at the shore of the sea, the beast, his empire raised up out of the sea.

That's the symbolism here.

The point is that in the new heavens and earth there will be no more evil.

There'll be no more chaos.

Because evil's very home, its base is gone.

We will only know true lasting peace.

Number two, verse four, death will be no more.

I think that might be one of the hardest things to imagine.

You'll never see or even hear about death.

There'll be no cemeteries, no hospitals, no diseases.

Death will be gone forever.

Friends, my guess is every single one of us know the long, awful shadow that death casts over this life and this world.

Truth be told, my guess is, and I know this actually, there are some, many of us, that are sitting in that shadow right now.

And we know that shadow so well.

And sometimes for us, it feels like this shadow is all that there is.

It's just always going to be this shadow, but it's not.

Even in the midst of our hopelessness, one day death will be no more.

We will only know life.

Which shouldn't surprise us of what number three says, verse four, that there will be grief, crying, and pain will be no more.

Grief, crying, and pain will be no more.

Do you think about how much of this life is just coping?

You're just trying to handle the evil and the sorrow and suffering and death of this world.

But in heaven, verse four, the end of it says, These previous things will pass away.

In heaven, we'll never say when someone asks, Hey, how are you doing?

Surviving.

Treading water.

We'll never say that in heaven.

In heaven, every single thing that weighs on your shoulders will be lifted and never return.

With nothing to ever replace it.

Except for joy.

All of that heaviness lifted from us.

We will know only freedom and light.

That's the life of heaven.

Number four, we got to move down a little bit, verse 22.

I did not see a temple in it.

I think that's an interesting remark.

Remember, the temple is the place where God dwelled with his people.

We would think, well, there's got to be a temple there, but there's no temple in the new heaven and earth.

Why?

The rest of the verse tells us, because the Lord God, the Almighty, and the Wham are its temple.

Now, here's the implication: there's no need for a temple.

Because God dwells fully with his people everywhere.

We don't have to go to him, he's there.

Always.

You know, one of my favorite verses of the Bible, it's sort of tucked in one of the most, maybe the worst moments of human history.

Right after Adam and Eve sinned, there's this passage, Genesis 3, verse 8.

Genesis 3:8

Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze.

Why at the time of the evening breeze?

Because that was a daily thing.

The Lord walked in the garden regularly with his people.

That's a glimpse of heaven.

But even more so.

There's no temple because God walks, dwells with his people.

Number five, verse 23, there's no more sun or moon.

Again, some of us might get a little bit nervous.

We like the sun and moon.

But I don't think that's the point.

The point is that the glory of the Lord far outshines everything else.

See, the point is that we don't need the sun or moon in the new heaven and new earth.

Now, think about particularly the sun.

What does the sun provide?

Light, warmth, radiance.

Many of us, we just came out of a pretty long winter that seemed to extend even into May in some ways.

And I don't know if you've had this experience where you just bast in the sun.

Somebody just walk outside and you stand there.

You know, this just feels amazing.

It's like life-giving, it's warm, like it's even calming.

Friends, in the new heavens and the new earth, we'll bask in the Lord.

Do you know who made the sun?

God did.

Do you know who gave the sun its light and warmth?

God did.

We'll bask in Him.

Number six, verse 25, it will never be night there.

Again, think of a symbol.

What is night?

It is darkness.

It's a realm of thieves and deception.

But there's no time where these thieves or deception or evil appears because there is no evil or thieves in the new heavens and the new earth.

There is no darkness, only truth, light, security, peace.

We live in such an electricity-dominated world that many of us have forgotten how fearful night can be.

The eeriness of darkness.

Heaven will only be day.

Number seven, verse 27, something else that won't be there.

Nothing unclean will ever enter it.

Or anyone who does what is detestable or false.

There's an encouragement here and maybe a slight discouragement here.

I don't think that this means that there is no mud or dirt in heaven.

I think there'd be a lot of boys that would be upset with that.

I think what it means is moral filth.

There's nothing vulgar or obscene or inappropriate.

Do you know how wonderful that would be?

I mean, think about how much of our world is filled with those sorts of things.

If you're a family with kids, have you ever just wondered, I just want to find a movie that our entire family can enjoy and I don't feel bad about it?

Like a face doesn't turn red in the middle of it.

But you know what the real problem is?

Is that uncleanness we know dwells in our hearts.

That's the real problem.

Is that we read something like this and we go, well, wait a second.

We do and think what is detestable or false.

So how are we gonna be there?

Because of the last thing that won't be in heaven.

Look at chapter 22, verse 3.

And there will no longer be any curse.

Friends, this is the curse of sin.

Bible is so clear, we all, because of our sin and rebellion against God, we are under a curse, a curse of judgment and death, a curse of separation from God who is life.

But here's the most wondrous thing that won't be anymore in heaven.

There will be no more curse.

Here's actually the burden that most weighs us down.

Here's actually the burden that we cannot remove no matter how hard we try.

Here's where so much of our hopelessness lies.

It is in our sin and our shame and our guilt.

But you know what the wondrous news that undergirds heaven is?

