Days of Vengeance - The Preterist Archive

22:3-4
Paradise is not, therefore, only “restored”; it is
consummated, its every implication brought to
complete fruition and fulfillment.
The word Tree is xulon, often used with reference to
the Cross (cf. Acts 5:30; 10:39; 13:29; 1 Pet. 2:24); in
fact, it is likely that Christ was crucified on a living
tree, as His words in Luke 23:31 imply: “For if they do
these things in the green tree, what will happen in the
dry?” St. Paul saw Christ’s crucifixion as the fulfillment
of the Old Testament curse on one who is hanged on a
tree (Gal. 3:13; cf. Deut. 21:23; Josh. 10:26-27). 3 St.
Irenaeus saw the Cross as the Tree of Life, contrasting
it with the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil,
through which man fell: Jesus Christ “has destroyed the
handwriting of our debt, and fastened it to the Cross
[Col. 2:14]; so that, just as by means of a tree we were
made debtors to God, so also by means of a tree we may
obtain the remission of our debt.” 4 The image was
quickly adopted in the symbolism of the early Church:
“Early Christian art indicates a close relationship
between the tree of life and the cross. The cross of
Christ, the wood of suffering and death, is for
Christians a tree of life. In the tomb paintings of the
2nd century it is thus depicted for the first time as
the symbol of victory over death. It then recurs again
and again. The idea that the living trunk of the cross
bears twigs and leaves is a common motif in Christian
antiquity.” 5
As in Ezekiel’s vision (Ezek. 47:12), the Tree of Life is
continuously productive, bearing twelve crops of fruit,
yielding its fruit every month in a never-ending supply
of life for the overcomers (2:7), those who do His
commandments (22:14). St. John goes on to make it
clear that the power of Christ’s Tree will transform the
whole world: The leaves of the Tree were for the
healing of the nations. Again, St. John does not conceive
of this as a blessing reserved only for eternity,
although its effects continue into eternity. The Tree of
Life is sustaining believers now, as they partake of
Christ:
Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My Word, and
believes in Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not
come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life.
Truly, truly, I say to you, an hour is coming, and now is,
when the dead shall hear the Voice of the Son of God; and
those who hear shall live. (John 5:24-25)
In the same way, St. John expects the healing virtues of
the Cross to give Life to the nations as nations, in this
world; the nations, he has told us, are made up of “those
whose names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life,”
since the nations as such are admitted into the Holy
City (21 :24-27). The River of Life is flowing now
(John 4:14; 7:37-39), and will continue to flow in an
ever-increasing stream of blessing to the earth, healing
the nations, bringing an end to lawlessness and warfare
(Zech. 14:8-11; cf. Mic. 4:1-4). This vision of the
Church’s glorious future, earthly and heavenly, mends
the fabric that was torn in Genesis. In Revelation we
see Man redeemed, brought back to the Mountain,
sustained by the River and the Tree of Life, regaining
his lost dominion and ruling as a priest-king over the
earth. This is our privilege and heritage now, definitively
and progressively, in this age; and it will be ours
fully in the age to come.
3-4 Thus there shall no longer be any Curse, in
fulfillment of the ancient promises:
Thus says the Lord GOD: On the Day that I cleanse you
from all your iniquities, I will cause the cities to be inhabited,
and the waste places will be rebuilt. And the desolate
land will be cultivated instead of being a desolation in the
sight of everyone who passed by. And they will say, “This
desolate land has become like the Garden of Eden; and the
waste, desolate, and ruined cities are fortified and
inhabited.” Then the nations that are left round about you
will know that I, the LORD, have rebuilt the ruined places;
I, the LORD, have spoken and will do it. (Ezek. 36:33-36)
The Throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in the
Holy City, as St. John implied in 21:3, 11, 22-23. It is
striking that the citizens are called His servants – an
expression that is primarily used to describe prophets (cf.
1:1; 10:7; 11:18; 15:3; 19:2, 5 [cf. 18:24]; 22:6, 9). As we
have seen, this has been a significant theme in
Revelation, the fulfillment of the Old Covenant hope
of communion with God: All the LORD’s people are
prophets, for the LORD has put His Spirit upon them
(Num. 11:29). Therefore they shall see His face, and
His name shall be in their foreheads. Kline comments:
“Behind the imagery of Revelation 22:4 are the figures
of Moses and Aaron. Aaron bore on his forehead the
name of the Lord inscribed on the crown on the front
of the priestly mitre. The very countenance of Moses
was transformed into a reflective likeness of the Glory-
Face, the Presence-Name of God, when God talked to
him ‘mouth to mouth’ (Num. 12:8) out of the Glorycloud.
As the Name and the Glory are alike
designations of the Presence of God in the theophanic
cloud, so both name and glory describe the reflected
likeness of God. To say that the overcomers in the New
Jerusalem bear the name of Christ in their forehead is
to say that they reflect the glory of Christ, which is to
say that they bear the image of the glorified Christ.” 6
Thus, says St. Paul, all the saints now see His face: “We
all, with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the
Glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same
image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the
Spirit” (2 Cor. 3:18). And, because all the saints are
priests (Rev. 1:6; 20:6), we wear His name in our
forehead (3:12; 7:3; 14:1), serving Him in His Temple
(7:15).
3. The word cross (stauros) can refer either to the tree itself (considered as the
instrument of execution) or to the patibulum, (the upper crosspiece to which
Christ’s hands were nailed, and which was then nailed to the tree). For a
discussion of this whole issue, see Ernest L. Martin, The Place of Christ’s
Crucifixion: Its Discovery and Significance (Pasadena, CA: Foundation for
Biblical Research, 1984), pp. 75-82.
4. St. Irenaeus, Against Heresies, v.xvii.3.
5. Johannes Schneider, in Gerhard Kittel and Gerhard Friedrich, eds.,
Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, 10 vols., trans. Geoffrey W.
Bromily (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1964-76), Vol.
5, pp. 40-41.
6. Meredith G. Kline, Images of the Spirit (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House,
1980), pp. 54f.
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