God’s Final Eu-Topia

By Rev. Dennis Johnson
Christians differ on events to come, but we are agreed on two things:

1.     Our blessed hope is the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ (Titus 2:13).

2.     Whatever trends or events, good or bad, lie ahead for the church for the rest of the messy history of the present heavens and earth, our final destiny is a new heavens and earth, which will be a cosmic and terrestrial paradise that outshines Eden before Adam’s Fall, “God’s good place” from which every remnant of creaturely rebellion, human and demonic, and its every toxic byproduct are utterly excluded. 

Other contributors from the trurthXchange Think Tank The Coming Pagan Utopia, have the sobering task of exposing the illusions of Oneist eschatology, the fantasies of those who worship the creature and the created order as though they were the Creator, who is blessed forever.

On the other hand, I get the happy assignment of exploring from the Bible the sure future that overflows with sheer joy and celebration, which the true and living God, Creator of everything and redeemer of his people and his cosmos, has in store for those who humbly trust him—and which he has guaranteed by embedding the beginning spark of his new creation into the midst of history, in the resurrection of Jesus Christ as the first fruits of the robust, endlessly overflowing life of the age to come.

God’s good place is unimaginably beautiful (Rev. 21:1-4, 10-21)

The New Jerusalem is a portrait of God’s people, founded on the Lamb’s 12 apostles and fulfilling Israel’s 12 tribes (Rev. 21:12-14). The final revelation-resurrection-transformation of God’s people will precipitate the whole creation’s liberation from corruption/decomposition for the cosmos groans in longing (Rom. 8:19-23). The beauties of the New Jerusalem—precious stones and metals, radiant light, flawless dimensions, impregnable holiness—are portrayed in images drawn from our limited experience to give us a sense of ravishing beauty beyond our wildest imagination. The resplendent glory of the New Jerusalem exemplifies the unimaginable beauties awaiting the cosmos when God announces, “Behold, I am making all things new” (Rev. 21:1)

God’s good place is unembarrassedly physical
(1 Cor. 15:20, 35-57; Phil. 3:20-21; Luke 24:36-43; Acts 1:1-2) 

How can we discern the line in the visions of Revelation between symbolic imagery and the “prosaic” form of the future reality that the symbols signify? The resurrection body of Jesus is the one foretaste, the visible, touchable sample of the new heavens and earth, sent “back from the future” to mark the epochal turning point of our mundane and messy history.

The Bible’s use of elements from our physical experience to symbolize realities beyond our senses does not arise from God’s discomfort with, or disapproval of, material substance. God is Spirit, and must not be confused with the stuff of the universe that he has made. But God does not find the universe’s “matter” uncomfortable or embarrassing—far from it! In fact, the creation of the first heavens and earth “in the beginning” (Genesis 1-2) shows that physical reality is, in itself as a product of the Creator himself, “very good.” What is wrong with the world (and us) is not derived from the matter from which our bodies are made, but from the rebellion of our minds and hearts against the God of truth. In Jesus’ resurrection God has demonstrated that he has redeemed, is redeeming, and will redeem us as whole persons, soul and body reunited, vivified and purified to glorify and enjoy him forever.

Our great hope, then, is not to escape “place”—not to escape the fact that we have bodies that are located at specific places in time and space. The hope that God promises us is that he will bring us into his eu-topia—his very good place, to live in his presence as he lives among us in the person of the God-Man, Jesus Christ. 

God’s good place is unapologetically discriminatory
(Rev . 21:8, 27; 20:11-15)

On Thomas More’s fictional island of Utopia, adherents of various religions coexist peaceably and respectfully—a feature that leads some scholars to suspect that More’s portrait of this beautiful “nowhere land” is at times ironic…since in real life More was virulently devoted to the Church of Rome and violently opposed to adherents of the Reformation. Still, his image of idyllic religious tolerance would have widespread appeal today. By contrast, the vision given by the real, risen Jesus to John smashes to smithereens this ever-so-appealing One-ist eschatology of religious tolerance and ultimate convergence. Twice in the description of the stunning beauties of the New Jerusalem, emblematic of the whole new creation order, we are told that certain people will have no access at all to God’s good-place (Rev. 21:8, 27). The unapologetic discrimination of God and his Christ—admitting some and excluding others from their city of joy—is consistent with the previous vision of final and irreversible judgment, when every human being will stand before the bar of God’s ultimate justice and face a verdict either of vindication or of condemnation (Rev. 20:11-15). Although we might wish it to be otherwise and fabricate future scenarios in which tolerance has reached its acme, the fact is that our mundane choices, our current affections and allegiances, have eternal consequences. The living God, Creator and Redeemer, not we, has drawn registry of those who will be admitted to his celestial city and seated at his wedding banquet.

God’s good place is uncompromisingly Twoist (Rev. 22:3-5)

a.     Initiated by the personal, physical, visible reappearance of Jesus the risen Lord on the public stage of human history. (Titus 2:13; Phil. 3:20-21; 1 John 3:1-3)

God’s Eu-topia, for which we long, will not arrive as a result of evolutionary forces currently operating within this old creation, nor as the outcome of human development in spirituality. The new heavens and earth will break in on our status quo through the personal arrival of Jesus the eternal Son of God and anointed rescuer of his people. 

b.     Consummated in creatures’ enraptured adoration of our Creator and Redeemer. (Rev. 22:3-5; 4:8-11; 5:9-14; 7:10; 11:17-18; 15:3-4; 19:1-8)

God’s servants will fulfill their true purpose and find their supreme joy in adoring their Creator and Redeemer (Rev. 22:3). The Lamb’s bride will display her true glory when she is presented to her Husband, who has adorned her in his own pure loveliness (Rev. 21:2, 9ff; see Isa. 61:10).
 

+ This lecture can be heard in its entirety here on the truthXchange podcast.