Good evening and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of Revelation.  Tonight is study #6 of Revelation chapter 21 and we are going to read Revelation 21:3-4:

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 they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.

I will stop reading there.  We are presently looking at verse 3.  God had spoken of the holy city new Jerusalem coming down from heaven and then He said, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them.”  We saw that God has been “acting out” this fact all through Biblical history as He has been teaching us that it is His plan to make a people for Himself and to dwell with them.  He did this with national Israel when He delivered Israel out of Egypt and they became His people, a corporate entity.  They were a nation delivered from cruel bondage in Egypt.  Then God instructed them to construct a tabernacle and He dwelt among them in the type and figure of the ark indwelling that tabernacle.  Later, God had King David prepare for the temple and He had King Solomon build the temple and then the ark was placed within the temple, representing God dwelling with His people.  Sacrifices were offered in the temple and it was all central to the teaching that God will make Himself a people and dwell with them. 

The problem with national Israel was that they were not all the elect of God.  Some were elect, but it was only a remnant, but the entire corporate body was used by God to typify what God was doing throughout history as He built a spiritual house or spiritual tabernacle that would be completed at the end of the world, at the point when God would save the last person He intended to save.  Then His Spirit would indwell each and every one of His elect and God would place them in the land of the “new earth,” which the land of Canaan typified, and God would dwell with this people.  They are, perhaps, as many as 200 million people and God will dwell with them for evermore. 

We read Biblical terms like “evermore” or “everlasting” in relationship to the (physical) land that was promised to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as an everlasting possession or in relationship to God dwelling in the (physical) tabernacle forever, but none of these things happened with the “types” that were used in this world.  The temple was destroyed.  The tabernacle is no more.  No one even knows what happened to the Ark of the Covenant and the land of Israel and Judah will be destroyed when this world is destroyed. 

There is no permanence to any of those types and figures that God used and this shows that it is always the deeper, spiritual meaning that has the greater significance.  These statements are true statements only when viewed spiritually.  It is the formation of a new heaven and a new earth with “new creatures” in Christ.  They are new in body and soul, without sin, and they are to be placed in that new creation and God will dwell with them eternally.  All the promises of the Bible are fulfilled at that point.  When this present evil and cursed world ends and the new world is created, then God will have completed His Word.  He has upheld His promises that He has given throughout the Bible and every one of them will have found fulfillment.

It goes on to say at the end of Revelation 21:3:

… and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God.

Does this sound familiar?  God himself shall be with them and be their God.  Where have we heard that before?  We heard it in regard to the promise of the Messiah.  Over 700 years before the birth of Jesus Christ into the world, the Lord moved Isaiah the prophet to write in Isaiah 7:14:

Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.

The name “Immanuel” is a compound word meaning “God with us.”  (The word “El” means “God.”)  God defines that word in the New Testament as he speaks of the virgin Mary, in Matthew 1:21-23:

And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name JESUS: for he shall save his people from their sins. Now all this was done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.

Jesus is the promised Son.  God gave promises that were fulfilled with this first coming of Christ.  One of the reasons He did this was to show that He is a faithful God and His Word is true and faithful.  His Word can be trusted and God watches over His promises and fulfills them in their proper time and season.  So He gave promises in regard to the first coming of the Messiah or “Emmanuel” and in 7 BC in a Jubilee year the Christ came into the world as the very essence of the Jubilee.  He came to set the captives free as He demonstrated what He had done from the foundation of the world.  God directs the reader’s attention back to Isaiah’s statement regarding the virgin conceiving and brining forth a son whose name would be “Immanuel,” which means “God with us.”  Christ is eternal God and He was eternal God when He entered into the world and dwelt among mankind.  As eternal God, He humbled Himself and took upon Him the form of a servant and, as a man, walked among men, but that was only a stepping stone.  It was God with us in bodily, human form, but God’s intent was far greater than just being with people and standing upon the same earth.  It is God’s intent to dwell with His people for evermore and not just for a little while as He dwelt in a figure in the tabernacle or in the ark.  Those things came to an end, but God’s promise is to dwell everlastingly with His people.  Let me read, again, what we read in 1Kings, chapter 8.  Once the house of God was finished and the ark was placed therein, it says in 1Kings 8:12-13:

Then spake Solomon, JEHOVAH said that he would dwell in the thick darkness. I have surely built thee an house to dwell in, a settled place for thee to abide in for ever.

