And the city had no need of the sun, etc. Today is the longest day of the year - the day in which the light of the sun lasts longer than on any other day. It may be allowed, therefore, to suggest thoughts concerning that place and time when the sun shall no longer be needed, its light being superseded by the light of the glory of God. Now, it may be that our text is to be taken literally. What is here said is clearly not impossible, for there has been the resemblance of it already in the most holy place of the tabernacle. But if the sun be really no longer needed, then we may believe that there will be -

I. BETTER MEANS THAN THE PRESENT OF REVEALING WHAT IS TO BE KNOWN. The sun is our revealer here. Its light is that which makes all things manifest. All light, artificial as well as natural, comes from one central sun. Either from the sun's direct rays, as in daylight, or from those rays stored up in primeval forest products, and now liberated again for our use. But when we see things in the light of God's glory, we shall see far more than we do now. Our judgments of what is seen will, after such vision, be changed not a little.

II. BETTER MEANS OF GROWTH. The sun is such a means. Harvests spring and ripen beneath its beams. And because "growth" will belong to the better world - for we cannot conceive of an everlasting halt and standstill - even more than to this, there must be means of growth. The sun here represents all such means, whether in things material, mental, or moral. But if these means are superseded, then the glory of God must be - and in things spiritual we can well understand this - a better means.

III. AND OF ADORNMENT. It is the sun which, touching, tinges with all loveliest hues even the dullest and dreariest things. Out of the dreary rain it calls forth the gorgeous "bow in the cloud," the seven-hued arch that spans the heavens, so unspeakably lovely that St. John makes it again and again the symbol of the glory that over arches the throne of God. But in the light of Christ and God, told of here, we shall become spiritually beautiful. Here we may see all manner of beauty, and remain foul at heart -

"Where every prospect pleases,
And only man is vile." But that light likens those on whom it falls to him from whom it comes. What, then, is the adornment of the natural sun compared to that?

IV. AND OF SERVICE. "Work... while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work." So, and truly, spoke our Lord. Sunlight and strength alike fail us, though service needs to be rendered and work waits to be done. So is it here. But there the essentials of service will be present in degree and kind such as here we have not known.

CONCLUSION.

1. In order to our possession of all these, we must use the means we have. They that cannot bear a weak light, will yet less bear a strong one.

2. As there are better things provided for us, we may be sure that we shall be made better likewise, so as to be fit for them. Our future home is a prepared place for a prepared people. - S.C.

1. A temple is a place set apart for the residence of a Deity. In heaven there is no temple, no particular place of worship. In Revelation 7. it is said, "they serve Him in His temple." There heaven itself is the temple mentioned; here it is meant that no portion in particular could be styled the temple.

2. A temple is a place where particular rites are observed. In Deuteronomy 12:13, it was expressly commanded that no sacrifices should be offered but in the temple; elsewhere they would be a profanation. But in heaven no place was set apart for religious services; they might be offered in all parts alike.

3. A temple is a place where the worshippers resort at seasons for worship: three times a year the Israelites went up to Jerusalem to appear before the Lord from all parts of the holy land. In heaven there are no stated seasons of worship; no need to say there, "Come, let us go up to the house of the Lord": the inhabitants are everywhere and always engaged in the service and worship of God.

4. A. temple is set apart from common uses for sacred exercises. In heaven there is no distinction between ordinary and religious employments.Lessons:

1. Those must be essentially disqualified for heaven who find no pleasure in devotion.

2. What a reason is here why we should improve the seasons of devotion, and especially these Sabbath opportunities of religious improvement!

3. Finally, how happy are those that love God and His service!

(R. Hall, M. A.)

The explanation given of how this comes to be does not at the first satisfy us. We all know that in this world, to say that every day should be kept as a sabbath, comes to exactly the same thing as having no sabbath at all. Some of you will think how a certain eminent man, set free from work after many years of weary and uncongenial drudgery, said that he found that where all your time is holiday, there are no holidays. And yet this is all the comfort given us in the presence of the statement that in heaven there is no temple. We are told that there will be no temple in particular, because the place will be all temple. Now, the somewhat disappointed feeling that rises at the first glance at our text comes of our applying our common worldly ways of thinking to the better world — to a state of being that transcends our present thoughts. As we are now, it is only for short isolated times that we can be at our best in the matter of spiritual mood and holy feeling. But in heaven all this is changed. And it seems to me as if there were a sudden light cast upon the state of the redeemed, by the brief statement that as for heaven, the happiest and holiest place in all the universe, there is no temple there. You know, that statement might, standing by itself, read in either of two quite opposite ways. It might be the very worst, or the very best, account of the place of which it is written. "No temple there," might mean no care about religion at all. "No temple there," may mean that the whole place is one great temple; and that the whole life there is worship; and that the inhabitants are raised quite above all earthly imperfections, and above the need of those means which in this world are so necessary to keep grace in the soul alive. All temple would, with creatures like us, be equivalent to no temple at all. But with glorified souls, it means that they are always at their best: always holy and happy: always up to the mark of the noblest communion with their Saviour and their God! All this, however, is but one truth set out by this text. Let us now proceed to an entirely different view of it. It is something to remind us of the great fact that blest souls in heaven are lifted above the need of the means of grace. They have reached the end of all these; and accordingly the means are needed no more. You have got the good of them, indeed, but you do not need to use them now. They were very well in their time, but their time is gone by. Now, all the means of grace — and God's house, with its praises, prayers, and exhortations, among the rest — are just as steps towards heaven. And when the soul has reached heaven their need is over. The church and its services are no more than the means, and when we can have the end without the means we may well be content. You know the scaffolding which the workmen use in building up some tall church spire may be very ingenious, may serve its purpose admirably well; but when the spire is finished you do not propose to keep the scaffolding up permanently. And the means of grace, all of them, and God's house with the others, are no more than as the scaffolding by whose means the soul is edified. And when the glorified soul has reached the highest attainments of Christian character, and has always within reach the sublimest depths of Christian feeling and solid enjoyment — as it has in heaven — then the scaffolding by which it was built up to this may be taken down; the means of grace, so needful in their time, may be done without, may go.

(A. K. H. Boyd, D. D.)

