Paradise Regained | Revelation 22 | The Final Vision of Hope
The book of Revelation is often viewed through a lens of confusion, but its original purpose was far simpler: to provide hope and comfort to God's people during tribulation. As we land in the final chapter, Revelation 22, we are given a glorious, final vision that guarantees our eternal future.
In this message, we dive deep into the ultimate reversals of the curse—seeing the River of the Water of Life flowing from the Throne and the Tree of Life restored. This vision affirms that what was broken in the Garden has been restored through the work of the Lamb.
We examine the final signature of the book, where Jesus declares Himself the Alpha and the Omega, confirming that His word is trustworthy and true. Watch the message below to learn why the ultimate assurance of God's covenant promises frees us from anxiety about the future and empowers us to live confidently today.
Cling to Christ, knowing that He is the reason you will walk through the gates into Paradise Regained.
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Thank you for joining us for this week's sermon from First Reformed Church in Edgerton, Minnesota. Each week, we dig into God's word, trusting that the Holy spirit will continue the good work of sanctification in us. I want you to recall an important message that you've received. Maybe it was a college acceptance letter, maybe it was a doctor's report, maybe it was even an email or a text message that delivered some important information to you. When we receive consequential correspondence, we find that we often go back to them repeatedly, don't we? We check them again and again to see maybe if there's something that we've missed, or we may be excited about this message that we've received. And We go to the contents and we look over it again, and we look at it with either joy or disbelief. We know what it says, but we keep checking this important message. Now, because we have different works that make up our Bible, all these different writings come together in one book for us, I think we can easily forget that much of the was correspondence. Now, obviously, it's correspondence to us as God's people. But when it was written, it was correspondence, it was letters to these folks.
It's really easy to lose sight of this with Revelation because of all the imagery that's contained within its pages. But when we go back to the beginning, we're reminded that Revelation is sent to seven churches, and they are receiving the the book as a word of hope and comfort for them in the midst of substantial persecution and tribulation. I have wondered how this book was received by them. Did they understand all the allusions made in the book better than us because of their historical proximity to when the book was written? We have to assume that with copying limitations and literacy rates, that most of the original audience would have had it read to them instead of being able to pore over it word by word, like we can because of our having it right there in our Bibles. We go back to letters and texts with good news, and we read them again and again. Of all that is in the book of Revelation, what would our first century sisters and brothers go over in their minds that would give them hope? In Revelation, there is much that might confuse or confound us, but cutting through all of it at the end is the message of hope and the promise of eternal life that we find in the final two chapters. Throughout the ages, Revelation has been a source of confusion and debate because of its cryptic nature. But yet, we keep coming back to it because of the ultimate hope that we find in it. We need to remember to focus on the comfort and not the confusion.
As we land in the final chapter, we find hope, peace, and assurance. The judgments are finished. The vision is complete. And we come to a final message that lets us know that these words are faithful and true. In this letter to the people of God, this is the signature that guarantees everything that's comes before it. In our time through Revelation, I've been emphasizing that it doesn't make sense for us to fear a book that is intended to bring us comfort. And it is my hope and prayer that as we see these final words in the book, that our view of Revelation will change. Instead of treating it like a confusing map that we can't make sense of, we will see it as an affirmation of God keeping his covenant promise to his people. This truth is vividly displayed for us with powerful imagery in the first two verses of chapter 22.
Revelation 22:1-2, ESV, "Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb, through the middle of the street of the city, also, on either side of the river, the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations."
Like we have seen so many times before in Revelation, we are given a vision from a distance, and then we are zoomed in to see more detail. In the 21st chapter, the vision was of the New Heavens and the New Earth, and then a zoom in on the New Jerusalem. And now, we are going down to take in some important details inside this city made up of the people of God. In the city, there is a river that contains the water of life. We are told that it is as bright as crystal. It is perfectly pure. Most rivers, even at their sources, are a muddy mess because they take the dirt and the impurities of the earth downstream with them. But in this city, the river is as crystal because of its source. It doesn't originate in a snow capped mountain peak in the distance. The throne of God and of the Lamb, right there in the city, is the source of it. This life-giving water is alluding to multiple allusions to rivers from the Old Testament. We see rivers in the Garden in Genesis 2. Psalm 46:4 speaks of a river whose streams make glad the city of God. Joel 3:18 speaks of a fountain whose waters flow into the stream beds of Judah. The imagery here is that of God being the source of nurture and abundance for his people. But this zooming in on the city gives us more than just a view of a pure river flowing from God and the Lamb. On either side of the river, there is the tree of life.
