Revelation 22:1

Chapter 22 - Eternal affairs in the Holy City

1 And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.

John is shown a pure river of water of life. If the Holy City were on earth one might think that this conflicts with the previous chapter, where it says there will be no more sea on the new earth and thus no rain is likely .  There is more than one possibility that would allow fulfillment of this passage without any conflict.

As I said in the previous chapter, this could mean no Mediterranean Sea or it may mean the new earth may again be one continent. The sea could be outside all land mass as it was before the earth was divided in the days of Peleg (Genesis 10:25; 1 Chronicles 1:19,). Scripture says there will always be seed time and harvest on the earth so there must be moisture (Genesis 8:22). It is not likely that there could be rain without evaporation from oceans. God gave the rainbow as an everlasting  covenant to all creatures (Genesis 9:16). If there is no rain there is no rainbow. Thus, God's everlasting covenant would be broken. If there is rain, this verse could be literally fulfilled on the earth.

Some Bible skeptics use the reference in Ezekiel where water flows down from the temple to the Dead Sea and say it contradicts the claim in Revelation that there will be no more sea. The problem with trying to match what is seen here with the account in Ezekiel is that Ezekiel s account in Chapter s 40 through 48 only applies to the millennial reign. The detail and measurements in the Chapter s make it certain that Ezekiel is not talking about the eternal Holy City.

I have another solution as to where the water goes. I do not believe the Holy City is on the new earth at all.  Let us assume the Holy City is a pyramid, the throne of God and the Lamb would be the capstone of this pyramid; the water of life would flow down  from the throne through the city to the tree of life and then back to the throne by some unknown force.

What is shown here is taking place totally within the Holy City. The passage does not say that water actually flows to the new earth at all. The whole system might be a closed system within the Holy City. We cannot even assume that physical laws will be the same in this Holy City. The Holy City will have any physical laws that God wants it to have. There are likely to be more than four dimensions in the Holy City. The Holy City may have real physical manifestations that will demonstrate eternal spiritual truths. The spiritual truth in this case is the living water of the Holy Spirit flowing from the throne of Father God and His Son to the nations.