Our apostle's mind, then, had been Divinely enlarged until the old doctrinal methods of worship had begun to tell upon him with the power of a hindrance and limitation. This prophecy of a city without a temple, like all true prophecy, is the daughter of unit. It is the attempted escape out of form of a mind or heart that feels strained by present limitations. Pressure, such as it discovers itself to be in our unrest, is the impulse outward of a mind that finds its immediate quarters too small for it, and so moves, or undertakes to move, into a house that is larger. As we grow we outgrow everything in the way of a mode and form of worship. Worship up to the time of Christ had centred in the temple at Jerusalem, a custom of Divine origin. Now, St. John had had that experience of the spiritual character of God that disclosed to him the utter incompatibility existing between true worship and any admixture of the building or house element; and because he realised that the temple and perfect worship are incompatible, he saw that there was sure to be a time when the temple would be everywhere, and it is thus explained to him. And this prophecy of his, like all true prophecy, is but the name we give to that power by which a Divinely quickened mind rises against those restraints by which its own thoughts and experiences have hitherto been bound. There is a very important purpose subserved in having the ideal disclosed to us, although not able to live by it. It gives us a direction like the polar star to the fugitive escaping towards freedom, and lays down a pathway along which we, too, may move in the direction of freer life. And the ideal is not only a distant line of guidance, but instructs by the power of contrast, for the brighter and purer it is the more startling the contrast in which the non-ideal is seen to stand to it. I would not try to trust myself, nor would I recommend it to the most spiritual-minded man or woman among you to trust yourself to any system of worship or method of religion that is not, in part, formal or methodical. The fact that some time we are going, we hope, to live in a city that has no temple, or will need none, has nothing to do with it. The fact that we already appreciate the incompatibility between stereotyped methods and places and religion has likewise nothing immediately to do with it. The great matter of spirituality is what must determine the moral and spiritual law that is to govern us. People in absenting themselves from the sanctuary are saying that, according to the words of the apostle, and even of the Lord Himself, sanctuary worship makes up no true part of religion. Well, neither is the shell the true part of the nut, and the nut will not always need the shell. The sanctuary and all its form and local appurtenances are not religion, but simply its encasement, its integument, and is not for its own sake, but for the sake of religion. When religion has become perfectly natural to us — that is to say, when it is just as natural for us to be religious as it is to be irreligious, when irreligion has become perfectly unnatural to us, and spiritual-mindedness a second instinct, and obedience to God has become spontaneous, and adoration before Him and the spirit of communion with Him works within us with the enforced facility of new genius — then, having become ideal men and able to live an ideal life, we need be amenable only to an ideal law. Just to the degree that we are dominated by the Divine Spirit, we are free from the obligations of the studied and the narrowed. But because religion is going to be a purely spiritual thing some time, or because there are those to whom it is mostly such now, that is not what it is to us, except as we are ourselves spiritualised. Counting the time, I believe, is no true ingredient of musical skill, but the fact that an accomplished musician can keep time without counting is no reason why the novice should omit doing so until he has so progressed that he can keep time without counting. As has been said before, the ideal has no relevancy to us any farther than we ourselves get in the range with the ideal, and become ourselves idealised. If we are ever competent to live in an untempled city, it will be because of our faithful use of the formal we have graduated out of the necessity of the formal, just as the grown man's ability to get along without parents to control him proceeds from the fidelity with which he conformed himself to parental instruction before he became a man. Fidelity to His sanctuary is God's appointed means of making us free from the necessity of the sanctuary, and forms faithfully observed, and methods loyally and devoutly adhered to, are so many appliances Divinely contrived for reinforcing human infirmity, and for the protection of the renewed spirit, till that spirit shall have reached such proportions of sanctity and power and have become so instilled with the life of God — that is, shall be competent safely to determine for itself its own methods, and its expanded heavenly genius have become within it the secure law of its own individual spiritual life.

(C. H. Parkhurst, D. D.)

He who witnessed the glorious vision recorded in this book had doubtless oft travelled from Galilee to Jerusalem to present himself before the Lord in the temple. He who had seen and rejoiced in the sight of the earthly Jerusalem had now a different scene opened before him. What would the earthly Jerusalem have been without its temple? A body without a soul, a world without a sun. In the world we have many institutions which are intended for good, but their very presence is an indication of evil. In going through the streets of a large city, you often find buildings, some of them like palaces, not intended for the rich and gay; but, it may be, for orphans, or destitute old men and women. What a blessed city that would be where there was no need of such institutions. And so is the absence of the temple the crowning glory of the Holy Jerusalem. That we may enter more into the meaning of the text, let us glance at the uses of the temple.

1. It was a meeting-place between God and His people. How grateful ought we to be that God has appointed to man meeting. places. Are we strengthened, enlivened, comforted, by meeting with fellow-Christians? If the temple and the church now be a place for such purposes, how is it that the absence of a temple in the heavenly Jerusalem is a mark of its perfection? The history of our earth tells, when there was no imperfection, no sin ill the world, there was no temple; there was no need for it. A temple conveys the idea of limiting the worship of God to a set time and place; and not only that, but it reminds us of how many places there are where we seldom think of meeting with God. In heaven there is no temple, because it is not needed. There is no need of a meeting-place when God dwells among the inhabitants; no need of a temple, for we shall never be forgetful of Him; no need of getting our hearts anew enkindled with a devout and heavenly flame when every heart is full of love.

2. The temple a place of reconciliation. If two friends have quarrelled, how delightful to see them reconciled and walking together! But the very fact of your saying that they are reconciled shows that they have quarrelled. So it is in the church and in the temple. You cannot listen, you cannot look upon the ceremonies, without at once learning that man has quarrelled with God; that he has sinned against Him, and is now reconciled. But in the New Jerusalem there is no need of the symbol, or the words that tell man has been reconciled to God — brought back to God — for he is with God; what need of a place where friends should come to be reconciled, when they are reconciled already.

(James Aitken.)

