Revelation: Christian Future - The New Jerusalem

'"I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away, and there was no more sea. And I John saw a holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband." In taking these words for my text I placed myself at the point where the whole teaching of Scripture culminates. Here, at the last step, we have a definite and satisfactory completion of the former doctrine of the future. There is to be a perfect humanity; not only perfect individually, but perfect in society. There is to be a city of God. "The Holy City!" - there is the realization of the true tendencies of man. "New Jerusalem!" - there is a fulfilment of the ancient promises of God' (Thomas Dehany Bernard, The Progress of Doctrine in the New Testament, 217).