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Scripture Reading: Rev. 21:3-4, 6-7, 24, 26; 22:2-5, 14, 17
The New Jerusalem is the consummation of the entire divine revelation. The sixty-six books of the Bible have a conclusion, and this conclusion is the New Jerusalem. The Bible begins with God’s creation and ends with His building. The creation is not God’s goal. It is for His goal, which is the building. This thought of the divine building runs through the whole Bible.
The vision of God’s building first came to Jacob. While he was escaping from his brother, Esau, he had a dream. He dreamed about God’s house, Bethel (Gen. 28:11-19). Later, God brought Jacob’s descendants out of Egypt and over to Mount Sinai, where they stayed for a long time. While they were there, God showed them the heavenly design of a building, the tabernacle, which would be God’s dwelling among His people on earth.
After they entered the good land, God wanted them to build the temple. The Old Testament is a history mainly of the tabernacle and the temple. These two are one — the dwelling place of God on this earth among His people. The history of Jacob’s descendants is a history of the tabernacle and the temple in the Old Testament. These two were the center, the focus, of the history of God’s Old Testament people on this earth.
In the New Testament we see God incarnated. God became flesh. John 1:14 tells us that this incarnated One “tabernacled among us.” John particularly used this word tabernacled. It indicates that when the Lord Jesus was on earth in the flesh, He was God’s tabernacle. In typology the tabernacle built in Exodus was a full type of the Lord’s incarnation; the Lord was incarnated to be the very embodiment of God on this earth. This embodiment was God’s dwelling. Colossians 2:9 tells us that the fullness of the Godhead dwells in Christ bodily, in Christ with a human, physical body. The very Christ was the embodiment of God, and this embodiment was the tabernacle of God.
In John 2:19 the Lord told the Jews, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” The Lord Jesus’ physical body was a temple of God (v. 21). The tabernacle is in John 1, and the temple is in John 2. The Lord’s word in three days signifies His resurrection. Paul tells us in Ephesians 2:6 that when Christ was raised, we were resurrected together with Him. Peter says further that through that all-inclusive resurrection we have all been regenerated (1 Pet. 1:3). We have been born of God and are His sons. This implies that the very temple the Lord Jesus built up in three days, that is, in His resurrection, is not an individual thing but a corporate thing. Therefore, in the Epistles we are told that the church as the Body of Christ is God’s temple. First Corinthians 3:16 says that the saints are the temple of God.
The New Testament ends with the New Jerusalem, and the New Jerusalem as the conclusion of the Bible is called the tabernacle (Rev. 21:3). John says that he did not see any temple in the holy city, “for the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb are its temple” (v. 22).
As we have pointed out, the measurement of the New Jerusalem is the same in length, breadth, and height. In three dimensions the city measures twelve thousand stadia (v. 16). The principle revealed in the Bible is that a building with the same three dimensions indicates the Holy of Holies. The Holy of Holies in the tabernacle was ten cubits in three dimensions. According to 1 Kings 6:20, the Holy of Holies in the temple was also three equal dimensions of twenty cubits each. According to the measurement of the New Jerusalem, then, this holy city must be the Holy of Holies. If we read Revelation 21 carefully, we can see that the holy city is both the tabernacle and the temple.
Both the Old Testament and the New Testament are focused on the tabernacle and the temple as God’s dwelling. Then the conclusion of the entire Bible, both the Old Testament and the New Testament, is also the tabernacle and the temple. In the Old Testament the tabernacle typifies Christ individually as God’s tabernacle, and the temple typifies Christ corporately as God’s temple. What we have here is Christ and the church. Christ is the fulfillment of the type of the tabernacle, and Christ as the Head together with the church as His Body fulfills the type of the temple. This will have a consummation, and this ultimate consummation will be the New Jerusalem, which is both the tabernacle and the temple. Here is the ultimate consummation of God’s dwelling, which He has been building for centuries. Further, this New Jerusalem is a living composition of all the saints of the Old Testament, as represented by the names of the twelve tribes, and of all the saints of the New Testament, as represented by the names of the twelve apostles. It is a living composition of God’s redeemed people to be His eternal dwelling place.
In the old creation, before the coming of the new heaven and new earth, there are four dispensations. The dispensation of the patriarchs, from Adam to Moses, was the dispensation before law. You may call it the pre-law dispensation or the dispensation of the patriarchs. The second is the dispensation of law, from Moses to Christ’s first coming. The third is the dispensation of grace, lasting from Christ’s first coming to His second coming. Then with His second coming, the fourth dispensation will begin, that is, the thousand-year reign of Christ. After this fourth dispensation the old creation will surely be entirely renewed because through these dispensations God will have accomplished what He intends to accomplish.
