Revelation 21:2Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

The city is said to come down from heaven because the grace by which God creates it is heavenly. Therefore He says to it through Isaiah: “I, the Lord, create this” (Isa 45:8).

Indeed, it comes down from heaven from the very beginning, from the time when its citizens, during this age, grow by God’s grace descending from above. They grow through the laver of regeneration in the Holy Spirit, sent down from heaven.

But at the judgment of God, which will be the final judgment through His Son, Jesus Christ, this city, by the gift of God, will appear in such great and new radiance that no trace of oldness will remain. The bodies themselves will pass from the old corruption and mortality to incorruption and immortality.

The Jerusalem on the former earth is the image of this Jerusalem. In it the righteous are prepared beforehand for incorruption and made ready for salvation. Moses received the image of this tabernacle on the mountain.

Nothing here can be taken as allegory. All is faithful, true, and substantial, created by God for the enjoyment of righteous men.

For as truly as God exists, who raises man, so truly does man rise from the dead, and not figuratively, as I have repeatedly shown. And as truly as he rises, so truly will he be prepared for incorruption, and will grow and be strengthened in the times of the Kingdom. Thus he will be able to receive the glory of the Father.

Compare: “The New Jerusalem was raised upon every wound that bore witness to the sufferings of the Savior.”

The vision of the holy city Jerusalem as new signifies the passage into the brightness that the Jerusalem above will receive. It descends to men from the bodiless powers above, for the head of them all is Christ our God. This city, having Christ as its cornerstone, is composed of the saints, concerning whom it is written: holy stones are scattered upon His land (Zech 9:16). It is called a city as the dwelling place of the Holy Trinity, for according to the promise She dwells and walks in it (1 Cor 6:16). This city is called the bride because it cleaves to the Master and is united with Him in a perfect and indissoluble union. It is adorned because, according to the Psalmist, it has glory and beauty (Ps 44:14) in the diversity of virtues.

The heavenly Jerusalem is the multitude of the saints, of whom it is said that they will come with the Lord, according to the word of Zechariah: the Lord my God will come, and all the saints with Him (Zech 14:5). They are those who will dwell with Him. They are prepared for God as a pure habitation, as a bride adorned for her husband. Adorned with holiness and righteousness, they go forth to be united with their Lord and to remain with Him in eternity.

By the name Jerusalem are signified the blessedness of the saints and their dwelling. John figuratively calls it Jerusalem both here and in the earlier chapters. Its magnificent and fair description is given so that we may direct our mind from what is expressed sensibly to the spiritual blessedness and way of life of the saints.

“The former heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements, being set on fire, will be dissolved. The earth and all the works upon it will be burned up” (2 Pet 3:10).

On the basis of these words of the Apostle, some ancient interpreters thought that the present world would be completely annihilated and that God would create a new one. But from the words of the Apostle Paul (Rom 8:21), it is clear that the world will not be completely annihilated. It will only be renewed and reborn through fire for the better.

What is meant by this image of the holy city, the new Jerusalem? The triumphant Church of the Lord. The innocence, righteousness, and good works of the saints form the adornment of this Church, as of the Lord's bride. The earthly Jerusalem, once the capital among the people of God, was only a faint type of the heavenly Jerusalem, that is, the Church of the Lord.

In this Revelation we continually see the true Church. Finally, with the new heaven and the new earth, she too is renewed as the new Jerusalem, descending from God out of heaven.