We need to look at the culture at the time in which the Bible was written, to understand what certain words really meant. The meaning of the words ‘first heaven and earth’ which passed away and ‘no more sea’ in the book of Revelation was not referring to what we see as the heaven sea and earth today, but in the time this book was written, John was talking about (and it was understood by the Jews as such) the temple where the holy of holies was known as ‘heaven’, the holy place as ‘earth’ and there was a molten sea where the priests washed themselves before entering the holy place, in other words, John was talking about the destruction of the temple here. When Jesus spoke about the destruction of Jerusalem and the great tribulation, He was referring specifically to that generation and all the signs He was talking about came about during their lifetime. The Jewish people saw God as a judge who, when a person was rich, was blessing that person, and when a person was poor or sick, He was punishing that person. Jesus came to change this wrong perception of who God was and to manifest God’s true character to the world. The word judgment tends to have a negative connotation, but it simply means to make a decision or a decree. God does not judge, but warns people through His prophets about the consequences of their wrong decisions. To not defend and take care of the poor and judging them to be under punishment was called an unrighteous judgment. God’s judgment towards mankind is to heal, make whole and save. He is only light and life and anything opposite of this means an absence of God. Jesus had drawn all judgment of the world upon himself when He hung on the cross, to replace all of mankind’s hatred and violence with God’s love.
