REVELATION 22
Read Revelation 22:1-21
This, the final chapter in the Book of Revelation, and indeed the final chapter in the whole of the Bible, continues the thought of Chapter 21. After all the frightening descriptions of the great cosmic struggle between good and evil, between God and the Devil, we see the world as it should be now that God has triumphed in Jesus. Everything is now calm, sin has been dispensed with and, as we saw in the previous chapter, Eden has been restored – this is how it was always supposed to be; God dwelling in harmony and in close relationship with his people.
Themes from earlier in the Bible continue to reappear. One of the most prominent is that of The River of Life. The description of the ‘river of the water of life’ (v1) is reminiscent of the rivers in Genesis 2:10-14 which flow from God’s dwelling place in the Garden of Eden and bring blessing and abundance wherever they go. We see something similar in Ezekiel 47 where God encourages the exiles in Babylon who think that God has abandoned them and withdrawn his presence from them. Here Ezekiel describes a vision of the Temple where a river comes from God’s house and brings blessing and abundance wherever it goes, including trees on both banks (Ezekiel 47:7) just like the river of Revelation 22:2,. The source of this river of blessing and abundance is God himself. The sense that what awaits the faithful in eternity is the reinstatement of perfection, the Garden of Eden, is very strong.
This is strengthened by the promise that there will be no more curse (v3), sin does not exist in God’s realm. Just as in the Garden, God will dwell with his people and he will be accompanied on the throne by the Lamb, Jesus (v4) just as we saw in John’s first glimpse of heaven (Revelation 5:6).
Another biblical theme that comes to its conclusion is that of God the Father and God the Son as light. We are told that there will be no need of sun or lamps in the new heaven and the new earth as God will be there and he is light (v5). Jesus himself said this in his earthly ministry, ‘I am the light of the world’ (John 8:12). And we are given the comfort that this will be the case for eternity (v5).
This chapter ends with a sense of finality. God’s work is complete. When God created all things in Genesis Chapter 1, at each stage, ‘it was good’. By the end of the sixth day when he had created all things, it was ‘very good’ (Genesis 1:12). In Chapter 3 of Genesis we see sin entering the world and marring God’s perfect creation. At the end of Revelation we see that God has rectified the situation and all is very good once more. Sin has been eradicated and everything is as it was in the perfect state of Eden before the fall. The book, the Bible, ends with a blessing to the faithful but also a warning. The warning is to not add or take away anything that God has said. What is before us is sufficient for our salvation. It is God’s work and if we think we can add to God’s work to achieve salvation, then we are badly mistaken.