What is the very foundation of everything that we have seen and will see?

It's that Jesus took the curse for us.

Here's what Galatians 3.13 says Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, because it is written, cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.

Do you know that heaven is all God the Son ever knew?

Heaven, the joy, the purity, the righteousness, the perfect communion with God the Father and Spirit, the goodness, the beauty.

That's all God the Son ever knew.

But then he became a human.

God the Son, Jesus, God the Son, became a man, and he did so for one primary reason: to redeem us from the curse by becoming a curse for us.

Jesus never sinned.

He lived perfectly righteous.

He alone, among all of humanity throughout all of history, he alone did not deserve the curse of sin.

But he took it.

He became sin for us.

He suffered the punishment for our sin upon the cross.

Why?

That we might be free from our sin and its curse, completely, eternally free, we see here.

That's why there will no longer be any curse in heaven.

Because Jesus has taken it for all those who trust in him.

In heaven, Christian, you will know an eternity without the curse of sin.

An eternity with no sin, no temptation, no guilt, no shame, no frustration.

All of these things have an end, but not you.

In Christ, we won't know sin or its effects.

We won't be separated from God.

The life of heaven is actually life with God.

That's why to know the hope of heaven is to know hope now.

And that's why our last point and most important is the Lord of heaven.

Friends, the place, the people, the gifts, the glories of heaven are remarkable, but they are all founded on the Lord of heaven.

Do you know what makes heaven truly heaven?

It's God Himself.

It's that we dwell with Him, the one for whom our hearts were made.

That's the undeniable focus of this passage.

Look at the very beginning of chapter 21, verse 3.

Look at this.

Then I heard a loud voice from the throne Look, God's dwelling is with humanity, and he will live with them.

They will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them and will be their God.

I'm not sure there's a more glorious statement in all of Scripture.

In the beginning, humanity dwelled with God in Eden.

And the rest of the Bible is our coming home.

Because we sinned and rebelled against that God.

We were removed from his presence, removed from our home, and the rest of the God, the Bible is God bringing his people home to him.

That's the promise of Abraham.

That's what we see in the Exodus.

The tabernacle when he dwelled with them in the wilderness, the temple when he dwelled with them in the promised land.

Even the exile to Babylon was a punishment for their sin, and it was longing and pointing to the one who could remove sin, Jesus, the God who became flesh.

And then now we as a church in Christ are people and dwelt by God the Spirit.

All of it culminates right here.

Look, God's dwelling is with humanity, and he will live with them.

That's the point of the whole Bible in one sense.

Here's why heaven isn't just described as a new Jerusalem, but as a new temple and as a new Eden.

Did you ever wonder, maybe, as you were reading through it, you may thought, Jeff, you missed something.

Why is this city described as 12,000 stadia wide, 12,000 stadia long, but also 12,000 stadia high?

That's 1,400 miles high.

Everest is 5.5 miles high.

The beginning of space is 62 miles high.

This is an absurd height, if taken literally.

That's not the point.

The point is that the city is a cube.

And it's a cube of gold.

You go, wow.

I don't know.

That didn't seem that great.

Well, if you know this, at the very heart of the temple was the Holy of Holies.

And the Holy of Holies was the place where God most supremely dwelt.

His glory was in the Holy of Holies.

And it was a place where only one person, the high priest, he could enter only one time a year.

And it was a cube.

And it was decorated in gold.

Now the new heavens and the new earth, the entire thing is a cube of gold.

Why?

Because God's glory and his dwelling is full with his people.

People don't merely enter into it, they live in God's presence, in his glory.

Friends, I remember when Steph and I got first got married.

We had been dating for eight years, which is a decent amount of time.

And uh when we got married and moved into our first apartment, we were almost giddy.

And the reason that we were giddy is because we didn't have to leave each other at the end of that night.

We didn't have to go to our separate homes.

This was our home together for life.

Friends, that's what's being pictured here, but so much better.

But this is our home with God together for eternity.

This is the new, better, incredible Eden.

It's no longer a garden tucked away on a mountain.

It's a city that spans the whole earth.

That's why there are hints of Eden.

Look at the very beginning of chapter 22, verses 1 and 2.

Then he showed me the river of the water of life, clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb.

And it's flowing down the middle of the city's main street, and the tree of life was on each side of the river, bearing twelve kinds of fruit, producing its fruit in every month.

Now there's so much that we can say here, but why is there this river that's flowing down main street of heaven?

And why is there this seemingly tree that's on both sides of the river?

Well, do you know what flowed through the middle of the Garden of Eden?

And do you know what stood at the very center of the Garden of Eden?

A river and the tree of life.

See, here's the point.

Church, when God's plan did not fail when Satan showed up in Eden.

It didn't fail when humanity rebelled.

He didn't scrap up his original plan and throw it off and go back to the chalkboard.

No, this was his plan the whole time.

God was doing something so much greater than we could imagine.

He was doing and moving everything to Revelation 22, the new and better Eden, our true home.

See, I grew up in Yorktown, Virginia, spent much of my early childhood there.

