Pre-Millennial Typology

Revelation 21–22 has numerous parallels with Genesis 2, but at the same time it reflects a better world than Genesis 2’s, since it’s the completion of the process that God initiated back in Eden. God always builds back better.

• Just as Eden is a garden, so too is the New Jerusalem. And yet the New Jerusalem is more than a garden: it’s a garden-city, housing and bringing together the entire people of God.

• Just as a river waters the garden of Eden, so a river waters the New Jerusalem. And yet this river doesn’t merely nourish trees and plants; it’s the water of eternal life, as bright as crystal.

• Just as the downstream Edenic world is rich with gold and precious stones, so too is the New Jerusalem. And yet in the New Jerusalem these materials have been unearthed and are being used to beautify God’s world.

• And, just as Eden includes a tree of life, so too does the New Jerusalem. And yet it apparently includes more than one of them; it includes trees of life (plural) that can stand on both sides of the river (Rev. 22.2).

All this is well-known. But there’s a feature of the New Jerusalem that’s often overlooked.

In terms of Revelation’s literary flow, the New Jerusalem is populated with two distinct groups of resurrected people—those who were raised in ‘the first resurrection’ (since they remained true to Christ on earth and didn’t take the mark of the beast) (Rev. 20.4), and those who were united with Christ over the course of the millennium and were raised in the second resurrection (20.15). On pre-millennialism, both of these resurrections are physical. Hence, what’s spoken about elsewhere in the New Testament as if it’s a single event—the resurrection (John 5.28–29)—is filled out in more detail in Revelation 20. In Revelation 20, we find out that the resurrection involves two separate events.

Interestingly, all this follows the pattern of Genesis 2, where God plants and fills the garden of Eden. The creation of Adam and Eve are, figuratively, resurrection events. Adam is made from non-living material (dust), and Eve from Adam’s rib (which was extracted from him while he was in a death-like sleep). Hence, what’s described in Genesis 1 as if it’s one event—the simultaneous creation of man and woman (Gen. 1.26–31)—is filled out in more detail in Genesis 2. In Genesis 2, we find out that Adam and Eve’s creation involved two separate events.

With this in mind, a further parallel between Genesis 2 and Revelation 21’s events can be noted. Just as Adam is created outside the garden and then witnesses the garden being formed (Gen. 2.7ff.), so those who partake in the first resurrection are raised before Revelation’s garden-city appears and then witness it descending from heaven. Meanwhile, just as Eve is created within the garden, which is the first thing that she sees, so the first thing that those who partake in the second resurrection see in their glorified bodies is God’s new garden-city.

In sum, then, what’s often regarded as a bizarre or ad hoc feature of pre-millennialism turns out to follow an expected pattern, i.e., the pattern of creation. The new creation is like the old creation, only better.