This paper explores the bookends of Scripture in terms of the beatific vision, that is, the future blessed sight of God. Scripture begins with the powerful goodness of God on display in creation and the invitation for humans to participate in the tree of life (Gen 1-2), and it ends with humans seeing God’s face in the restored new creation (Rev 22:4). This paper thus seeks to establish the biblical validity of the beatific vision by analyzing its bookends and argues that the doctrine is highlighted in both.
The paper is in three parts: an analysis of the vision of God in Genesis 1-2, Revelation 22, and finally a section linking both together and briefly capturing the broad strokes of the vision in between the bookends. Specifically, while humans are created to share light and life with God, setting their gaze upon him, they ultimately look away from God and downwards toward themselves, leading to their destructions. Genesis 1-2 frames the rest of Scripture while also offering a prelude to some of the final biblical promises in Revelation, one that Scripture leads up to in detail: “They will see his face” (Rev 22:4), a promise that reveals a reversal of the curse from Genesis 3 and restoration of the tree of life.
Key Words: Beatific Vision, Seeing God, Heaven, Genesis, Revelation, Biblical Theology