God’s creation work was complete in the first two chapters of the Bible. Then from the second half of Genesis 2, God began His building work. This work goes on for all four dispensations: the dispensation of the patriarchs, the dispensation of law, the dispensation of grace, and eventually the dispensation of the thousand-year reign. Through these four dispensations God accomplishes His building.
God’s work through all four dispensations is a work of building. In the Old Testament we see the building of the tabernacle and the temple, which was the focus of Old Testament history. When the Lord Jesus came, He was the tabernacle. After helping His disciples to realize that He was the Christ, the Son of the living God, He immediately revealed that He would build His church (Matt. 16:18). The Lord’s word indicated that He was doing a building work.
This thought of building is very strong in the Bible. Even in Acts 4 Peter told the Jewish leaders that they were the builders who had rejected Christ, the living stone, yet God had raised Him up and made Him the cornerstone of His building (vv. 10-11). Peter tells us in his writing that the Lord is the living stone, and we all as living stones come to Him and are being built up as a spiritual house (1 Pet. 2:4-6).
Paul also speaks of the building. He tells us that he has laid the unique foundation, and that no one can lay another. The problem, however, is how we build upon the foundation. We can build either with gold, silver, and precious stones or with wood, grass, and stubble (1 Cor. 3:10-12).
In John’s writings the thought of building is stronger. When Simon came to the Lord Jesus in John 1:41-42, the Lord changed his name to Cephas, which means “a stone.” Later in the same chapter the Lord told Nathanael that he would “see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man” (v. 51). Actually, the Lord was referring Nathanael to the dream of his forefather Jacob (Gen. 28:12, 17, 19), indicating that a building work of Bethel, the house of God, was beginning. Then in John 2 the Lord indicated that He would build up His body in resurrection as God’s corporate temple (vv. 19, 21-22).
John writes further in Revelation that the overcomers will be made pillars in God’s temple (3:12). Eventually, in Revelation 21 he shows us that the ultimate consummation of this building work will be the New Jerusalem, the tabernacle and temple of God, built with gold, pearls, and precious stones and having the apostles as the twelve foundation stones.
Notice, then, that in the entire Bible only one and a half chapters are on God’s creation. The rest of the Bible, from the second half of Genesis 2 to the end of Revelation, is on God’s building. This building is termed the tabernacle and the temple again and again in the Old Testament, in the New Testament, and at the conclusion of the Bible. In the Old Testament are the tabernacle and the temple. In the New Testament is the reality of the tabernacle and the temple. At the conclusion of these two Testaments is the ultimate consummation of the tabernacle and the temple.
This consummation, the New Jerusalem, is the aggregate of the divine sonship for the corporate expression of the Triune God (Rom. 8:23). The Son is the expression of the Father. No one has ever seen God, but the only begotten Son has declared Him (John 1:18). A father and his sons bear one image. The faces of the sons are like the face of the father. Jesus Christ as the Son of God is the very expression of God the Father. God, however, would like to have more than one son. Christ is referred to as the only Begotten in John 1:18 and in John 3:16, where it says that God gave His only begotten Son. From Romans 8:29 we know that in resurrection this unique Son of God became the Firstborn among many brothers. The Lord Jesus in His resurrection charged one of the sisters to “go to My brothers” (John 20:17), and Hebrews 2:11 says that He is “not ashamed to call them brothers,” because they were all born of the same Father. The only difference is that He is the first Son, and we are the many sons.
The Triune God is still working today to bring His many sons into glory (v. 10). We are sons of God, but we are not in glory yet. Just as a caterpillar is transformed into a butterfly, so we are being led into glory. Hallelujah, we are on the way! One day we will all be there in glory as the many sons of God. Romans 8:18-22 tells us that the entire fallen creation, now under the slavery of corruption, eagerly expects to see us in glory. That glory will be the freedom of the glory of the children of God, which is our full redemption (v. 23). Our body has not yet been redeemed, but one day it will be transfigured into a glorious body (Phil. 3:21). This full redemption of our body is the full sonship. Our spirit has already been born of God, but our body has not yet been brought into sonship. The entire universe is eagerly expecting the final part of our redemption. The creation wants to see all the sons of God brought into glory to enjoy their full sonship.
