Omega City
Homily:
Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from
our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
Today, brothers and sisters, we read together the last
vision of the last book of the last Testament of our Bible. We read of the
New Jerusalem, the City of God, which shall descend from above at the end of
time, and in which we shall live joyously for all eternity. It is a vision
of absolute, sublime beauty.
Now don’t get me wrong: all the things that I said about
Revelation last
week are still true. It is rife with symbolism, metaphor, and
astonishing visions from the Old Testament. It is full of dragons and
wars, fire and blood, and it can be very difficult to understand. But in the
end, all of that gives way to peace. And we are left not with the devastation
of an angry, wrathful God, but with the eternal City that the Risen Christ
lovingly prepares as our abiding place of joy. No wonder that we read so much
from Revelation during Easter.
This new heavenly Jerusalem is not like the earthly
Jerusalem, beset by divisions and violence and ancient, bone-deep hatreds. It
is not like Philadelphia, where I had to live each day behind two panes of
bulletproof glass, nor even like Boston, which offers safety and luxury, but
only for those with six-figure incomes. Indeed, the New Jerusalem is not
like any other city we can imagine, because it is, in effect, an urbanized
Garden of Eden.
Remember Eden, way back in Genesis 2 and 3? Eden was
how God intended for us to live. Our job was to be the stewards, the
caretakers, the loving lords of Creation, working with and on behalf of the
Creator Himself, who daily spoke and walked beside us. God delighted in His
garden, and we were given the holiest honor of being His fellow gardeners. We
ate of every fruit of the garden, even the fruit of the Tree of Life, and there
was as yet no rain, because a great river swelled up to nourish the
ground. We were so safe, so secure, that we had no need even of clothing,
clothed as we were in glory. In Eden, we dwelt directly in the presence, in the
peace, in the shalom of God. Life was verdant, superabundant, and eternal.
Ah, those were the days.
But then came the Fall. Then came the moment when we
decided to abuse our God-given freedom so as to exercise our wills over the
will of God. Then came our fateful decision to try and be our own gods,
judging right and wrong for ourselves. And we all know how that turned
out, don’t we? We’re living it today. Our self-imposed exile from the garden
has barred us from Paradise, from the Tree of Life, from the crystal waters of
peace. And the entire story of the Bible—the whole arc of both the Old and
New Testaments—has been of God trying to bring us back home: back to Eden, back
to life, back to Him. And when we would not be brought back, He came down
to us, down into the mud and the blood, as Jesus Christ, our Lord.
In this morning’s vision from Revelation, we see the
culmination of God’s efforts, God’s self-sacrifice, God’s undying love on our
behalf. For in this New Jerusalem, in this City of God, Heaven itself comes
down to earth—not in a veiled way, as in Communion, but openly for all the
world to see.
There is no Temple in this New Jerusalem, for Christ Himself
is our Temple, and God is all in all. There is neither lamp nor moon nor sun in
the sky, for the Light of God is always and forever radiating into each nook
and cranny of Creation, suffusing every aspect of our being. Night itself has
been transformed into brightest day. Remember how the Book of Exodus told us
that no one can see the face of God and live? Well, to heck with
that. That’s over and done with. In the New Jerusalem, everyone knows
God face-to-face, as our first parents once did. And that’s not all.
Recall Jesus’ parable of the foolish bridesmaids, who come
late to the wedding feast and find the doors barred to them. Well, the gates of
this City, this Eden, this Heaven, shall never be shut. There are no threats by
day, and there is no night at all. None are barred. The walls of God’s home are
open eternally, for all humankind.
The River of Life—the Fountain of Youth, if you will—courses
through the beating heart of the City, out from the Throne of God and of the
Lamb, for the River of Life is our Baptism. And along this river’s banks sprout
entire groves of the Tree of Life, which produces every kind of fruit in every
single month, and the very leaves of which are balm for the healing of the
nations. For this Tree of Life, restored to us now, is revealed as the Cross of
Jesus, and its fruit is none other than the Risen Christ Himself.
And this City is not only for those who earn it. Oh, no. It
is for all who are written in the Book of Life, which is to say that this City,
this Heaven, is given to us by grace. Its gates are open to all, yet only
the righteous enter; how can this be? Because the City itself makes us
pure. God the Holy Spirit cleanses the wicked, heals the sick, and saints
the sinner. Anyone can come as they wish, freely and confidently in the grace
of our Lord. And though none shall be forced, all are yet welcome.
Remember those nations who opposed God and His Church earlier
in the Book of Revelation, by great warfare and suffering? Here now they
reappear, welcomed into the City of God. God’s own enemies, welcomed in!
Remember those wicked kings who, earlier in this very book, committed idolatry
and oppression, and who were condemned by the fiery wrath of God? Here now
they stand before us, forgiven, restored, raised to life anew. By God, even
they!
Revelation is like St Augustine, who after a particularly
virulent sermon on the horrors of damnation and the eternal fires of hell, was
confronted by a tearful, fearful woman who begged to know how she could be
saved, how she could become one of God’s elect. And this same preacher, who
could wield the Law to such devastating effect, now turned to her tenderly and
promised, with all the grace of the Gospel: “If you wish it, it is so.” God
never tires of redeeming the lost, of forgiving the sinner. God never tires of
welcoming us home. The gates of this City, brothers and sisters, shall never be
shut.
Indeed, the reason that Eden has become now the New
Jerusalem—the reason that eternal life in the presence of God is described no
longer as a garden but as an unfathomably gigantic megacity—is because there
will be such unbelievable numbers of men and women from every tribe and tongue
and race of earth, all forgiven, all redeemed, all restored to the glory of
God. The Garden of Eden is no longer large enough to contain God’s
boundless mercy and grace. For the
redemption He now plans, God needs to expand. He needs to urbanize. He needs to build the Omega City.
And that, dear Christians, is how the world will end: with
the Resurrection of Jesus Christ healing the whole of Creation, the entire
cosmos; filling it to overflowing with life and light, love and grace, promise
fulfilled and paradise regained; Christ overcoming, indeed devastating, every
division that stands between God and Man! In the end, Jesus conquers. In the
end, all are His.
This is our story. This is our fate. This is
the great work to which we are called within the Body of Christ. We are
not citizens of this passing world, but of the world to come, citizens of the
City of God. And this shall be forever our greatest—and final—Revelation.
In the Name of the Father and of the +Son and of the Holy
Spirit. Amen.
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