Revelation 21:3 says, “I heard a loud voice out of the throne, saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will tabernacle with them, and they will be His peoples, and God Himself will be with them and be their God.” The peoples in this verse are not the sons of God but the restored nations. At that time there will be several peoples on the earth, and each corporate people will be a nation on the new earth. By that time their rebellious nature will have been purged away. As the purged and restored nations, these peoples will live outside the New Jerusalem. God will dwell with His peoples, but He will not dwell in them. God will dwell in the New Jerusalem as the tabernacle, and the peoples will be around the New Jerusalem. In this way God will dwell with them.
The restored nations will enjoy the common blessings in the new heaven and new earth. These blessings are described in verse 4: “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and death will be no more, nor will there be sorrow or crying or pain anymore; for the former things have passed away.” In the new heaven and the new earth there will be no tears, no death, no sorrow, no crying, and no pain. Instead, there will be full satisfaction and rest; there will be no more cause for tears. Since death will be wholly swallowed up by life (1 Cor. 15:54) and cast into the lake of fire (Rev. 20:14), in the new heaven and the new earth there will be no more death. Not only will death be cast into the lake of fire, but the elements of death—sorrow, crying, and pain—will be abolished.
The restored nations will inhabit the new earth around the holy city. They will also walk by the light of the holy city (21:24). The glory of God will illumine the New Jerusalem, and its lamp will be the Lamb (v. 23). For this reason, the city will have no need of the light of a lamp and of the light of the sun, for the Lord God will illumine it (22:5). God Himself will be the light and Christ will be the lamp, shining out God to enlighten the entire city. This is the light in which the nations will walk.
The second half of Revelation 21:24 says, “The kings of the earth bring their glory into it.” In this verse glory refers to splendor (Matt. 5:16; Heb. 2:9). The kings of the earth are the kings of the nations on the new earth. There will still be kings on the new earth, but they will be subordinate to the holy city. The fact that the kings will bring their glory into the New Jerusalem indicates that they will be subordinate to the New Jerusalem.
Revelation 21:26 says, “They will bring the glory and the honor of the nations into it.” Once again, glory refers to splendor. Honor refers to preciousness in status and dignity in position (cf. Esth. 1:4). The people bringing the glory and honor of the nations into the holy city indicates that they will be subordinate to the sons of God, who will be reigning as kings in the New Jerusalem.
The nations on the new earth will be preserved by the leaves of the tree of life to exist in the created and restored human life forever. Revelation 22:2 says, “The leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.” In the Bible leaves are a symbol of man’s deeds (Gen. 3:7). The leaves of the tree of life symbolize the deeds of Christ. The regenerated believers will eat of the fruit of the tree of life, receiving Christ as the life and life supply inwardly, so that they may enjoy the divine life for eternity. The restored nations, on the contrary, will be healed by the leaves of the tree of life, taking the deeds of Christ as their guide and direction, so that they may live the created and restored human life forever.
The new heaven and the new earth will not be something other than the old heaven and the old earth but will be the old heaven and the old earth renewed to be the new heaven and the new earth through the judgment of God at the close of the old creation. By the judgment of God, the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the elements, burning with intense heat, will be dissolved, and the earth and the works in it will be burned up. This is the procedure that God will use to roll up the heavens and the earth and put them away so that they may be changed from the old to the new. All the material things will pass away, but His eternal word will abide forever.
The new heaven and new earth will be the new universe as the realm of God’s ruling in eternity. It is the issue of God’s work of the new creation in the old creation and of God’s work of restoration in the old creation. Through these two kinds of work, God will have two kinds of peoples. The first kind will be the saints, the regenerated, transformed, and perfected saints to be the kings and priests in the center, the New Jerusalem, of the new heaven and new earth. The second kind, who will not be regenerated and transformed, will be the restored nations—those who are restored to the original state of God’s creation.
After the coming forth of the new heaven and the new earth, the holy city, New Jerusalem, will descend to the new earth. Righteousness will dwell in the new heaven and new earth and will saturate God’s new universe to maintain it absolutely under God’s righteous order. The new heaven and new earth will have years, months, days, and nights ruled by the sun and the moon. In the New Jerusalem, however, there will be no distinction between day and night, for the light in the holy city will be the Triune God Himself. The restored nations on the new earth will be the people of God, but they will not have God’s life and nature. God, who dwells in the New Jerusalem as the tabernacle, will be with them. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and death, sorrow, crying, and pain will be no more. They will be sustained eternally by the leaves of the tree of life to live on the new earth outside the New Jerusalem, taking the deeds of Christ as their guide and direction, so that they may live the created and restored human life and share the common blessings in the new heaven and the new earth forever.