I. THE SYMBOL OF THE DIVINE GLORY, WHICH WAS SEEN IN THE TEMPLE AT JERUSALEM, WILL BE EXCHANGED IN HEAVEN FOR THE IMMEDIATE PRESENCE OF GOD AND OF CHRIST. There shall be no display of supernatural light there, such as dwelt in fearful majesty of old within the holy place of the temple; there shall be no symbol of mysterious glory, as in the ancient sanctuary, fitted and designed rather to veil the face of God than to reveal His character; the Almighty will not clothe and hide Himself, as in former days, with the impenetrable cloud, or the equally impenetrable brightness. But, without the intervention of any sign or symbol, or even outward representation, the living God shall be there seen as He is; the excellent glory that blazed between the cherubim as the representative of the Divine presence in ancient times will give place to the revealed form and the open face of Jehovah.

II. THE SACRIFICES AND OFFERINGS FOR SIN, WHICH FORMED A PRINCIPAL PART OF THE SERVICES OF THE TEMPLE AT JERUSALEM, WILL BE EXCHANGED IN HEAVEN FOR THE FAVOUR OF A RECONCILED GOD AND AN EXALTED REDEEMER. The sacrifice once presented on the Cross by the Son of God Himself has completely taken away the guilt of sin and the Divine wrath that was due to it. The one shedding of blood upon Calvary has perfectly done what the blood streaming upon a thousand altars, and shed by ten thousand victims, in former ages, could never accomplish. There shall be no temple in heaven, in respect that there shall be no need of sacrifice or shedding of blood there. But more than this. We are assured by the inspired apostle that, in the absence of any other temple, "the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb shall be the temple there"; and no small share of the happiness of the redeemed, as we learn from the passage before us, will be that, in exchange for the sacrifices and offerings presented for sin in the ancient temple, the saints of the Lord in heaven shall enjoy the favour of a reconciled God, and dwell in the presence of an exalted Saviour. And shall not the presence of the Lamb in the midst of heaven, the appearance of the crucified Saviour in human form among the multitudes whom His blood has saved, lend to them an assurance of peace and safety, and complete acquittal from the guilt of sin, which cannot fail to swell their hearts with more than mortal gladness?

III. THE IMPERFECT REVELATIONS PECULIAR TO THE ANCIENT TEMPLE AT JERUSALEM WILL BE SUPERSEDED IN THE CELESTIAL WORLD BY THE FULL KNOWLEDGE OF GOD AND THE REDEEMER. In this world of sin and imperfection the Christian sees only through a glass darkly. He sees, therefore, but in part, and he knows but in part. Mortal ears are not capable of hearing the accents of eternity; and there are sights there which could not be unveiled to mortal eyes. The angels of heaven "desire to look into them," and even they look in vain. And the redeemed of the Lord, when they break away from the confinement of their present condition and awaken to the vastness of their future lot, shall enter upon a state of existence in which new thoughts, new feelings, and new truths concerning God and concerning the Saviour, shall occupy and enlarge their souls throughout eternity.

IV. THE PARTICULAR PLACES AND SEASONS, WHICH WERE PECULIAR TO THE DEVOTIONS OF THE TEMPLE AT JERUSALEM, WILL BE DONE AWAY WITH IN THE WORSHIP OF HEAVEN. The many mansions of that celestial city will be alike pervaded by the glory of the Almighty, and alike sanctified and gladdened by it. The inhabitants of that kingdom, which is eternal in the heavens, will not have to wait the slow return of those annual seasons when His ancient people were invited to appear before God in Zion, and to hold fellowship with the Most High in His sanctuary; for their life will be a season of continual and endless fellowship with their Maker; and the day of glory which they shall spend in His presence — a day which has no morning and no night — will be one everlasting and uninterrupted Sabbath.

(J. Bannerman, D. D.)

I. THERE IS NO TEMPLE IN HELL. There is none for the devil. Here he has innumerable followers; and the Scriptures call him not only the prince of this world, to show that they are his subjects, but the god of this world, to show that they are his worshippers. There are days set apart for his honour, and places of worship open for his name. They will soon see him as he is — they will see what a wretch they have been serving here; how he has deceived them — how he has destroyed them; and, after having been their tempter, proving only their tormentor; and therefore Scripture says, "They shall look upward, and curse their king and their god."

II. THERE IS NO TEMPLE IN HEAVEN.

1. There is no idol temple there.

2. There is no temple there for heresies and error.

3. There is no party temple there.

4. There will be no material temple there.The reason is, because they will be unnecessary. They are now in the order of means, but then the end will be accomplished.

III. NOW THERE ARE TEMPLES ON EARTH WHICH DESERVE OUR ATTACHMENT AND OUR RESPECT.

1. It is even possible for us to err now on the side of excess. We do this whenever we forget that their institutions and ceremonies are not to be regarded for their own sake. They are not ends, but means; they are not religion, but the instrumentalities of religion; and these temples, therefore, are not in all respects essential to religion even here.

2. We are more liable to err on the side of deficiency than of excess; and, therefore, having opposed formality which rests in temples, we must assail enthusiasm that would rise above them, and despise the things that are not necessary in eternity, though important and necessary here. Hereafter we shall live without food and without sleep; but what should we think of a man who affected to be spiritual enough to despise these vulgarities now, and to think that he could live without them? Let us take six views of man, each of which will show that, though our temples are to be dispensed with hereafter, yet that they are important and necessary now.(1) Let us view man physically. Let us look at his very constitution; at his nature. It was reserved for a philosopher of our own times to prove that the possessions of the most enlarged mind are from ideas originally admitted through the medium of the senses, or from contemplating the operation of our own minds acted upon by the medium of sensation. And what reason in the world have we to suppose that religion will not operate in the same way, and derive benefit from external things? Now God has acted all along upon the truth of Locke's principle, and He addresses us chiefly, in His word, by facts. The apostle spoke of those things which he had seen, and heard, and handled, of the good word of life. All the observances of Christianity are founded upon facts which interest and impress us entirely through the medium of sensation and reflection.(2) Let us view man as an immortal being, who has deep wants, and mysterious cravings, which distinguish from all the orders of inferior creatures, but rendering him the subject of hopes and fears which nothing earthly can remove or satisfy. It is only the institutions of religion that can meet this hunger.(3) As a depraved being. Who can deny this? For what is the inference? If he be ignorant, he needs to be instructed; if he be wandering, he needs to be reclaimed; if he be careless, he requires to be aroused; if he be averse to duty, he stands in need of every address and motive that can excite him and influence him. Can religion be safely left to the choice and the disposition of such a being as this?(4) View man as a renewed being. Thus he is made to differ from others, and from himself. But though he be a changed creature now, he is not yet a glorified one. He is surrounded with numerous diversions and temptations; he abounds with much evil. Religion is indeed planted in him, but then it is an exotic, and a very tender one. Can religion be kept alive and flourishing in the soul without aid — constant aid?(5) View man in his civil being. Here you will meet with him among ranks and degrees of life, and these ranks and degrees of life are proper. The Scripture enforces an attention to them; no advantage is ever derived from the violation of them. But then it will be acknowledged that they may become excessive and injurious, and I ask what there is that can charm them, and sanctify them, like public worship, where the rich and the poor meet together, etc.(6) Let us view man publicly, in his connection with the State, for whose safety and for whose welfare he ought to be concerned. Now, if religion be essential to the safety and the welfare of a country, we contend that these institutions, and these observances, are essential to religion. And we would ask, What would any nation, what would any neighbourhood be, if the Sabbath, and if our temples were given up? How rude, how savage, how insubordinate, how insulting, are found those in the different parts of the country that are brought up away from the influence of the means of grace.

