Good evening and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of Revelation.  Tonight is study #27 of Revelation chapter 21 and I am going to read Revelation 21:13-16:

On the east three gates; on the north three gates; on the south three gates; and on the west three gates. And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and in them the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. And he that talked with me had a golden reed to measure the city, and the gates thereof, and the wall thereof. And the city lieth foursquare, and the length is as large as the breadth: and he measured the city with the reed, twelve thousand furlongs. The length and the breadth and the height of it are equal.

I will stop reading there.  Again, this is the city of God, heavenly Jerusalem, which is made up of everyone God has saved out of the world.  They are all part of this city.

We discussed verses 12 through 14 in our last study, but I just wanted to mention one more thing before we move on to verse 15.  In verse 13, it said, “On the east three gates; on the north three gates; on the south three gates; and on the west three gates.”  The Lord is highlighting the number “12” in this chapter.  There is no question about that.  Anyone can see this when they read the chapter, as verse 12 mentioned the number “12” three times and verse 14 mentioned the number “12” two times.  As we go on in this chapter, the number “12” is everywhere.  Later on, God multiplies the number “12” to get “144,” and He also divides the number “12.”  This is what He is doing in verse 14; we have the 12 gates broken down into “3 x 4.”  The four points of the compass each have three gates.  This is a verse that show us that when we break down a number into its basic components and assign spiritual meaning to the broken down number, that is Biblical.  The number “12” points to fullness, but here God breaks down the 12 gates to “3 x 4.” Each of the four directions had “3” gates.  He includes the number “4” as He mentions the four points of the compass: east, north, south and west.  That helps to teach us that within “12” gates, you have the number “3” and the number “4,” as “3 x 4” equals “12.”  We can also break down the number “144” into “12 x 12,” and that adds emphasis to the number.  Since we mention the breaking down of numbers quite often, I thought I would point this out. 

Let us go on to Revelation 21:15:

And he that talked with me had a golden reed to measure the city, and the gates thereof, and the wall thereof.

The one talking to John is one of the “seven angels” and this was mentioned back in a previous discussion of these “seven angels,” but Christ is “of the seven” because Christ is “of” the believers.  A while ago we went back to Ezekiel, chapter 9.  It said in Ezekiel 9:2:

And, behold, six men came from the way of the higher gate, which lieth toward the north, and every man a slaughter weapon in his hand; and one man among them was clothed with linen, with a writer's inkhorn by his side: and they went in, and stood beside the brasen altar.

So there are “seven” and one of the seven has the ink horn and that would be Christ.  So when we read of the seven angels that typify the believers, they are indwelt by the Spirit of God and the Lord Jesus Christ.  We are “one” in Him and Him in us.  It is Christ that has the power and authority to do the action of the one that we read of who had the golden reed to measure the city.   This individual would point to the Lord Jesus Christ.

We covered this, too, in Revelation, chapter 11, but that is a time that the Apostle John had a reed to measure with, in Revelation 11:1-2:

And there was given me a reed like unto a rod: and the angel stood, saying, Rise, and measure the temple of God, and the altar, and them that worship therein. But the court which is without the temple leave out, and measure it not; for it is given unto the Gentiles: and the holy city shall they tread under foot forty and two months.

This is the same Greek word that is translated as “reed.”  It is the same command, to measure the temple of God, which points to the true believers, the elect.  God is concerned with His people as He has obligated Himself to save them.  God was longsuffering and patient, putting up with the sins of mankind for one purpose: salvation.  But once salvation was complete, the Lord ceased to be longsuffering and He brought judgment.  The door is shut and we are presently in the day of God’s wrath.  He is no longer longsuffering and patient with mankind, but He is judging the people of the world.

The “reed” points to the written Word.  The word “reed” is translated as “pen” in 3John, verse16, where the Apostle John said, “I had many things to write, but I will not with ink and pen write unto thee.”  The “reed” would have been used in those days to dip into ink and then to write on parchment.  It was a writing instrument and, of course, a writing instrument was used in the epistles of John, as God moved John to write His Word, so the “reed” identifies with the Word of God.  It is a picture, as He says, “Rise and, measure the temple of God.”   He is underlining the spiritual understanding of the construction of the spiritual house of God (whose house are we).  It is the same idea in our verse in Revelation, chapter 21, as they are going to measure the “city,” the “gates” and the “wall.”  There are three things (pointing to the purpose of God) and they all have to do with salvation.  They all identify with the salvation of His people and the “golden reed” was to measure the city. 

