Questions and Answer: No Night and All Saved?

From: Questions and Answers in Christian Treasury

Narrator: Chris Genthree

• 2 min. read • grade level: 8

QUESTION: I have read that Rev. 21:1-8¹And 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. ²And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. ³And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. ⁴And 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. ⁵And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said unto me, Write: for these words are true and faithful. ⁶And he said unto me, It is done. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely. ⁷He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son. ⁸But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death. (Revelation 21:1‑8) refers to the eternal state, and the remainder of the chapter to the millennial state. It does seem like it, but the last few verses rather puzzle me: "no night there." Will there be no night in the millennium, and does the last verse mean that all will be saved?

ANSWER: Rev. 21:1-8¹And 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. ²And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. ³And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. ⁴And 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. ⁵And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said unto me, Write: for these words are true and faithful. ⁶And he said unto me, It is done. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely. ⁷He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son. ⁸But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death. (Revelation 21:1‑8) is a continuation of the subject taken up in the latter part of the previous chapter, that is, the eternal state of the lost and saved that succeeds the millennium. Then in verse 9, the Spirit of God reverts to the millennium for the special purpose of showing the place that the Church, as the bride, the Lamb's wife, holds during that period. A description of it is given, as previously that of Babylon had been given.

One of the seven angels shows the prophet this scene as in the previous case. "No night there" has reference to the city, and not, we understand, to the earth. It seems from other scriptures there will be night and day on earth during the millennium. (See Gen. 8:22²²While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease. (Genesis 8:22); Isa. 66:23²³And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord. (Isaiah 66:23); Jer. 33:20²⁰Thus saith the Lord; If ye can break my covenant of the day, and my covenant of the night, and that there should not be day and night in their season; (Jeremiah 33:20); Ezek. 46:1¹Thus saith the Lord God; The gate of the inner court that looketh toward the east shall be shut the six working days; but on the sabbath it shall be opened, and in the day of the new moon it shall be opened. (Ezekiel 46:1).)

In the last verse the inhabitants of the city are in question, and their title to be there is that their names "are written in the Lamb's book of life." As to the inhabitants of the earth, we are only told that they "walk in the light of it: and the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honor into it," as owning the heavens and the heavenly kingdom, the source of it all.

“The nations of them which are saved" refers to salvation from the temporal judgments on earth, not that they are individually saved from eternal judgment; on the contrary, the masses of these very nations, thus saved, apostatize at the end of the millennium. (See Ch. 20:8.)

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