Before His resurrection Christ was God’s only Begotten, but through death and resurrection He became the Firstborn, followed by the many sons who were produced through His death and resurrection. Now to God we are the many sons, to Christ we are the many brothers, and to His Body we are the members. This is why we call ourselves brothers. We are brothers to each other because we are the brothers of Christ and the sons of God. This is sonship. It is a corporate entity.
The New Jerusalem is the aggregate of the divine sonship. There is only one divine sonship; we are all in this one sonship. In resurrection we will all be males, including the sisters. In this body of the old creation we still have the difference between brothers and sisters, but in resurrection we will all be males, brothers. The total sonship will be completed through the coming rapture and resurrection. When we are there in the New Jerusalem, that will be an aggregate of the divine sonship. This sonship is for the corporate expression of the great God who is triune — the Father, the Son, and the Spirit.
This sonship fulfills the desire of God’s predestination. Ephesians 1:4-5 tells us that before the foundation of the world God predestinated us unto sonship. When I was young, I loved these verses, but I thought that God had predestinated me unto heaven. Then I thought that I was predestinated unto salvation. Many of us may have thought the same thing. Many times when we read the Bible, we read something from our mentality into it. The Bible does not say that God has predestinated us unto heaven or unto salvation. It says that we have been predestinated unto sonship.
God made a firm decision before the foundation of the world to make you a son. Every chosen one is a sinner, even an enemy to God, but God has the redemptive ability to make you, who are a sinner and an enemy of His, one of His sons. This is the wonder of wonders. God has made us, who were His enemies, His sons.
John says that all those who receive Him, that is, believe into His name, are given authority to become children of God (John 1:12). These are born of God. He came to be the tabernacle (v. 14), desiring that we receive Him and thus be born as sons. The intention of the Lord Jesus, the tabernacle, was that we be born as sons to be the components of the coming temple (2:19, 21-22).
In Romans 8 Paul is strong in this matter of sonship. Romans 8 says, “As many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God” (v. 14). God has not given us a spirit of slavery but a spirit of sonship (v. 15). His Spirit witnesses with our spirit that we are children of God (v. 16). The entire creation is eagerly expecting this sonship of ours (v. 19). God is now conforming us to the very image of the Firstborn, Christ (v. 29). We are His brothers today but not fully. We are in the process. When we are conformed to the image of the Firstborn, we will be His very expression in a corporate way.
In Revelation God sitting on the throne looks like jasper (4:3). Then in 21:18 John tells us that the wall of the city was made of jasper. These two verses tell us that the New Jerusalem will look like God. The city will be a corporate expression of God.
That God will have a corporate expression is also indicated in His creation of man. Before the ages God predestinated us unto sonship. Then He created man in His own image, according to His predestination, with the intention that one day this created man would be His corporate expression. That day is not here yet. When the four dispensations are over — the dispensations of the patriarchs, of the law, of grace, and of the kingdom — God’s work of conforming us to the image of the Firstborn will be completed. Then we will be a living corporate entity, bearing the image of God.
The New Jerusalem is the aggregate of all the sons together as a corporate expression. It is a composition of all the dear saints redeemed by God in all the dispensations, both of the Old and of the New Testaments. They together will be the components of this holy city, the aggregate of the divine sonship, expressing God corporately to fulfill His heart’s desire, as indicated in His creating man in His own image. Revelation 21 and 22 are the fulfillment of Genesis 1:26 — God having a man in His image.
In the new heaven and new earth there are two categories of people. One is the many sons, and the other is the peoples. When we are in the New Jerusalem, we will be the sons of God, not the peoples of God.
In Britain there is a royal family. They are not “the people” but the reigning ones. Saints, have you ever considered that you are not among the ordinary people? You are of the royal family. John tells us in Revelation 1:6 that Christ has made us “a kingdom, priests to His God and Father.” We are the sons of the almighty God, who is the King of kings. This makes us members, folks, of the royal family. We are not only sons of God but also members of the kingly family.
Revelation 21:3 says, “They will be His peoples.” Then 21:7 says, “He who overcomes...will be a son to Me.” In 21:24 there are “the nations.” The nations will walk by the light of the holy city. We, the sons, the royal family, are the holy city. To God, then, His sons are one category, and His peoples are another.
In London I was taken to see the changing of the guard in front of the gate of Buckingham Palace. Even in the big city of London, there is a “little city” called Buckingham Palace, where the royal family lives. The New Jerusalem will be the heavenly, spiritual, divine, eternal “Buckingham Palace.” Around the royal city are the nations.