Again, it is the Word of God that is the measuring stick for this city.  It is the Bible that has told us of God’s plan to save a great multitude and of God’s plan to complete His salvation of all He intended to save by May 21, 2011.  Therefore, it is the Bible that has instructed us – it is the measuring reed that has informed us that the fullness of believers has come in.  As it says in the Book of Romans, when the fullness of the Gentiles would come in then in this manner shall all “Israel” be saved.  It is speaking of spiritual Israel.  The Bible has now revealed that all the Gentiles (nations) have come in and spiritual Israel has been saved.  The city is complete, the wall is finished and all have entered in through the gates.  It is the “reed” that measures and tells us that the fullness of the elect has been gathered and that is why we see the number “12” again, and again, and again.  The “reed” is revealing that it is the completed city of God. 

The Bible today reveals that all the elect have become saved.  There are no more sheep of the house of Israel and, therefore, there is no need for “search parties” to find lost sheep and gather them into the fold.  The Bible tells us the door is shut.  The information that God has shut the door tells us that all are safely within the ark and all the people of God have entered into the safe chamber.  It says in Isaiah 26:20: “Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee,” or the Bible tells us that all the wise virgins heard the cry during the Great Tribulation that “the bridegroom cometh” and they entered in with Christ and the door was shut.  That has all taken place.  In each of these cases, it is indicating that all the elect have been saved. 

Therefore, the fullness of the believers, as emphasized by the number “12,” has come in.

In Revelation 21 we have this discussion of one of the seven angels with a measuring reed that is going to measure the city, but we have a similar account in the Old Testament in the Book of Ezekiel.  We also read of a “man” with a measuring read in Ezekiel 40:2:

In the visions of God brought he me into the land of Israel, and set me upon a very high mountain, by which was as the frame of a city on the south.

We see that this is going to involve measuring the frame or outline of the city of God.   It also speaks of the temple because, spiritually, they also represent the same spiritual picture of everyone God has saved.

Then it says in Ezekiel 40:3-5:

And he brought me thither, and, behold, there was a man, whose appearance was like the appearance of brass, with a line of flax in his hand, and a measuring reed; and he stood in the gate. And the man said unto me, Son of man, behold with thine eyes, and hear with thine ears, and set thine heart upon all that I shall shew thee; for to the intent that I might shew them unto thee art thou brought hither: declare all that thou seest to the house of Israel. And behold a wall on the outside of the house round about, and in the man's hand a measuring reed of six cubits long by the cubit and an hand breadth: so he measured the breadth of the building, one reed; and the height, one reed.

Again, we find a man with a measuring reed, just as it says in Revelation 21:15:

And he that talked with me had a golden reed to measure the city…

So many hundreds of years earlier, Ezekiel was given a vision by God and the “man” in view would also be Christ and He is showing him the same city of God that John saw in Revelation.  God knows the end from the beginning, so it is nothing for God to describe that city thousands of years before He would complete it and before all those He would save would enter into it.  That is what God is doing in Ezekiel 40 and in Revelation 21.  In fact, the Book of Revelation was not finished until almost 2,000 years ago and, yet, God was looking ahead to the end of the world (where we presently are) and He is describing the events that are taking place.

Notice that the measuring reed in Ezekiel 40 is “six cubits long.”  So when we read of “one reed” it equals six cubits.  It goes on to say, “so he measured the breadth of the building, one reed; and the height, one reed,” so that is the same as saying the breadth of the building was six cubits and the height was six cubits. 

We do not have to know the actual length of a cubit in feet.  Some say it is one and one half feet (and maybe it is) and this would make six cubits equal to nine feet, but that is not important because the Bible does not break down the length of a cubit.  It may be interesting to us, but as far as the Biblical use of numbers, the important number here would be the number “six” which equals “one reed.”

Let us go to Zechariah, chapter 2, where we find this same “man” (the Lord Jesus Christ) with a measuring reed.  It says in Zechariah 2:1-2:

I lifted up mine eyes again, and looked, and behold a man with a measuring line in his hand. Then said I, Whither goest thou? And he said unto me, To measure Jerusalem, to see what is the breadth thereof, and what is the length thereof.

Jerusalem is also the city in view in our verse in Revelation.  Then it says in Zechariah 2:3-5:

And, behold, the angel that talked with me went forth, and another angel went out to meet him, And said unto him, Run, speak to this young man, saying, Jerusalem shall be inhabited as towns without walls for the multitude of men and cattle therein: For I, saith JEHOVAH, will be unto her a wall of fire round about, and will be the glory in the midst of her.

