God's Sanctuary in Revelation

(avg. read time: 4–8 mins.)

Before we conclude our series of posts on Revelation, I would like to explore two motifs that are intertwined: God’s sanctuary and God’s throne. Naturally, I have had to mention these motifs a lot in the process of analyzing Revelation this month, but I want to compose direct, focused analyses of them. These are not motifs unique to Revelation, but no other text so pervasively features them, and thus it is worth considering how and why they function so pervasively here.

When it comes to God’s sanctuary, the first reference we get to it comes in a promise to the church in Philadelphia in 3:12: “The one who conquers I will make a pillar in the temple/sanctuary of my God, and that one will not go out from it, and I will write upon that one the name of my God and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem, which is coming down out of heaven from my God, and a new name from me.” Interestingly, by the end of Revelation there is not a temple in the promised new Jerusalem, so this is not a promise related to a literal temple. But the temple imagery nevertheless signifies that where God’s manifest presence is (i.e., in the new creation), there the conqueror will be and will not be removed from there. And as the faithful bore the name of God in testimony, they will bear his name everlastingly in the age to come as the fully realized image- and likeness-bearers of God. This promise thus points to a time that will be portrayed at the climax of the book when the new creation will be sacred space and those who occupy it will be utterly sanctified.

The next concrete indication we get of the sanctuary, given that one could argue the heavenly worship scenes might be more abstractly indicative of the same, is the reference to the altar in 6:9, under which are those who have been martyred. This altar will again be referenced in 8:3–5; 9:13; 14:18; and 16:7. As 8:3 clearly declares, this altar is in proximity to the throne of God. Although John does not attempt to give some detailed “map” of his heavenly vision, even on par with other Second Temple apocalypses, the indication here and elsewhere are that God’s throne room and his sanctuary/temple are seemingly one and the same.

Of course, this is not some notion new to Revelation, as God’s throne is biblically linked with God’s sanctuary in some fashion in both the heavenly reality and the earthly counterpart, particularly in the ark of the covenant and its mercy seat (1 Sam 4:4; 2 Sam 6:2 // 1 Chr 13:6; 2 Kgs 19:15; Pss 11:4; 80:1; 96; 99:1; Isa 6:1; 37:16; 66:1–2; Jer 3:16–17; Ezek 10; 37:24–28; 43:1–12; Zech 14:9, 16–21). Likewise, Ps 110 further upholds the imagery of the priestly king, as the Lord who sits at the right hand of the Lord is also said to be a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek (the priestly king). The Israelite king could also function in a priestly capacity, as seen in 2 Sam 6:14, 17–18; 8:18; 1 Kgs 8:14, 55, and 62–64. Indeed, it should hardly be surprising that the divine throne room would at the same time “double” as a sanctuary of worship in light of these contexts, and that the golden altar should be before the throne in the heavenly sanctuary as it was before the ark of the covenant in the earthly one (Exod 40:5, 26; 1 Kgs 6:22; 7:48). And so too does the ark of the covenant appear in the heavenly scene of Rev 11:19.

In a hint of what is to come, we are told that the uncountable multitude of the faithful are before the throne of God and that they serve/worship (the term λατρεύω has both senses) in his sanctuary/temple (7:15). God throne room is also the sanctuary (cf. 8:2–4; 16:17). This is why the one who sits on the throne is also said to speak from his holy sanctuary (16:1, 17). But as we will see by the end of the book, the throne and sanctuary where the one who sits on the throne “will live with them” (7:15) is the new Jerusalem, where a separate temple will not be needed because God is there like never before. In a similar vein, 13:6 speaks of how the beast blasphemed God’s name and his dwelling/tabernacle. The term can be translated as either, as 15:5 makes clearer in that what had previously been referred to as God’s temple now refers also to his tabernacle/tent of testimony (cf. Exod 30:26, 36; 31:7; Lev 24:3; Num 9:15; 17:4–10; 18:2; 2 Chr 24:6). In any case, the sanctuary and throne room are where God dwell, and so it is appropriate to transfer this phrasing to the coming new Jerusalem, even though there is no distinct temple there, as the whole city still serves the function of the temple where God’s throne is.