(W. Jay.)

I. THE USE OF TEMPLES IN MAN'S PRESENT STATE.

II. THE ABSENCE OF TEMPLES FROM MAN'S FUTURE STATE. What changes then must have passed upon our condition ere temples may be swept away without injury, nay, rather, with great benefit, to vital religion. It tells me there is no keeping of the earthly Sabbaths, for all its days alike are holiness to the Lord: and telling me this it also tells me that if once admitted within the gates of pearl, and privileged to tread the streets of gold, I shall be free from every remainder of corruption; I shall no longer need external ordinances to remind me of my allegiance, and strengthen me for conflict; but that, made equal to the angels, I shall love God without wavering, and serve God without weariness. It is, however, when we consider churches as the places in which we are to gain acquaintance with God, that we find most of interesting truth in the fact that there is no temple in heaven. Allowed not direct and immediate intercourse with God, we can now only avail ourselves of instituted means, and hope to obtain in the use of ordinances faint glimpses of that Being who withdraws Himself majestically from the searchings of His creatures. And we may not doubt that God shall everlastingly continue a mystery to all finite intelligences; so that we look not in the favoured expatiations of the future for perfect acquaintance with Deity. We rather take it as a self-evident truth, that God can be comprehensible by none other but God; and that consequently there will always be between the Creator and the created that immeasurable separation which forbids all approach to familiar inspection. But nevertheless we may not doubt that although God must be inscrutable even to the angel and the archangel, there are disclosures of Deity made to these illustrious orders of being such as we ourselves are neither permitted nor qualified to enjoy. The manifestation of Godhead in that to us unknown region which we designate heaven, and to those ranks of subsistences which we believe associated highest in the scale of creation, must be, we are sure, of that intenseness and that vividness which give to intercourse the character of direct and personal communion. To such manifestations we ourselves are privileged to expect admission. It shall not be needful in order to advance in acquaintance with the Deity, that the saints gather themselves into a material sanctuary, and hearken to the teaching of one of their brethren, and partake of sacramental elements. They can go to the fountain head, and therefore require not those channels through which riving streams were before time transmitted. Present with the Lord, they need no emblem of his presence: faith having given place to sight, the apparatus of outward ordinances vanishes, like the shadows of the law when the substance had appeared.

(H. Melvill, B. D.)

I. IN THAT WORLD THERE IS NO SPECIALITY IN THE FORMS OF RELIGIOUS WORSHIP. A city without a temple would strike the common notions of men as atheistic. To the Jewish mind especially it would give the idea of a city to be avoided and denounced. Still, whatever might be the popular notions of men about temples, with their methods of worship:

1. Their existence implies spiritual blindness and imperfection, they are remedies for evils.

2. Their history shows that men, in many instances, have turned them to a most injurious account. They have nourished superstition; men have confined the idea of sacredness and worship and God to these buildings. They have nourished sectarianism. When it is said, therefore, that there is no temple in heaven, it does not mean that there will be no worship in heaven, but that there will be no temple like that on earth; always implying imperfections. The reason assigned for the non-existence of a temple in heaven is a very wonderful one, "The Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it." God and His Holy Son are not only the objects of heavenly worship, but the very temple of devotion. All there feel, not only that they have to render to God and His Son worship, but they are in them in the worship.

II. IN THAT WORLD THERE IS NO NECESSITY FOR SECOND-HAND KNOWLEDGE. The fountain of all light is God Himself. He is the Father of lights. Here, like Job, we hear of God by the hearing of the ear, there we shall see Him as He is, and be like Him. He will be the light, the clear, direct, unbounded medium, through which we shall see ourselves, our fellow worshippers, and the universe.

III. IN THAT WORLD THERE WILL BE NO APPREHENSION OF DANGER FROM ANY PART. "And the gates of it shall not be shut at all by day: for there shall be no night there." No fear of temptation; here we are bound to watch and pray lest we fall into temptation. Why? Because of the greater amount of motive that now exists in heaven to bind the virtuous to virtue, the Christian to Christ, the godly to God.

1. There is a motive from the contrast between the present and the past.

2. There is the motive from the appearance of the Lamb in the midst of the throne. There is no fear of affliction; we are told there "shall be no sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain."

IV. THAT IN THAT WORLD THERE WILL BE NONE OF THE INCONVENIENCES OF DARKNESS. "There shall be no night there."

1. Night interrupts our vision. It hides the world from our view, and is the symbol of ignorance. The world is full of existence and beauty, but night hides all.

2. Night interrupts our labour. We go forth unto our labour until the evening.

V. THAT IN THAT WORLD THERE WILL BE NO ADMISSION OF IMPURITY OF ANY KIND. "And there shall in no wise enter into it any thing that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a lie; but they which are written in the Lamb's book of life."

(Homilist.)