Again, that was never true of the physical house or temple that Solomon built, but it is true of the One that Solomon represented, the “man of peace,” the Lord Jesus Christ.  Christ is the embodiment of peace, according to Ephesians, chapter 2.  Christ built a house (whose house are we) and in that “house” God will dwell forever.  When Jesus entered into the human race it was another demonstration of God’s intent to obtain a people for Himself with whom He would reside into eternity future.

Here in our verse in Revelation 21, we see the wonderful statement: “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.”  This is the fulfillment of “God with us,” or God with His elect and never again will there be separation.  According to the Book of Isaiah, it is sin that separates us from God, but there is no sin in the new heaven and new earth, so there can be no separation.  As He has promised, God will never leave us or forsake us.  Remember that wonderful statement that starts out as a discussion of marriage, in Hebrews 13:4-6:

Marriage is honourable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge. Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee. So that we may boldly say, The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me.

Do you see the relationship to how God introduces the new Jerusalem as the bride coming down from heaven in Revelation 21?  It is because He is the bridegroom and all those He has saved are the “bride” and they are coming together in a spiritual marriage.  It is God and His people.  He has a people to love and to dwell with and His marriage vow to His bride is that there will be an eternal unity and “oneness,” as the Gospel of John points out that Christ is “one” with the Father and we are in Him.  Now He indwells His people and He is with them forever and there cannot be divorce for any reason.

You know, the churches do not know what they are doing when they devise false teachings and false doctrines out of their own minds.  It sounds good to them and there was pressure put upon them by the unsaved in the congregations in times past as many of these doctrinal errors were developed in centuries past.  There was pressure that (unsaved) men applied.  For example, there was an “allowance for divorce” in certain cases of adultery.  “Who could argue against that?  The wife has been unfaithful, so only in these special circumstances can a man put away his wife.”  So this idea was built into their confession and, yet, most churches did not act upon that for most of history because God kept His hand of restraint upon them.  Not until the time of the end arrived did God begin to allow the corporate churches to go after their own lustful desires and high places.  Then it exploded, as divorce became rampant for any reason and now the churches do not even think about the idea that there is not to be divorce for any reason.  That is the true Bible teaching.  When a man and woman marry, according to the Bible, they are married until the husband dies or until the wife dies.  They have been joined together by God and Christ said, “What God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.”  What do men do, as if that is not clear enough?  Men put it asunder because of adultery or because of “this or that.”  Man just does not listen or hearken to the Law of God.  It is the nature of man to rebel against God’s commandments, but God’s commandment is perfectly clear and there is never to be divorce. 

God is bound by His own Law and according to the Law of God, it cannot be broken, changed or altered.  God’s Law is much superior to the law of the Medes and Persians, for example and, yet, the Medes and Persians had great respect unto the laws of their king.  If their king made a law, it must be upheld, but the Law of God is much more important than the law of people and God upholds His Law to the utmost and He will not transgress it.  Of course, if He did transgress His Law it would be sin and God cannot sin, the Bible tells us.  It is impossible for God to lie or do any kind of evil and “evil” is the transgression of His Law.  And the Law of God states that a husband must love his wife and, once married, he is married until death.

When we get to the new heaven and new earth, we will have the “Bridegroom” joined with His “bride,” the body of believers.  They are all those that God has redeemed and they are washed and made pure and white and wearing the “fine linen” of the righteousness of the saints.   Now they are joined together in unison as one and that union cannot be broken.  What if there is sin?  God says there will be no divorce or separation: “I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.”  That is the marriage vow of God and, of course, there will be no sin there because sin would break the vow and bring death.  There is no death because it is an eternal and perfect marriage.  It is a super special joining together in an intimate relationship between God and His people.  What does it say in our verse?  “And he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God.”