In the new heaven and the new earth we will not be the peoples, the nations, but the sons. The sons of God in Revelation 21:6-7 are those who have been born of God through regeneration (John 1:12-13; 1 Pet. 1:3, 4, 23; James 1:18). They are built together through transformation (1 Cor. 3:9-12a; Eph. 2:20-22; 1 Pet. 2:4-6; 2 Cor. 3:18; Rom. 12:2; Eph. 4:23-24). They will be glorified in full conformation to be a corporate expression of the Triune God (Rom. 8:29-30; Heb. 2:10; Rev. 21:11). The nations outside the New Jerusalem are not born again, transformed, or glorified. We are different from the nations.
The category of people who are reborn, transformed, glorified, and conformed will be the components of the New Jerusalem. Today the believers as the members of the Body of Christ are the components of the church, which is both the house of God and the wife of Christ. The church is not a building. It is a living composition of all the living members of Christ. This living composition is an organism. It is not an organization. Where these people are, there is the organism. We are here as this organism, the church. If we move to Miami, this organism will be there in Miami.
These components — the regenerated, transformed, glorified, and conformed sons of God to be both the house of God and the wife of Christ (vv. 3, 9) — in eternity will eat the tree of life and drink the water of life. These will be the two main, substantial, basic enjoyments of the sons of God. Revelation 22:14 promises that we will have the right to eat of the tree of life. In Revelation 22:17 is a call to drink the water of life. These will be our basic enjoyments in the New Jerusalem for eternity.
Then we will serve God and the Lamb as His slaves (v. 3) for eternity. We will also be kings over the nations — the peoples — for eternity; Revelation 22:5 says that we will “reign forever and ever.” The believers as sons of God will all be kings. The angels will be serving ones (Heb. 1:13-14), serving us. They are the servants of the royal family, and we will be kings over the nations. This is the kingdom of God in eternity.
The peoples of God in Revelation 21 are a remnant of the sheep described in Matthew 25:31-46. When the Lord Jesus comes back, He will sit on His throne of glory in Jerusalem and will gather all the living, different peoples of the nations to Him. They will be classified into sheep and goats, and He will judge them. The goats, who are on His left hand, will go directly to the lake of fire. The sheep, on His right, will inherit the thousand-year kingdom, which God prepared for them from the foundation of the world. We were predestinated unto sonship before the foundation of the world, but the millennium was prepared by God for these sheep from the foundation. There is a difference.
This judgment will not be at the great white throne (Rev. 20:11), which follows the millennium. It will be at the throne of Christ’s glory before the thousand years. The judgment will not be according to the law of Moses or according to the gospel of grace but according to the eternal gospel (14:6-7). Many Christians have never heard of the eternal gospel. It does not include redemption or the forgiveness of sins. It comprises two things: to fear God and to worship Him. This gospel will be preached by an angel at the time of the great tribulation, which will last three and a half years. This is the time when Antichrist will do all that he can to persecute the Jews and the Christians. In Matthew 25, according to the verdict of Christ’s judgment, the Jews and the Christians will be treated quite well by the sheep (vv. 34-36). But a great many will follow Antichrist in persecuting the Jews and the Christians. Christ will make His judgment accordingly, and that judgment will be according to the eternal gospel.
The sheep will be transferred into the millennial kingdom to be the peoples, and the overcoming saints will be kings over them (Rev. 20:4, 6). The sheep will be restored to the original state of man as created by God and will be citizens of the millennial kingdom, enjoying the blessing of the restoration (Acts 3:21). Restoration is not regeneration. To be regenerated is to be born again with another life, God’s life, but to be restored is to be brought back to the original state of God’s creation.
At the end of the thousand years Satan, after being released, will instigate the last rebellion against God (Rev. 20:7-9). Many of the sheep will join Satan’s rebellion and will be burned with fire from heaven. The remnant of the sheep will be transferred to the new earth to be the nations (21:24). God will tabernacle with them, the peoples (v. 3). They will be ruled by the sons of God as kings (22:5). To them there will be no more death, sorrow, crying, pain, or curse (21:4; 22:3a). They will be sustained eternally by the leaves of the tree of life (v. 2). We will eat the fruit, but the nations will enjoy the leaves. They will walk by the light of the holy city (21:24a). With their kings they will bring their glory and honor to the city. They will respect the city and regard it as superior.
The saints throughout all the dispensations who have been redeemed will be the reborn ones, God’s sons, belonging to the royal family. They will be kings in eternity. The restored remnant of the unbelievers will be the peoples, the nations, walking in the light of the city and ruled by the saints. Another category of people is the perished ones. The perished unbelievers will be in the lake of fire (v. 8). This gives us a general view of the new heaven and new earth.