The first of these ideas is that of special local manifestations of God's presence and power. This idea was strongly suggested by the ancient Jewish temple, and particularly by the Shechinah which always blazed above the mercy-seat. It was the earthly palace of the heavenly King, where He held His earthly court. This temporary idea was necessary for the development of the human sense of the Divine presence on the earth, as the scaffolding is required for the construction of a building, or a ladder may be needed to reach the summit of a cliff. The spiritual sense of humanity was not sufficiently developed to see the glory of God everywhere and in everything, to behold every common bush afire with God. Only a great spiritual eye can read the name of God in the common everyday writing of human history. In order that men should see it at all it was necessary to write it here and there in great capitals. Just as a man pursuing his way in the midst of gathering electric forces may know nothing of them until the lightning flashes bright from the thick cloud, so men, as yet untrained to feel the invisible, would have become regardless, and perchance ignorant, of the Divine presence were it not for its special and pronounced manifestation in the "temple" and other holy places. The attempt to force men at once to recognise an equal Divine presence everywhere would have resulted in their not recognising it anywhere. In the interminable and pathless jungle of human life they would forget a God that might be present everywhere but was conspicuous nowhere.

(John Thomas, M. A.)

—

The God-enlightened city: —

I. The principal purpose here mentioned, for which the heavenly bodies were created, and for which we need them in this lower world is, TO GIVE LIGHT UPON THE EARTH. But agreeable and necessary as they are to us, the New Jerusalem needs them not for this purpose; for the glory of God doth lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof. The unfathomable flood of light and glory which unceasingly flows from the Father, is collected and concentrated in the person of His Son; for He is the brightness of the Father's glory and the express image of His person. Heaven is, therefore, illuminated not only with God's glory, but with the brightness of His glory, with the most dazzling effulgence of Divine, uncreated light, a light which enlightens and cheers the soul as well as the body. Of the nature and degree of this light, who but the happy beings that enjoy it can form any conception? As the inhabitants of heaven will not need the light of created luminaries, so, we may add, they will no more need the assistance of human teachers, or of the means of grace. Little do they need human teachers, who know incomparably more of Divine things than all the prophets and apostles united knew, while here below. Little do they need the Bible, who have forever escaped all its threatenings, who are enjoying all its promises, who intuitively understand all its doctrines, and who have arrived at that heaven to which it points out the way.

II. Another purpose for which God formed the sun was, we are told, TO DIVIDE THE DAY FROM THE NIGHT. To creatures constituted as we are, the vicissitude of day and night, which is thus produced by the sun, is equally necessary and agreeable; and we ought ever to acknowledge the wisdom and goodness to which it is owing. Our bodies and our minds are soon fatigued, and indispensably require the refreshment of sleep. But we may easily perceive that it would be a great privilege to be freed from the necessity of sleeping, and especially from that subjection to weariness and fatigue which occasion the necessity. Do the rays of light grow weary in their flight from the sun? or does the thunder-bolt need to pause and seek refreshment in the midst of its career? As little do the inhabitants of heaven become weary in praising and enjoying God. As little do they need refreshment or repose; for their spiritual bodies will be far more active and refined than the purest light; and their labour itself will be the sweetest rest.

III. Another purpose for which the heavenly bodies were created was TO SERVE FOR SIGNS, AND FOR THE REGULATION OF THE SEASONS. In this, as in other respects, they are eminently useful to a world like ours. The heat of the sun is no less necessary than its light; but the convenience and happiness of man require that this heat should be communicated to us in different degrees at different periods. But however necessary the celestial luminaries may be for signs and seasons on earth, they are needed for neither of these purposes by the inhabitants of heaven. They need no pole star to guide their rapid flight through the immeasurable ocean of ethereal space; for God, their sun, is everywhere, and where He is, there is heaven; there they are at home. They need no signs to warn them of approaching storms, or impending dangers; for they enjoy uninterrupted sunshine and perpetual peace.

IV. Another purpose for which the heavenly bodies were created was TO SHOW THE FLIGHT, AND MARK THE DIVISIONS OF TIME. But though such divisions of time, as days and years, are thus necessary on earth, they will be perfectly needless to the inhabitants of heaven. With them, time has ended and eternity begun; and eternity neither needs, nor is capable of division. They know with the utmost certainty that their happiness will never, never end. Why then should they wish to know, what possible advantage could it be to them to know, at any given period, how many days or years had passed away since they arrived in heaven?

(E. Payson, D. D.)

I. IT IS PECULIAR LIGHT. There is none like it. Its blaze is not earthly. Yet it is truly light for men. It is Divine, but it is also human. All created and all uncreated brilliance is concentrated in it. The Man Christ Jesus is there. God over all is there.

II. IT IS UNCHANGING LIGHT. He from whom it emanates is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever. Here there is no rising nor setting; no clouding nor eclipsing.

III. IT IS FESTAL LIGHT. The feast is spread; the marriage of the Lamb is come, and His wife hath made herself ready.

IV. IT IS ALL-PERVADING LIGHT. It is not confined to a few favoured dwellings; to one region of the city. The whole city shall be full of fight.

V. IT IS THE LIGHT OF LIFE. It is living light, fife-giving light; not dead and inert like that of our sun, and moon, and stars, but living; instinct with fife, and health, and immortality. It fills the whole man with life — body, soul, and spirit.

VI. IT IS THE LIGHT OF LOVE. For that name, "the Lamb," contains within it the revelation of the love of God. That lamp, which is the Lamb, then must be love; its light must be the light of redeeming love.

(H. Bonar, D. D.)

I. WHAT CHRIST IS IN HEAVEN. He is the Son of Man, it says; for it calls Him "the Lamb," the same name that was applied to Him in His human nature on earth, and a name which will not admit of being applied to Him as the everlasting God. It involves in it an idea, not at variance with divinity, but yet quite foreign to it. Further, this name sets Him forth as retaining in heaven the marks of His sufferings on earth. This teaches us not only the blessed truth that we shall see in heaven the Saviour who bled for us, but that we shall see Him as the Saviour who bled for us; we shall never look on Him without beholding in Him that which will remind us of His dying love. But again — our Lord is styled also in this text "the glory of God." I say, our Lord is so styled, because it seems quite evident that the glory of God and the Lamb mean here one and the same object. The apostle evidently speaks as though by God and the Lamb he meant the same Person; as though he could not separate them in his mind; as though, in fact, they had been presented to him in this vision but as one object, and were but one object. And we are to infer more from this, than that the ascended Jesus is acknowledged in heaven to be God and Lord; we are warranted to infer that no other God or Lord is seen or thought of in heaven; and more also — that Christ's human nature is as complete a manifestation of the Divine glory as even heaven itself can understand or bear.

