Last week we turned our attention to the destruction of the false city, spiritually understood as Babylon. This false city is not one place, but may be in any place at any time. It may be manifest in earthly cities, but one may operate by its principles in any setting. The principle of the City of Man rules over the nations of the earth. At its heart lies the evil one himself. In the book of the Revelation this city is shown to ride on the shoulders of the Dragon. It is the earthly expression of Satan's word and will-as revealed in the Beast and the False Prophet. This Harlot-City is the parody, counterfeit and twisted distortion of the Bride-City, which is the dwelling place of God and the Lamb. It goes without saying that the Spirit of God is the only one who can reveal either of these two Cities to us (Rev. 1:10 cf. 3:1, 3; 21:10), just as it is only the Spirit who can reveal the Throne Room of God over all history (Rev. 4:2) i.e. the throne of Grace, with a Lamb, standing as if slain.

The glorious City of God-spiritually called Mt Zion, or the New Jerusalem-is the real (i.e. ontological) entity. The other is the false copy, made in the image of its maker (Satan) just as the City of God bears His glorious image. Various biblical images/realities coalesce in the City of God. Eden, Temple, Holy Hill and Bride, for example, are diverse expressions of the singularity of its nature and purpose. It is God's beloved possession and his dwelling place. In particular, however, we may say that the mark of the City of God is that it is the place where the Father is loved and glorified. In this heavenly City only his Word (Christ) is heard and adored and only his Spirit empowers and fills its citizens. This City is the Father's family, glorified and eternalized through the gift of immortality, which is granted to it by virtue of its union with the Son.

As a result of redemption, God's ransomed humanity shares in the life the glorious City of God. However, this City is not created by redemption, as such. Men and women come to be joined to the City by God's grace, but they become members of an eternal realm by so doing. From one point of view the City of God is the expression (in relationships ad extra) of the eternal relational life of the Trinity. Eden was the earthly manifestation of that City, when God created all things. We may say that Eden was the material expression of an already existing spiritual reality. Men and women are redeemed into the City, so to speak. They can only be brought into its gates if the power of the false city's hegemony is broken.

Given what we have said above, we can see that the false city could only come about through the rejection of the Father's Word. Where Adam (the earthly son of the heavenly Father) gave ear to another word, he at the very same time entered the gates of the counterfeit city, whose life is still shaped by the word of the Serpent. Eden was not destroyed, but Adam was cast out of its holy sanctuary. Indeed, far from being destroyed by human rebellion, Eden was guarded by God that a new Adam might enter-but only by passing under the flaming sword of judgement which guarded it.

Cain built the first physical city as his alternative to the Garden City of Eden, and as an expression of the lost glory he sought for himself. From then on we see an insoluble connection between the false city, human pride and ‘glory' (so called), which operates as a huge engine room for human achievement and technology. It is no accident that Babylon was famed for its hanging gardens, and that all the great cities of the world cling to park-like environs to enhance their architecture. Cities are universally used to proclaim the power, prestige, glory and character of the nations that the City of Man enthralls.

If these things are so, then we may also say that the establishment of the glorious City of God must at the same time be the establishment of the Father's people in the Father's Word. This is why we cannot conceive of the City of God without at the very same time understanding it to be the Bride of Christ. He (Christ) is the foundation of the City, since he is the only Word that is heard in the City. The heavenly Jerusalem has the glory of God, because-as the Bride, the wife of the Lamb-she has Christ, in whom the Father's glory dwells.

While the glorious City of God is not created by redemption as such, the Word of God the Father is the power by which the false word of the Serpent is undone and by which eyes deceived by his venom may be opened. Christ is the Word of God who destroys the works of the devil, and in him God the Father liberates his captive children. The ‘Word gifts' (e.g. apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor and teacher) effect liberation through the proclamation of a victory already won in Christ's cross. Just as the returning exiles found that the earthly Jerusalem and its physical temple could only be rebuilt by the word of God (especially as given through Haggai and Zechariah¬-not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the Lord), so the heavenly Jerusalem is in some sense built on the words of the apostles and prophets. All the while, however, Christ himself is the chief cornerstone.