We can see by this language God is identifying with entering into the body of believers. We spent some time looking at the city “having the glory of God,” once God enters into the true believers in salvation.

Then it goes on to say in Zechariah 2:6-7:

Ho, ho, come forth, and flee from the land of the north, saith JEHOVAH: for I have spread you abroad as the four winds of the heaven, saith JEHOVAH. Deliver thyself, O Zion, that dwellest with the daughter of Babylon.

In these verses, God is joining together the language of measuring the city Jerusalem with the coming out of Babylon and the deliverance of the people of God, which the Bible equates to coming out of Egypt.  It is a picture of great salvation.  On May 21, 2011 God saved the last individual to be saved.  Can you imagine being that individual?  It is a good thing we did not know who it was.  If there had been a countdown clock of all those God was saving and if we saw that there were only 100 people left to save and we were not yet saved, we would have had great fear.  Yet, there was an individual somewhere that was that “last” person.  His salvation probably coincided with the end of the Great Tribulation and the very end of the pouring out of the Latter Rain and the shutting of the door of heaven.  Just as that last person entered in, God shut the door, issuing the command to come forth and to “deliver thyself, O Zion, that dwellest with the daughter of Babylon.”  God’s people went forth, spiritually, via salvation and they were no longer a part of the Babylon of this world, the kingdom of Satan.  They had been delivered.  God likens it to them having been spread “abroad as the four winds of the heaven.”  That is actually a very interesting statement because of what we find in Matthew, chapter 24, where God speaks of the end of the Great Tribulation.  It says in Matthew 24:29:

Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken:

That is the point of Babylon’s fall and the fall of the kingdom of Satan.  It is the point when all of spiritual Israel has been delivered from Babylon.  Historically, that was when the Israelites could leave Babylon when Cyrus, the king of the Medes and Persians, took the kingdom and put to death the king of Babylon at the end of the seventy-year period.  It pointed to that time “immediately after the tribulation” when God’s people were all delivered and come out of spiritual Babylon.  Then God says in Matthew 24:30-31:

And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.

Why did God say “the four winds?”  It is because Zechariah 2, verses 6 and 7 tell us that before the elect came out of Babylon, they were scattered to the four winds of heaven.  They were delivered from the kingdom of Satan.  They had left the world through the merciful salvation that God had granted them and, yet, they were scattered abroad to the four winds.  That is where the elect will be found when Christ finally comes at the conclusion of the prolonged Day of Judgment, which will very likely occur on October 7, 2015, after 1,600 days.  That is where they will be gathered and those living will be raptured from the four winds.

What is interesting is that when we go back to Ezekiel, chapter 42, where we saw the man with the measuring reed that was measuring the frame of the city, He is continuing to do that.  It is a very drawn out and detailed measurement, as we start to read about it in chapter 40.  It says in Ezekiel 42:15-20:

Now when he had made an end of measuring the inner house, he brought me forth toward the gate whose prospect is toward the east, and measured it round about. He measured the east side with the measuring reed, five hundred reeds, with the measuring reed round about. He measured the north side, five hundred reeds, with the measuring reed round about. He measured the south side, five hundred reeds, with the measuring reed. He turned about to the west side, and measured five hundred reeds with the measuring reed. He measured it by the four sides: it had a wall round about, five hundred reeds long, and five hundred broad, to make a separation between the sanctuary and the profane place.

Here is the gate “whose prospect is toward the east” being measured by the man with the measuring reed, the Lord Jesus Christ.  Again, the “reed” points to the Word of God.  Because of the way the King James translators translated this, we do not see that the English word “side” is the Hebrew word translated as “winds,” as it was used in the Book of Zechariah, where it said they had been scattered to the four winds.  The four winds point to the universality of God’s elect all over the world; they are a great multitude from every tribe, nation and tongue and here they are scattered to the four winds.  Now the man is coming toward the east gate, as the “east” points to the direction of heaven.  He measures the east wind at 500 reeds, the north wind at 500 reeds, the south wind at 500 reeds and the south wind at 500 reeds, for a total of 2,000 reeds.  But what does a “reed” represent in cubits?   Each reed is “six cubits,” so 2,000 reeds x 6 equals 12,000 cubits, a measurement of the complete fullness of God’s elect.  It is “complete fullness” because the number “12,000” has multiples of “10” included within it, so the “four winds” are a picture of everyone God had saved.  The man with the measuring reed is, once again, showing us that everyone to be saved has been saved.