II. WHAT CHRIST IS TO HEAVEN. He is in it as the Son of Man, the once crucified Son of Men, the glory of God; He is to it a light, and all the light it has. There are two ideas generally connected with the word "light" in Scripture, when used in a spiritual sense — one primary idea, knowledge, because light shows us things as they are; and then a secondary idea, joy, because a right knowledge of spiritual things imparts joy. When therefore we are told that there is light in heaven, that God dwells in light there, that the inheritance of the saints there is an inheritance in light, we are to understand that heaven is a world of knowledge, and such knowledge as gives rise to pleasure and joy; that we shall not lose our character as intellectual beings there; that our minds and understandings will go with us to heaven, and be called into exercise in heaven, and have everything brought before them that can expand, and elevate, and delight them. But whence is this knowledge to come? The text tells us. It traces it, observe, to the glorified Jesus as its source. God in Christ, it says, and in Christ as the Son of Man, is the author of it. "The city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it." In this imperfect state of the Church, we need the sun and the moon, all the help we can obtain. We want the assistance of created things to impart knowledge and joy to us — Scriptures, and ministers, and sacraments, and ordinances. But not so in heaven.

III. THE GREATNESS OF THIS HEAVENLY HAPPINESS. This is evidently the point to which the text is intended to bring us. Its design is to show us how much happier a world heaven is than earth, and how much happier the Church in heaven is than the Church on earth. It supposes, you observe, the Church to have some blessedness here. It has its sun and it has its moon, some sources of knowledge and joy, and these quite sufficient, not to meet its desires, but to answer the purposes of its present condition. But then it implies that these sink into nothing, when compared with the light which will shine on it, the knowledge and joy which will be imparted to it in the heavenly city.

1. The light that flows immediately from Christ in glory, is clearer and brighter than any ether light can be. There is more of it, and what there is of it is of a purer nature.

2. The knowledge we shall have in heaven is not only more accurate than any we can attain here, it is a knowledge more easily acquired. How difficult do we sometimes find it now to lay hold of Divine truth! What a process we are obliged to pass through in order to arrive at a clear comprehension of the simplest truths of the gospel! Now in heaven a glance will teach you. Knowledge will flow like a stream into our minds, and bring happiness with it, and this every moment, and this for ever, without mixture, without interruption, withoutend.

(C. Bradley, M. A.)

In that millennial state of which the text speaks, Jesus Christ is to be the light thereof, and all its glory is to proceed from Him; and if the text speaketh concerning heaven and the blessedness hereafter, all its light, and blessings, and glory, stream from Him: "The Lamb is the light thereof."

I. THE MILLENNIAL PERIOD. Jesus, in a millennial age, shall be the light and the glory of the city of the new Jerusalem.

1. Observe, then, that Jesus makes the light of the millennium, because His presence will be that which distinguishes that age from the present. That age is to be akin to paradise. It is true we have the presence of Christ in the Church now — "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world." We have the promise of His constant indwelling: "Where two or three are gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst of them." But still that is vicariously by His Spirit, but soon He is to be personally with us.

2. The presence of Christ it is which will be the means of the peace of the age. In that sense Christ will be the light of it, for He is our peace. It will be through His presence that the lion shall cat straw like an ex, that the leopard shall lie down with the kid.

3. Again, Christ's presence is to that period its special instruction. When He comes, superstition will not need an earnest testimony to confute it — it will hide its head. Idolatry will not need the missionary to preach against it — the idols He shall utterly abolish, and cast them to the moles and bats.

4. Once again, Christ will be the light of that period in the sense of being its glory. Think of the splendour of that time! Oh! to be present and to see Him in His own light, the King of kings, and Lord of lords!

II. THE STATE OF THE GLORIFIED IN HEAVEN ITSELF, "The city hath no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it."

1. The inhabitants of the better world are independent of creature comforts. We have no reason to believe that they daily pray, "Give us this day our daily bread." Their bodies shall dwell in perpetual youth. They shall have no need of raiment; their white robes shall never wear out, neither shall they ever be defiled.

2. While in heaven, it is clear that the glorified are quite independent of creature aid, do not forget that they are entirely dependent for their joy upon Jesus Christ. He is their sole spiritual light. They have nothing else in heaven to give them perfect satisfaction but Himself. The language here used, "the Lamb is the light thereof," may be read in two or three ways. By your patience, let us so read it. In heaven Jesus is the light in the sense of joy, for light is ever in Scripture the emblem of joy. Darkness betokens sorrow, but the rising of the sun indicates the return of holy joy. Christ is the joy of heaven. Another meaning of light in Scripture is knowledge. Ignorance is darkness. Oh! what manifestations of God there will be! Dark dealings of providence which you never understood before will then be seen without the light, of a candle or of the sun. Many doctrines puzzled you; but there all will be simple.

III. THE HEAVENLY MAN'S STATE MAY BE SET FORTH IN THESE WORDS. First, then, even on earth the heavenly man's joy does not depend upon the creature. In a certain sense we can say to-day that "the city hath no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it." As we can do without these two most eminent creatures, so we can be happy without other earthly blessings. Our dear friends are very precious to us — we love our wife and children, our parents and our friends, but we do not need them. May God spare them to us I but if they were taken, it does not come to a matter of absolute need, for you know there is many a Christian who has been bereft of all, and he thought, as the props were taken away one after another, that he should die of very grief; but he did not die, his faith surmounted every wave, and he still rejoices in his God. We finish by observing that such a man, however, has great need of Christ — he cannot get on without Christ. We can do without light, without friendship, without life, but we cannot live without our Saviour,

(C. H. Spurgeon.)