And over the last 30 years or so, every once in a while I've visited, it's been pretty sporadic.

And yet every single time I go, I'm driving back on I-64 past Richmond towards Yorktown, and there's this odd familiarity that begins to rise up in my soul.

These are the there's these loblolly pine trees that line the interstate.

And there's something about that bark and the needles, the smell, even the portions that are long without uh limbs, the limbs are higher up, and there's this little sense.

I don't even understand it.

It's like, oh, home.

Now maybe you haven't had an experience quite that way.

But maybe you've gone back to a family home on some sort of break or holiday.

Or maybe you've just pulled into your driveway after a long work trip or vacation.

Or maybe you've even just embraced an old good friend.

See, I think all of us have had little tastes of home.

But the point of scripture is that those are merely tastes.

That our real home awaits us.

Heaven is our true home.

I hope this encourages you this morning.

One day you'll be home.

One day you'll be really home.

Fully, finally, and forever.

One day you won't ever have that feeling of being on the outside looking in.

One day you won't have that plague of not fitting in.

You won't have that sort of fear of other people doing things without you, of not being included.

One day you won't have this general unsettledness in this life.

I don't belong for whatever reason might be the case.

Because home is still on the horizon, church.

And in Christ we will get there.

And you know what the best part of home is?

Do you know what really makes it home?

Is it we'll see God face to face.

Look at chapter 22, verse 4.

They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads.

We will look in the eyes of our Savior, and he will call us his.

Church, this is an unbelievable thing.

So much of the imagery in this chapter and a little bit of extra, it's trying to help us understand this.

It's trying to describe the indescribable friendship and fellowship and communion that we will have with God, with Jesus.

You know, I skipped another sentence earlier because I wanted it here.

Look at chapter 21, verse 4.

He will wipe away every tear from their eyes.

We've seen this.

Mom or dad gets close, wipes a tear from the cheek of their child, maybe a lot of tears.

How close do you have to be?

How real do you have to be?

What love and even intimacy and realness is there in that moment?

That's how Revelation pictures our friendship and fellowship with God.

One day, our God is pictured as wiping every tear from our cheeks.

Church, I really can't even begin to do this justice.

This is the unparalleled moment of our entire lives.

And it's just the very beginning.

See, the vision of seeing the face of God is often referred to as by uh theologians as the beatific vision.

My guess is you have not used the word beatific very often.

It's a word that is the same word as beatitudes, which maybe you remember from Jesus.

It's the word blessing.

This is how the Bible describes this moment.

It is pure blessedness, pure joy, pure happiness.

Do you know the well-known benediction?

That's how we'll finish this morning.

Number six, may the Lord bless you and protect you.

May the Lord make his face shine on you.

That's the sinner, and be gracious to you.

May the Lord look with favor on you and give you peace.

What is the very essence of blessedness, of joy, of life in Scripture?

It's the Lord's face shining on us.

Friends, this is the sight, the reality that will zap all sin, all suffering, all shame, all sorrow from our hearts and lives.

This is the sight which made Moses' face shine, gleam for weeks afterwards.

This is the sight of Jesus at the transfiguration that made Peter immediately want to build a home there.

He wanted to reside there.

This is the sight that John, the very author of Revelation, says in 1 John 3 2 this dear friends, we are God's children now.

That's true for us now.

And what we will Be has not yet been revealed.

We have no idea.

It's so great.

We know that when He, Jesus, appears, we will be like Him.

Why will we be like Jesus?

Because we will see Him as He is.

To see God is to know God.

To know God is to become godly, whole, full, blessed, righteous.

Here is the hope of heaven.

Here's why to know the hope of heaven is to know hope now.

Our family went to Disney a handful of years ago.

We tried to do the cool like Disney reveal with our kids.

Maybe you've done it.

Like got Disney gear, got some little Disney things.

We wrapped it up, we packaged it up, had them open it, and we were like, surprise, we're going to Disney.

And our boys, two and six-year-olds at the time, they were jumping up, screaming, so excited, and then my oldest just stops and goes expressionless.

What's Disney?

He knew he was supposed to be excited.

But he didn't know why.

Friends, I think that's how many of us are with heaven.

We know we're supposed to be excited, but we don't know why.

Church, I pray you've just gotten a glimpse of that this morning.

Friends, this is the most wondrous thing.

But let me encourage you with this.

Those who have been faithful, who have been conquerors throughout the history of the church, if we were to look at their lives, we'd notice one thing immediately.

They spoke, they thought, they read, they studied, they dreamed of heaven so much more than we do.

They would look at our hopelessness and they, you know what they would tell us?

Stop looking to this world.

Set your eyes on heaven.

Remember heaven.

That's your hope.

And you know what Jesus tells us right at the very beginning, heart of this passage is that this is not some sort of pipe dream church.

There's a reason why Jesus says this in verse 5 of Revelation 21.

Look, I am making everything new.

He also said, right, because these words are faithful and true.

They are rock solid and certain in Christ.

See, know the hope of heaven is to know hope right now, church.

And I pray that we would.

Let's pray.