The New City of Jerusalem

Homily for the Sixth Sunday of Easter

In today’s passage from the Book of Revelation, we are introduced to the new city of Jerusalem. Some people refer to it as the heavenly Jerusalem; however, to refer to it in this fashion is to misunderstand John’s imagery. Yes, the new city of Jerusalem comes down out of heaven; in that respect it can be called “heavenly.” While it originates in heaven, we must not lose sight of the fact that it comes down out of heaven to earth. In other words, John pictures eternal life with God not as some ethereal existence in the clouds or in some celestial realm, but as life within a renewed city on a renewed earth. Instead of the people of God ascending to heaven to be with God, in John’s vision God descends to a renewed earth to make God’s home with the people. The first time I recognized this fact, I was startled. I thought back to February 20, 1954, the day my father died. The local parish priest took me and my brothers and sister to the local parish rectory, sat us down at the kitchen table, and told us that God had taken our father up to heaven. I am sure that you have all heard a similar way of explaining what happens when a loved one dies. I think it is fair to say that we still think in these terms. However, Christ’s death renewed and redeemed all of creation, including the earth. John locates heaven right here in our midst.

John’s description of the new Jerusalem is very physical – a wall, gates, foundations of jewels, streets of gold, a river, a fruit bearing tree. The original world that God created, which humanity had misused and abused, is transformed in this vision. Obviously, John does not intend these details to be taken literally. They are imaginative descriptions of a glorious existence with God and deliberately include references to the twelve tribes of Israel as well as the twelve apostles who carried the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the entire world. Yet if John is comfortable using the imagery of a renewed physical world to describe eschatological existence with God, this indicates that John does not disparage the material world. The world that God created and of which God said, “This is good,” is here redeemed and renewed. This insight has implications for how we live our lives in the present. It means God’s creation, in the words of St. Augustine, is to be enjoyed, celebrated, respected, and affirmed.

The entire Book of Revelation has been moving toward this grand finale that depicts God’s ultimate plan for the world – a new creation in which evil and rebellion have no place. The eschatological woes, the punishments, the scenes of destruction, the last judgment – all are left in the shadows of the final spectacular scene of God’s glorious kingdom.

The last verses of this morning’s passage reveal one notable difference between the new Jerusalem and the old. In the new Jerusalem there is no Temple. Remember that for the children of Israel, the Temple was the only place within which they could come into contact with the God of Israel. In the days preceding every one of the festivals of the Judaic calendar, faithful Jews would make pilgrimage to Jerusalem in order to celebrate their holidays in the Temple. However, there is no need for a Temple in the new Jerusalem because God is dwelling with the people. In passing on this information, John answers one of the questions that comes to mind every time we read the first chapter of Genesis. On the first day of creation God says, “Let there be light”; yet it isn’t until the fourth day of creation that the sun and moon are created. We think of these as being the sources of light and question the creation account because light appears before the sun and the moon. However, in the new Jerusalem, the glory of God is the light and the Lamb is the lamp that houses this light. This reminds us of the opening verses of the Gospel of St. John which tell us that Jesus is the preexistent “Logos,” the preexistent Word who was present with God for all eternity. “He was in the beginning with God. All things came to be through him, and without him nothing came to be. What came to be through him was life, and this life was the light of the human race.”

The new Jerusalem is not so much a place as it is a people – the people of God. This is clear from the statement that the city is “prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.” John has already used the metaphor of the bride as the people of God. Here, the new Jerusalem and the bride are equated. On a literal level, obviously a city cannot be a bride. If the new Jerusalem is the people themselves, then how can they enter the city and live there? One must remember that John’s Book of Revelation draws from the world of imagination and creativity. John’s imagery is fluid. The new Jerusalem is the community in which the people of God will dwell; but even more, it represents the people themselves. The message cannot be forgotten: God dwells with the people. If we cling to this dogma of the faith, nothing that happens to us can destroy the hope we have in our Creator and Savior God.