"And the city hath no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine upon it." The sun and the moon are obviously the symbols of earthly resources. It is not through the city's sun and moon that God will flood her streets with the light of the jasper stone. It is not through the development of knowledge, the progress of thought, and the growth of the Arts, that God will raise city and State to an ideal condition. The impartation of God's glory to the earth is not dependent upon sun and moon. "The city hath no need of the sun." The "jasper" glory is obtained by direct communication with God. It is imparted immediately by the Divine Spirit to the spirit of man, and can only be received by spiritual trust and personal devotion. The "jasper" brightness will give new splendour to sun and moon, but the latter can never create the former.

(John Thomas, M. A.)

JohnJerusalemEnlightened, Gives, Glory, Illuminated, Illumined, Lamb, Lamp, Lighten, Moon, Shine, Shone, Thereof, Town1. A new heaven and a new earth.
10. The heavenly Jerusalem, with a full description thereof.
23. She needs no sun, the glory of God being her light.
24. The kings of the earth bring their riches unto her.

Revelation 21:23

     1045   God, glory of
     1193   glory, revelation of
     4251   moon
     4284   sun
     4835   light, spiritual
     9105   last things
     9414   heaven, community of redeemed

Revelation 21:9-27

     5659   bride
     7241   Jerusalem, significance

Revelation 21:20-27

     5256   city

Revelation 21:22-23

     9411   heaven

Revelation 21:22-27

     5006   human race, destiny

November 18. "And He that Sat Upon the Throne Said, it is Done" (Rev. xxi. 5, 6).
"And He that sat upon the throne said, It is done" (Rev. xxi. 5, 6). Great is the difference between action and transaction. We may be constantly acting without accomplishing anything, but a transaction is action that passes beyond the point of return, and becomes a permanent committal. Salvation is a transaction between the soul and Christ in which the matter passes beyond recall. Sanctification is a great transaction in which we are utterly surrendered, irrevocably consecrated and wholly committed …
Rev. A. B. Simpson—Days of Heaven Upon Earth

July the Twenty-Fifth no Temple Therein
"And I saw no temple therein!" --REVELATION xxi. 22-27. And that because it was all temple! "Every place was hallowed ground." There was no merely localized Presence, because the Presence was universal. God was realized everywhere, and therefore the little meeting-tent had vanished, and in place of the measurable tabernacle there were the immeasurable and God-filled heavens. Even here on earth I can measure my spiritual growth by the corresponding enlargement of my temple. What is the size of …
John Henry Jowett—My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year

He that Overcometh.
"He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be My son."--REVELATION xxi. 7. Year by year as at this time, when the week of our Saviour's Passion and Death is just in front of us, and the shadow of His Cross is falling over us, one generation after another of the boys of this school gather here, and in the face of the congregation, young and old, they take upon them the vows of a Christian life. So we met last Thursday, and your vow is still fresh upon a great …
John Percival—Sermons at Rugby

A New Creation
MEN GENERALLY venerate antiquity. It were hard to say which has the stronger power over the human mind--antiquity or novelty. While men will frequently dote upon the old, they are most easily dazzled by the new. Anything new has at least one attraction. Restless spirits consider that the new must be better than the old. Though often disappointed, they are still ready to be caught by the same bait, and, like the Athenians of Mars Hill, spend their time in nothing else but either to tell or to hear …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 61: 1915

29Th Day. A Nightless Heaven.
"He is Faithful that Promised." "There shall be no night there."--REV. xxi. 25. A Nightless Heaven. My soul! is it night with thee here? Art thou wearied with these midnight tossings on life's tumultuous sea? Be still! the day is breaking! soon shall thy Lord appear. "His going forth is prepared as the morning." That glorious appearing shall disperse every cloud, and usher in an eternal noontide which knows no twilight. "Thy sun shall no more go down, neither shall thy moon withdraw itself; for …
John Ross Macduff—The Faithful Promiser

31ST DAY. The Vision and Fruition of God.
"He is Faithful that Promised." "God himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away."--REV. xxi. 3, 4. The Vision and Fruition of God. Glorious consummation! All the other glories of Heaven are but emanations from this glory that excelleth. Here is the focus and centre to which every ray of light converges. God …
John Ross Macduff—The Faithful Promiser

The Disciple, -- Master, it is Clear to Almost Everyone that to Disobey God And...
The Disciple,--Master, it is clear to almost everyone that to disobey God and to cease to worship Him is sin, and the deadly result is seen in the present state of the world. But what sin really is is not absolutely clear. In the very presence of Almighty God, and in opposition to His will, and in His own world, how did sin come to be? The Master,--1. Sin is to cast aside the will of God and to live according to one's own will, deserting that which is true and lawful in order to satisfy one's own …
Sadhu Sundar Singh—At The Master's Feet

The Foundation of the Church among the Jews
A.D. 33-A.D. 38 Before entering upon an account of the Foundation and After-History of the Christian Church, it may be well to consider what that Church really is. Section 1. Definition of the Church. [Sidenote: Twofold nature of the Church.] The Church may be regarded in a twofold aspect, as an external Corporation, and as a spiritual Body. [Sidenote: 1. An external Kingdom.] In the first light it is a Kingdom, in the world, though not of the world, extending through different and widely-separated …
John Henry Blunt—A Key to the Knowledge of Church History

The City that Hath Foundations
"I ... saw the Holy City, New Jerusalem."-- Rev. xxi. 2. J. M. Meyfart, 1642. tr., Emma Frances Bevan, 1899 Jerusalem! thou glorious City-height, Oh might I enter in! My spirit wearieth for thy love and light, Amidst this world of sin-- Far over the dark mountains, The moorlands cold and grey, She looketh with sad longing, And fain would flee away. O fair sweet day! and hour yet more fair When wilt thou come to me? My spirit, safe within my Saviour's care Made glad, and pure, and free-- And calmly, …
Frances Bevan—Hymns of Ter Steegen and Others (Second Series)