Seeing this lets us know that the curse has been undone. When our first parents violated the covenant of works by eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they were banished from the garden to keep them from having access to the tree of life. Now, the tree of life is there in the midst of the city. Instead of a flaming sword keeping humanity out of the garden, the people of God come into his presence and have access to this river and the tree of life. What was broken at the fall has been restored because of the work of the Lamb. Notice that the fruit is always available. There is no season for the tree of life. It yields fruit each month. Not just at harvest time. The fruit is always available.
Revelation 22:3, ESV, "No longer will there be anything accursed, but the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and his servants will worship him."
And as we slide down to Revelation 22:3, we see that nothing is accursed anymore. As we read last week in chapter 21, it is done. The curse is over. And as evidence of this, Revelation reminds us of the presence of the throne of God and of the Lamb again. The repetition of this idea is making it clear for us that the dwelling place of God is now with man. From Genesis 3 on, we saw that we could go into the presence of God. The Tabernacle and the Temple illustrated this to us by having the Holy of Holies. Only the priest could go in there, and only once a year, and only with the blood of a sacrifice. Now, though, the servants will worship him. Worship is no longer mediated through a priest. Because Jesus is our once and for all sacrifice, and he is our mediator, we all dwell in the Holy of Holies, the New Jerusalem.
Revelation 22:4, ESV, "They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads."
We see the idea of a reversal repeated in verse four, when it tells us that the people of God will see his face. Just this past Wednesday, I was telling the catechism students about the story where Moses asks to see God, but God tells him he cannot see him. And so he hides Moses in the cleft of the rock, and he catches a little bit of his glory as he passes by. And with that partial experience of God's holiness, his face glows for a long time. In the New Jerusalem, the people of God see him face to face because they have access through Jesus.
They are marked as his people. This idea of being marked on their foreheads appears in other parts of Revelation. It is an identification that they are the people of God. They are not identified with those outside the city. They are the people of the one on the throne and the Lamb.
Revelation 22:5-6, ESV, "And night will be no more. They will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will reign forever and ever. And he said to me, 'These words are trustworthy and true, and the Lord, the God of the spirits of the prophets, has sent his angel to show his servants what must soon take place.'"
In the next two verses, we have another repetition of what we saw last week. There is no more night because the Lord God is the light of his people, and they will reign forever and ever. This amazing reversal of the curse and the glory of the New Jerusalem is not a temporary thing. It is permanent. Darkness is banished, and with it go the fear and the uncertainty that darkness brings. God lights up the new creation, and the threat of the curse is gone. And before we move on to the conclusion of the book, notice what is absent from the description of the New Jerusalem. There is no tree of the knowledge of good and evil to add the threat of failing to remain in the new city. There is a river. There is the tree of life, but there is no tree to test the people. Adam and Eve failed to keep the covenant of works in the Garden, but the New Jerusalem is the culmination of the covenant of grace, and it is eternal because God kept his covenant with his people and his promises cannot be broken. The vision of Paradise Regained is not some fairy tale that was made up to make people feel better when we face the grief of losing a loved one or while we are wrestling with the reality of our own mortality. We see that this is guaranteed because our covenant God is the one who secured it for his people. The first century Christians who received Revelation needed courage to endure what they were seeing in the world around them, but the message holds true for us nearly 2000 years further along in history. The book of Revelation is extremely practical because it gives us a full vision of why we can have confidence in our eternal destiny. Death is vanquished. Sorrow is banished. The curse has been decimated. And replacing them is not a new chance for humanity to keep things nice. Instead, God is dwelling with his people. He secured our eternal presence with him, and we are blessed with unending life before the throne. This means that we are freed from anxiety about the future because the God who holds the future has laid hold of us in Christ.
And as the book of Revelation closes up, we are shown why we can trust in this promise. It is because it rests completely on the word of the God who has spoken to his people. The words are trustworthy and true. The vision that has been revealed to John is from God himself.
