Revelation 21:10 - Printer Friendly

ESV: And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great, high mountain, and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God,

NIV: And he carried me away in the Spirit to a mountain great and high, and showed me the Holy City, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God.

NASB: And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me the holy city, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God,

CSB: He then carried me away in the Spirit to a great, high mountain and showed me the holy city, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God,

NLT: So he took me in the Spirit to a great, high mountain, and he showed me the holy city, Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God.

KJV: And he carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain, and shewed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God,

NKJV: And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me the great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God,

John reports in this verse that the angel carried him away to a high mountain, where he saw the holy city of Jerusalem descending from heaven from God. John was in the Spirit, when this occurred.

A sharp contrast exists between historic Jerusalem and the New Jerusalem of the millennium and eternity. The former Jerusalem is often disrupted by internal and external strife. The New Jerusalem will be a city of perfect peace. Men designed and built the former Jerusalem. God is the designer and builder of the New Jerusalem. The Babylonians, Romans, and centuries later, the Gentiles of the tribulation overran the former Jerusalem. The New Jerusalem is secure, indestructible, and eternal.

The current, earthly Jerusalem experiences pain, suffering, death, and mourning. Sorrow, pain, suffering, and death are absent from the New Jerusalem (Revelation 21:4). Several idolatrous, unrighteous kings ruled from the former Jerusalem. The kings who enter the New Jerusalem are righteous worshipers of God (Revelation 21:24–27) and the New Jerusalem is the capital from which the King of kings and Lord of lords rules. The former Jerusalem stoned God's prophets (Matthew 23:37). The New Jerusalem is a safe home to His prophets. The former Jerusalem clamored for Christ's crucifixion (Matthew 27:22–23). In the New Jerusalem Christ doesn't bear a cross; He wears a crown.

Revelation 21:9–27 presents a description of the New Jerusalem. Interpreters disagree about whether this is a flashback to the millennial reign of Christ, or a description of the eternal state of the city. A flashback is not unprecedented in Revelation, occurring in chapters 11, 14, 15, and 17. However, some verses here clearly refer to eternal conditions, and most scholars take this as a depiction of the eternal, final heavenly city.

This chapter focuses on the New Jerusalem. This is not the earthly, historic Jerusalem of the tribulation (Revelation 11:2, 8). Nor is it the surviving Jerusalem of the millennium that serves as Jesus' capital (Revelation 20:9). It is the heavenly city referred to in Hebrews 12:22, whose designer and builder is God (Hebrews 11:10, 16). John attempts to describe the indescribable using analogies to precious gems and metals.

Leading up to this chapter, all sin and evil have been entirely defeated. Satan is banished to hell, along with every person who rejected Christ, as seen in chapter 20. Here, John describes the nature of the New Jerusalem, the heavenly city which descends onto earth after the ultimate victory over evil. Chapter 22 is a further description of this perfect eternity, and last messages from Jesus to those who read John's words.

The word ''revelation'' means ''an unveiling or disclosure.'' This writing unveils future events such as the rapture, three series of judgments that will fall on the earth during the tribulation, the emergence of the Antichrist, the persecution of Israel and her amazing revival, as well as Jesus' second coming with His saints to the earth, the judgment of Satan and his followers, and finally, the eternal state. This content, combined with the original Greek term apokalypsis, is why we now refer to an end-of-the-world scenario as ''an apocalypse.''