The ties between the sanctuary and the throne room are conveyed in other ways in Revelation as well. Although Christ’s high priestly work is not explicitly emphasized here as it is in Hebrews, it is arguably in the background given how Jesus’s primary portrayal is as the Lamb who was slain and yet lives and rules from God’s throne. Likewise, it is notable how angels at various points are presented as both royal emissaries and priestly attendants. This is apparent in the imagery of the altar in ch. 8, and it is also indicated throughout chs. 14–16. Note how the angels go out from the sanctuary with commands from God or in execution of the same in 14:15, 17; and 15:6. In 15:6 in particular, the angels are dressed in priestly fashion. Unlike in Hebrews, the operation of the heavenly sanctuary as portrayed in Revelation is not about making atonement, but it is now focused on the execution of God’s will for judgment and salvation, the implementation of his royal decrees from the throne, the comfort of his people, and, in the process, preparing earth for the heavenly sanctuary to come from heaven to earth.

In such preparation, judgment must be executed. Thus, the angels who carry the seven bowls come from the sanctuary to pour them out upon the earth. At that point in the story, John tells us that the sanctuary was filled “with smoke from the glory of God and from his power, and nobody was able to enter into the temple/sanctuary until the seven plagues/judgments of the seven angels should be completed” (15:8). This fits other scenes in the earthly sanctuary observed in the OT (Exod 40:34–35; 1 Kgs 8:10–11 // 2 Chr 5:13–14; 2 Chr 7:1–2; Ezek 10:4). Moreover, when the seven bowls are poured out, a voice is said to come “out of the sanctuary from the throne” (ἐκ τοῦ ναοῦ ἀπὸ τοῦ θρόνου; 16:17). This linking of the throne with the sanctuary and God’s glory also fits what we have observed in the vision of Stephen.

Finally, we come to ch. 21, where the sanctuary language reaches its culmination. On the one hand, although the heavenly sanctuary was said to be God’s dwelling in 13:6 (cf. 15:5), the same term is used to say that his dwelling is with humans in the new creation, that he will dwell/tabernacle among them, “and they will be his people and God himself will be with them as their God” (21:3). On the one hand, this shows that the new creation is itself functioning as the sacred space of the sanctuary as the heavenly sanctuary had previously done. That is why John can declare in 21:22, “I saw no sanctuary in it, for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb is its temple.” Such is the result of the matrimonial union of heaven and earth at the end of Revelation. On the other hand, this fulfills the covenant formula we have noted many times of how God promises that the people will be his people and he will be their God, first articulated in Exod 6:7 in anticipation of him dwelling among them in the tabernacle. But now he has come to dwell among them in a new way, in fulfillment of hopes expressed many times in the OT (Pss 50:3–4; 96:12–13; 98:8–9; Isa 4:2–5; 24:21–23; 25:6–10; 31:4–5; 35:3–6, 10; 40:3–5, 9–11; 52:7–10; 59:15–21; 60:1–3, 19–20; 62:10–11; 63:1, 3, 5, 9; 64:1; 66:12, 14–16, 18–20; Ezek 43:1–7; 48:35; Joel 3:16–21; Zeph 3:14–20; Hag 2:7, 9; Zech 1:16–17; 2:4–5, 10–12; 8; 14:1–5, 9, 16, 20–21; Mal 3:1–4), which is now re-conceptualized through Jesus, who himself became flesh and dwelt among us to bring us into his kingdom family and give us his eternal life. He thereby makes us fit for the new creation that will be God’s sanctuary fully joining heaven and earth together, which is to say, this is the kingdom in which God is all in all (cf. 1 Cor 15:28).