1.- The names are diverse: eternal life, heaven, glory. The questions, deep: Is there anything afterwards? What is it? Only the heaven or the earth too? It is, of course, something that overcomes any philosophy. We cannot imagine it: Eyes has not seen, ear has not heard, nor has it dawned on the mind what God has prepared for those who love him (1 Co 2,9). Nevertheless, in the present experience of faith, we can already live now the signals of the Kingdom of God that anticipates the absolute future of the world. It is Jesus good news: The kingdom of God is among you (Lk 17,1). A new world begins with the kingdom of God, a transfigured, different world. The end comes from the beginning, like the grain from the dowel. About year 95, during Domitian persecution, John, exiled in the island of Patmos because God´s word (Rev 1,9), saw a new heaven and a new earth (Rev 21,1). What do we see? Is it possible a new heaven and a new earth?
2.- The kingdom of God begins among a world that does not recognize anything about him. But some already perceive in their humble beginnings the signals of God´s action: You have granted to know the mystery of the kingdom of God (Lk 8,10). God establishes his kingdom from a small group, insignificant to the human eyes: Do not be afraid, little flock, for it has pleased your Father to give you the kingdom (Lk 12,32). God´s creative action will revert that small group into a huge crowd, coming from all people of the earth.
3.- There are the signals! answers Jesus to John messengers: The blind see again, the lame walk, lepers are made clean, the deaf hear, the dead are raised to life, and the poor are given good news (Lk 7,22). The kingdom of God has commenced where it seemed impossible: in the exile, in foreign land. Merriness is made possible among suffering, freedom among slavery, strength among weakness, including life among the death. God´s spirit again blows over the dry earth. New creation has commenced! Like the Council says, “the plenitude of the times has arrived”, “and in some way it is really anticipated in this century” (LG 48)
4.- It is the accomplishment of Prophets announcement: Let the wilderness and the arid land rejoice, the dessert be glad and blossom; covered with flowers, it sings and shouts with joy. Give vigour to weary hands, and strength to enfeebled knees. Say who those who are afraid: have courage, do not fear… He will come and will save you. Then will the eyes of the blind be opened and the ears of the deaf unsealed. Then will the lame leap as a hart and the tongue of the dumb sing and shout… For the ransomed of Yahweh will return: with everlasting joy upon their heads they will come to Zion singing, gladness and joy marching with them, while sorrow and sighing flee away (Is 35,1-10; 11,6-9; Ez 36,1-15; Am 9,13-15). Israel liberation, the coming back from the exile, will be a new creation: I now create new heavens and new earth, and the former things will not be remembered, nor will they come to mind again. Be glad forever and rejoice in what I create; for I create Jerusalem… the sound of distress and the voice of weeping will not be heard in it any more (Is 65,17-19).
5.- Not even the violent death, sufferer by Christ, could avoid it. On the contrary, the Revelation says: I was dead and now I am alive forever and ever, and mine are the keys of death and the netherworld (Rev 1,18). And also: And I saw next to the throne with its four living creatures and the twenty four elders a Lamb standing, although it had been slain. I saw him with seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent out to all the earth. The Lamb moved forward and took the book from the right hand of him who was seated on the throne. (Rev 5,6-7; see 4, 6-7; 1 Chr 24,7-19). He is the Servant constituted as Lord: he was like a lamb led to the slaughter (Is 53,7), but he is standing, resurrected, and in the middle of the throne, he is the Lord. All power has been given to him, he has God´s spirit plenitude, and he comes to judge. The kingdom of God becomes present in the person of Jesus: The world has now become the Kingdom of God and of his Christ (Rev 11,15). It was announced: the Lord comes in power (Is 40,10), Your God is king! (Is 52,7)
6.- Like prophet Daniel announced (Dan 7,13), the son of man is coming: he comes over the clouds (Rev 1,7), it is to say, like God. He comes to judge: a sharp double-edged sword coming out of his mouth (Rev 1,16), write down all you see, in a book (1,11), the hour of his judgement has arrived (14,7), now I will show you the judgement of the sovereign prostitute (17,1), it is to say, of Rome. As it is written down, the Servant will announce the judgement to the nations: He made my mouth like a sharpened sword (Is 49,2; 42,1). The judgement is the answer to the believers´ prayers, persecuted because of his testimony: How long will it be? (Rev 6, 10; Ps 79).
