Psalms 122:3-5 “Jerusalem is built As a city that is compact together, (4) Where the tribes go up, The tribes of the Lord, To the Testimony of Israel, To give thanks to the name of the Lord. (5) For thrones are set there for judgment, the thrones of the house of David.”
We do not know just how many thrones will be made available to the saints in the New Jerusalem, but it must be a substantial number, because the scripture teaches us that all saints who endure in this life, will reign with Christ in the age to come (2 Timothy 2:12). The above passage of scripture reveals to us that thrones (plural) will be set in the heavenly city for the purposes of judgement or reigning. And so, clearly it will be the saints living in the New Jerusalem, which will occupy those thrones for the express purpose of governing the kingdom of God. But we also need to understand the nature of the thrones given to the saints in the age to come, for the thrones given will be thrones of authority to be exercised outside the city walls and not within the city walls. So what does that mean? It means that the saints will not be sitting on their thrones in the city, while the children of God line up in queues at the city gates, to wait for their turn to approach the saints so that their various issues can be judged. And so, to get some idea as to how the saints will reign in the earth, we can again look at the old covenant as an example. Before Israel had kings, she had judges. Those judges were appointed by God, and the way they ministered to the children of Israel, is that they would travel in circuits around Israel, and judge the various issues in the towns and villages as they went. And so, in a similar manner, the saints will not sit on thrones waiting for the children of God to come to them, but rather they will go to their constituents so to speak, to exercise judgement in their towns and villages. But don’t forget, that righteousness will dwell in the new earth. And so, there will actually be no disputes that will arise between men, over which the saints will have to pronounce judgement in order to settle those disputes, for all mankind will live together in complete harmony.
Michael E.B. Maher
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