This vision of Paradise Regained is not a beautiful fairy tale written for comfort 2000 years after the fact. It is a covenant guarantee written for courage then and courage now. The first century Christians needed to hold on to the certainty of this vision as they faced the daily reality of the Roman Empire and persecution. The practical application is this, since we are now given the full vision of our eternal security, the absence of curse, the presence of the throne, the unending life, we are freed from anxiety about the immediate future. We are freed to live in the light, secured by a covenant that God himself will not break. But how do we know this vision is real? How do we know it's guaranteed? John anticipates this question, and the final verses of Revelation are dedicated to providing the final unassailable witness. Look at verse six.
Revelation 22:6, ESV, "And he said to me, 'These words are trustworthy and true. And the Lord, the God of the spirits of the prophets, has sent his angel to show his servants what must soon take place.'"
In verse six, the angel who has guided John throughout this experience gives his final declaration, "These words are trustworthy and true." This phrase is a powerful legal and covenantal affirmation. It is the signature on the end of the letter. It is the guarantee that everything, the judgments, the persecutions, the ultimate triumph of the Lamb, the New Jerusalem, is grounded in the faithful character of God. This entire book is not John's fever dream. It is God's reliable testimony.
The angel also affirms the source of the message, stating that "the Lord, the God of the spirits of the prophets has sent his angel to show his servants what must soon take place." Notice the emphasis on the prophets. This final vision is not an isolated event. It is the culmination of all of God's prophetic promises, stretching back through the Old Testament, from Genesis to Daniel to Ezekiel. It all finds its fulfillment here.
Revelation 22:7, ESV, "And behold, I am coming soon. Blessed is the one who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book."
Then, breaking in from the vision, Jesus speaks directly. "Behold, I am coming soon." This is the great promise of the book, repeated multiple times. And again, for the first century church, soon was about the imminent crisis of judgment against the old order that allowed them to be persecuted. The establishment of Christ's full Messianic kingdom. As Terry reminds us, Christ has been coming and is continually coming in judgment, mercy, and truth throughout the Christian centuries. This means the promise of comfort is now, and the promise of ultimate deliverance is certain. And following this declaration is the final beatitude. "Blessed is the one who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book." To keep the words is not just to understand the symbols, but to live in fidelity to them, to persevere in worshiping the Lamb and refusing to worship the Beast, knowing the final outcome is guaranteed. This blessedness is our reward for courageous faithfulness.
Revelation 22:8-9, ESV, "I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things, and when I heard and saw them, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who showed them to me. But he said to me, 'Do not do that! I am a fellow servant with you and your brothers the prophets, and with those who keep the words of this book. Worship God.'"
This is the second time John attempts to worship the angel. The first was in 19:10, and the angel's correction is swift and necessary. "Do not do that. I am a fellow servant. Worship God." This is a critical theological safeguard at the very end of the Bible. The messenger is not the message. The visions, the prophets, the angels, they are all servants. The focus of all Revelation, and indeed all scripture, must terminate on the throne of God and of the Lamb. Worship is due only to the Sovereign God.
And what this conclusion of this book means for us is that we can make our through this life, confident in our destination, because we know that we are citizens of the new Jerusalem where God is on the throne. We can make our way through the darkness of this world because Jesus is our light. Look to this final vision of heaven and know that your final destination is not a shot in the dark. Your final resting place is not 6 feet under outside of town here.
When we are in Christ, you are headed to the new Jerusalem because God has laid hold of you and he has made you one of his people. His word does not fail, and his covenant promises are sure. So cling to Christ, knowing that he is the reason that you will walk through the gates into paradise regained. Amen. Let us pray. Great and merciful God, we praise you and thank you for the gift of your word. That because of it, we know our hope. And we know that it is a sure and certain promise, not because we have figured something out, but because the Lord Jesus Christ came, suffered, died, rose again, and ascended to the right-hand of the Father for us as his people. May this motivate us to live holy lives, confident in our destination, confident that you not only have regained paradise, but you have done it for us. It's the name of Jesus that we pray. Amen. Thank you for joining us for this week's sermon. For more information about First Reformed Church, head to our Facebook page or website, edgertonfrc.org.
This message on "Paradise Regained" is just one part of our commitment to understanding the Scriptures. If you were encouraged by the truth of God's covenant, we invite you to explore more sermons, series, and weekly messages from First Reformed Church.
