Revelation 21:22
22 And [kai] I saw [eido] no [ou] temple [naos] therein [en]: [autos] for [gar] the Lord [kurios] God [theos] Almighty [pantokrator] and [kai] the Lamb [arnion] are [esti] the temple [naos] of it. [autos] KJV-Interlinear
22 And I saw no temple in it, for the Lord God, the Almighty, and the Lamb, are its temple. NASB
From where he stood, John could either see the entire city, or he was taken inside of the city where he looked, but did not find, a temple. And he gives an immediate reason for there being no temple. There was no need for a temple, neither inside the capital city of Jerusalem, nor was there any need for a temple anywhere in the entire new universe.
A temple was originally designed to serve as a place for carrying out religious ceremonies, for worshipping, for the teaching of the doctrines of that belief, and so forth.
People would have to go to a temple in order to learn or perform their required religious obligations.
But with the advent of the Royal Family, came the trend and pattern, which would serve as the template for all believers for all of eternity.
In our present dispensation, we enjoy many blessings that were never made available to believers in past dispensations. You can go to the special study covering ‘Bible Blessings’ to get the details and references for the many special blessings we have been given.
Three of the more significant blessings are, that we are indwelled by all three members of the Trinity, that we are appointed as priests, and third, our bodies are temples.
We are indwelled by the Father, 1 Thes. 1:1, Eph. 4:6
We are indwelled by Christ, John 14:20, Col. 1:27
We are indwelled by the Holy Spirit, Rom. 5:5, 8:9, 1 Cor. 3:16, 6:9, Gal. 4:6, 1 John 3:24
We receive an appointment to the priesthood of God, 1 Pet. 2:5-9
We receive a royal priesthood appointment, 1 Pet. 2:9, Rev. 1:6, 5:10
19 Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? NASB
So when we actually get into the eternal state in the new universe, there will be no need for temples, because each believer will in him or herself, be a temple with God in all of His essence, living inside of each one of us.
Today that presence, of the trinity inside of each one of us, gives us control over human history in that we become a part of the great restraint of the human sin nature. At the Rapture when we are removed, that restraint is removed from the earth along with us.
You can see the impact that no restraint has on various parts of the world, what with the mass murders in some African countries, with the violence of terrorists, and so forth. When this restraint is removed in the future, then the violence of today will seem like child’s play.
But also, today we do not have direct access to the Power of God, we only have indirect access through the power of the Holy Spirit, through our spiritual growth, and through prayer. This is one of the reasons that advancing to spiritual maturity is so important in ones life. Not only will spiritual maturity enhance your eternal evaluation when you stand before Christ, but blessings and Gods control of history exist to some extent through mature believers. The more mature believers there are in the world, the greater the restraint against evil. The fewer mature believers there are, the lesser the restraint.
In eternity, the light of the glory of God will be inside of each one of us. We will be our own priests. We will be continually in the presence of God. There will never be a moment when we will not be in His presence. Worship will be our life and our very existence and moment-by-moment activities, whatever they are, will be worship.
We will not have to go anywhere to find God, or to learn of Him, He and His wisdom will be perpetually with us, inside of us.
Remember when we studied the tabernacle as being a mere shadow of the real tabernacle, which is in heaven? So likewise, our Royal Family status and spiritual life, which we enjoy in this dispensation, is a pattern, or a shadow if you will, of the real one which will exist in eternity.
When the canon of scripture was completed in 96 A. D., that is when our Church Age pattern of the spiritual life really began. After John completed the book of Revelation, then all visions, all communications, all special gifts, all special abilities and so forth, from God, ceased to exist. Thereafter, our spiritual lives have been totally dependent on the written Word of God.
From the written scriptures, we have access to everything that we need in order to grow up and live the spiritual life to its fullest possible scope.
Furthermore, what we have now is not all that there is. In eternity, our blessings and privileges will go beyond our imaginations. We only have a shadow for now.
Remember, when you see the shadow of the tree, you see only the two dimensional black and white outline of an object. You do not see in the shadow, the true size, the true texture, the true smell, the true color, etc. A shadow is far less than one percent of the reality of the true object.
And so eternity will be so phenomenal, that we cannot even begin to imagine it.
God gave us only a glimpse of the outline of the capital city of the universe. Imagine what the rest of the new universe will be like. Do you suppose that it might be one giant three-dimensional or multi-dimensional continent or continents the size of the universe, with light emanating from everything?
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