7.- The Lord judges the churches´ bishops. Of Ephesus: Remember from where you have fallen (Rev 2,5). Of Smyrna: Remain faithful even to death and I will give you the crown of life (2,10). Of Perga: Some among you hold the teaching of Balaam (2,14; Num 31,16). Of Tuatara: You tolerate your Jezebel, this woman who calls herself a prophetess and is deceiving my servants; she teaches them prostitution and the eating of food sacrificed to idols (2,20; 1K 16,30-33). Of Sardis: You think you live but you are dead (3,1) Of Philadelphia: You have kept my Word and not renounced me, in spite of your lack of power (3,8). Of Laodiceans: You are lukewarm, neither hot nor cold so I will spit you out of my mouth (3,16). The Lord judges the nations: You must again proclaim God´s words about many peoples, nations, tongues and kings (10,10). God reigns by means of those that give testimony: You are my witnesses (Is 43,12;44,8). It is necessary to be watching: The former things have come to pass, and new things do I declare (Is 42,9). Once and again, Jesus promises the reward to those who get victory: To the victors I will give the hidden manna. I will also give him a white stone with a new name written on it that no one knows except the one who receives it (Rev 2,17). The victory is the testimony in the name of Jesus.
8.- Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth. The first heaven and the first earth had passed away and no longer was there any sea (Rev 21,1), The old world, deformed by the sin, passes by. The sea (from where the Beast comes out) does not exist any more: There shall be no more death or mourning, crying out or pain, for the world that was has passed away. And the One seated on the throne said: I make all things new (Rev 21, 4-5). God “prepares a new home and a new earth for us, where the justice inhabits, and which beatitude is able to satiate the peace desires coming out from the human heart (GS 39).
9.- It is a world in which God has his home, and the new covenant is accomplished: And I saw the saint city, the new Jerusalem, the holy city coming down from God, out of heaven, adorned as a bride prepared for her husband. A loud voice came from the throne: Here is the dwelling of God among men (Rev 21,2-3; Ez 36,26-28). Psalm 16 says: Delightful indeed is my inheritance!
10.- The kingdom of God coincides with the new Jerusalem. It has twelve doors and twelve names on them, of the twelve tribes (Rev 21,12). The Servant has the function of congregating Israel (and the churches), but not only this: I will make you the light of the nations, so that my salvation will reach to the ends of the earth (Is 49,6). They come from every people and nation. The little group with which the kingdom of God began grows immensely: After this I saw a great crowd, impossible to count from every nation, race, people and tongue (Rev 7,9). In my Father’s house there are many rooms (Jn 14,2), says Jesus in the last supper.
11.- It is a new world where God reigns, where his will is accomplished in earth as in heaven: so that God is all in all (1 Co 15,28), so that “there will be no difference between heaven and earth” (Saint John Crisostomus, Homily over Mathew, 19,5). In the meanwhile, the whole creation groans and suffers the pangs of birth. Not creation alone, but even ourselves, although the Spirit was given to us, we groan in our innermost being (Rom 8,22-23)
12.- The new creation is identified with God´s paradise: to the victor I will give to eat of the tree of life, which is in God´s Paradise (Rev 2,7). Liberation from all pain, fatigue and weeping is the correction from the original mistake of man (Gn 3,16-19). Like Saint Cyril of Jerusalem says, “heaven could also be those who carry the image of the celestial world in whom God dwells and walks” (mistagogía Catechesis, 5,11). Being on the cross, the good thief asks Jesus: Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom. Jesus replied: Truly, you will be with me today in paradise (Lk 23,43). The new world is not a bestial one, but a humanized, divinised world, according to the original project of God.