The Land of Rest
Gerhard Ter Steegen Rev. xxi. 5 Wanderer, rest thy weary feet; Shapes and sounds forgotten now-- Close thine eyes in stillness sweet, With thy God alone art thou. In the deeps of silence rest, Let Him work His high behest. Silence! reasonings hard and keen, Still--O longings sad and deep-- Waken to the morn serene, Tangled dreams depart with sleep; In the calm eternal day Night's wild visions past away. In the silence of that dawn God shall speak His words of grace, Light that round thy waking …
Frances Bevan—Hymns of Ter Steegen, Suso, and Others

The Heritage of the Lord's People. --Rev. xxi. 5-7.
The Heritage of the Lord's People.--Rev. xxi. 5-7. "He that overcomes through me, Shall an heir of all things be, I his God, and he My Son," Saith the True and Holy One. What an heritage were this! An eternity of bliss, Heaven below and heaven above, O the miracle of love! "Abba! Father!" then might I Through the Holy Spirit cry; Heir of God, with Christ joint-heir, Grace and glory call'd to share. Can a worm such gifts receive? Fear not, faint not, but believe, He who gave His Son, shall He …
James Montgomery—Sacred Poems and Hymns

Whether God Always Loves More the Better Things?
Objection 1: It seems that God does not always love more the better things. For it is manifest that Christ is better than the whole human race, being God and man. But God loved the human race more than He loved Christ; for it is said: "He spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all" (Rom. 8:32). Therefore God does not always love more the better things. Objection 2: Further, an angel is better than a man. Hence it is said of man: "Thou hast made him a little less than the angels" (Ps. …
Saint Thomas Aquinas—Summa Theologica

The Impassibility and Immortality of the Risen Body.
Besides the attributes which immediately flow from the fact that our animal bodies will rise spiritualized, there are two more qualities, which we shall now consider; namely, the impassibility and immortality of our risen bodies. 1. Impassibility implies the total loss of the power of suffering. What an enormous capacity we have for suffering! The power of receiving pleasure through our senses is only as a drop in the ocean, when compared to our manifold capacities for suffering, in every faculty …
F. J. Boudreaux—The Happiness of Heaven

Christ's Finished and Unfinished Work
'Jesus ... said, It is finished.'--JOHN xix. 30. 'He said unto me, It is done.'--REV. xxi. 6. One of these sayings was spoken from the Cross, the other from the Throne. The Speaker of both is the same. In the one, His voice 'then shook the earth,' as the rending rocks testified; in the other, His voice 'will shake not the earth only but also heaven'; for 'new heavens and a new earth' accompanied the proclamation. In the one, like some traveller ready to depart, who casts a final glance over his preparations, …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture: St. John Chaps. XV to XXI

All Fulness in Christ
The text is a great deep, we cannot explore it, but we will voyage over its surface joyously, the Holy Spirit giving us a favorable wind. Here are plenteous provisions far exceeding, those of Solomon, though at the sight of that royal profusion, Sheba's queen felt that there was no more spirit in her, and declared that the half had not been told to her. It may give some sort of order to our thoughts if they fall under four heads. What is here spoken of--"all fullness." Where is it placed--"in him," …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 17: 1871

A Word for the Persecuted
Remember that this supposition is a very likely one. There are a few Christians so favourably circumstanced that all their friends accompany them in the pilgrimage to heaven. What advances they ought to make in the sacred journey! What excellent Christians they ought to be! They are like plants in a conservatory--they ought to grow and bring forth the loveliest Bowers of divine grace. But there are not very many who are altogether in that case. The large proportion of Christians find themselves opposed …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 20: 1874

Why they Leave Us
"Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me: for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world."--John 17:24. THE PRAYER OF THE SAVIOR rises as it proceeds. He asked for his people that they might be preserved from the world, then that they might be sanctified, and then that they might be made manifestly one; and now he reaches his crowning point--that they may be with him where he is, and behold his …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 32: 1886

The Apostolate.
"That ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ."--1 John i. 3. The apostolate bears the character of an extraordinary manifestation, not seen before or after it, in which we discover a proper work of the Holy Spirit. The apostles were ambassadors extraordinary -- different from the prophets, different from the present ministers of the Word. In the history of the Church and the world they occupy a unique position and have a peculiar …
Abraham Kuyper—The Work of the Holy Spirit

An Impossibility Made Possible
'Can the Ethiopian change his skin?'--JER. xiii. 23. 'If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature.'--2 COR. v. 17. 'Behold, I make all things new.'--REV. xxi. 5. Put these three texts together. The first is a despairing question to which experience gives only too sad and decisive a negative answer. It is the answer of many people who tell us that character must be eternal, and of many a baffled man who says, 'It is of no use--I have tried and can do nothing.' The second text is the grand Christian …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

'Three Tabernacles'
'The Word ... dwelt among us.'--JOHN i. 14. '... He that sitteth on the Throne shall dwell among them.'--REV. vii. 15. '... Behold, the Tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them.'--REV. xxi. 3. The word rendered 'dwelt' in these three passages, is a peculiar one. It is only found in the New Testament--in this Gospel and in the Book of Revelation. That fact constitutes one of the many subtle threads of connection between these two books, which at first sight seem so extremely unlike …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

Departed Saints Fellowservants with those yet on Earth.
"I am thy fellowservant, and of thy brethren the prophets." The revelation made to St. John in the isle of Patmos, was a comfort to the suffering apostle, and a blessing to the church. "Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the word, of this prophecy." The beginning indeed was dark; the prophetic sketch, was for sometime, gloomy: It unfolded a strange scene of declensions and abominations, which were to disgrace the church of Christ and mar its beauty; and dismal series of woes on woes, …
Andrew Lee et al—Sermons on Various Important Subjects

Greeks Seek Jesus. He Foretells that He Shall Draw all Men unto Him.
(in the Temple. Tuesday, April 4, a.d. 30.) ^D John XII. 20-50. ^d 20 Now there were certain Greeks among those that went up to worship at the feast [The language indicates that they were Greek converts to Judaism, such as were called proselytes of the gate. It is also noted that as Gentiles came from the east at the beginning of Jesus' life, so they also came from the west at the close of his ministry]: 21 these therefore came to Philip, who was of Bethsaida of Galilee [See p. 111. They were possibly …
J. W. McGarvey—The Four-Fold Gospel

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