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I still feel that we need to see more concerning the New Jerusalem and this problem of interpreting it as a heavenly mansion by looking at John 14, an auxiliary chapter to Revelation 21 and 22. We must purge out this leaven of the heavenly mansion. To understand John 14 through 16 plus chapter 17 as a prayer, we need to know how the entire Gospel of John is arranged. To know any point, especially a serious point in the Bible, we must take care of the entire book in which it is located. Then we know where that point is and how it is related to the context of the entire book.
The Gospel of John has an initial, complete section of eleven chapters. Chapter 1 gives us an introduction, a prologue, of the entire book. This prologue provides a clear view of the book of John. Then in chapter 2 are the principle of life and the goal of life. Then nine cases are presented to us from chapter 3 through chapter 11—from the case of regeneration with Nicodemus through the case of resurrection with Lazarus. All these cases are quite meaningful. They give us a clear view of how this life, which Christ imparts into people, meets the need of every man’s case.
Chapter 12 begins a new section. In this section the first part is a feast, a fellowship, in a small home in Bethany. That house in Bethany gives us a picture of a miniature of the church life. In chapter 12 the church life is portrayed in a miniature way because after all the instances of the divine life meeting the need of every man’s case, the church life is produced.
In chapter 12 we also see the Feast of the Passover (v. 12). Many people, even from abroad, came to Jerusalem to keep this feast. When they came, they heard about the greatest miracle, the resurrection of Lazarus from among the dead (vv. 17-18). Many people were excited and wanted to see the One who had performed this miracle (v. 19). Therefore, the name of Jesus became widely spread and famous. At that juncture Jesus entered into Jerusalem in a lowly and humble way, yet the people gave Him the top welcome. Humanly speaking, according to the natural concept, this was a golden time for Jesus when He was on the earth. All the people welcomed Him, and a number of people wanted to see Him. The disciples thought that Jesus would be happy, but His answer indicated just the opposite (vv. 23-28). It indicated that He did not care for that big welcome. That was not the thing on His heart, and that was not the thing in which He was interested.
From John 12:20 to the end of chapter 17 is a separate section, which could be titled “The Way of Jesus’ Glorification.” The glorification of Jesus is also mentioned in chapter 7. Chapter 7 tells us that whoever believes into the Lord shall drink of Him and shall have rivers of living water flowing out of his innermost being. These rivers refer to the Spirit, and this Spirit was not yet, because Jesus had not yet been glorified (vv. 37-39). In the Gospel of John the glorification of Jesus is a major point to which many readers and Bible teachers have not paid adequate attention. Chapter 12 tells us that the people gave Him a big welcome and that to them it was exciting to see Jesus (v. 13). It was at this juncture that the Lord spoke something which indicated that He was not interested in that kind of welcome, in that kind of exaltation, but that He was burdened to go through a procedure that He might be glorified.
We need to read some of the verses in chapter 12 and in chapters 14 through 17 in order to have a clear view of this matter of glorification. John 12:20-22 says, “There were some Greeks among those who went up to worship at the feast. These then came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida of Galilee, and asked him, saying, Sir, we wish to see Jesus. Philip came and told Andrew; Andrew came, and Philip too, and they told Jesus.” Jesus did not answer Andrew and Philip by saying, “Hallelujah! Glorious!” Instead, we read in verse 23, “Jesus answered them, saying, The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.” This is the subject of the following chapters through chapter 17. If we are going to understand chapters 14 through 17, we must stand on this key verse. This verse is the ground and base for interpreting John 14 through 17. After chapter 17 He was betrayed, arrested, judged and sentenced to death, crucified, buried, and resurrected. Then He came back in glorification. From 12:20 to the end of chapter 17 is an unveiling of how Jesus could be glorified. Then from chapter 18 through chapter 20 Jesus was glorified through death and resurrection. In resurrection and on the day of resurrection, He came back to His disciples not in the natural way but in the resurrected way. In other words, in the glorified way He came as the glorified Jesus.
Then in the verse following 12:23, the Lord Jesus unveiled the way for Him to be glorified: “Truly, truly, I say to you, Unless the grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it abides alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit” (v. 24). This is the way for Jesus to be glorified — to die and to be resurrected to bring forth many grains. These many grains actually are the essence of His glorification. Within a small grain of wheat is the life element. When the life within it is released to bear much fruit, the many grains become the glorification of the one grain. The more grains that are produced, the more glory the one grain enjoys. To die and to grow up in resurrection was the way for Jesus, as the one grain with the divine life concealed in His humanity, to be glorified. His humanity was a shell to Him, just like a grain of wheat has a shell that must be broken through death. The human shell of our Lord’s humanity had to be broken so that the divine life concealed within Him could be released to grow up to produce many grains for Him to be glorified.
After the Lord responded to Andrew and Philip, He prayed in verse 28, “Father, glorify Your name.” The Father’s name denotes His person. The Lord was asking the Father to glorify His person, because the very divine person of the Father had been concealed in His humanity. After Jesus prayed, “Father, glorify Your name,” there came a voice out of heaven, “I have both glorified it and will glorify it again.” This is the Lord’s prayer on the way to His being glorified. Then in verses 32 and 33 He said, “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to Myself. But He said this signifying by what kind of death He was about to die.” The Lord’s death and His resurrection would produce much fruit, and this fruit would be the many men drawn to Christ by His wonderful death. When He died, all men would be drawn to Him, and these men drawn to Him would be the very fruit produced by Him in resurrection.
John 13:31-32 says, “Then when he [Judas] went out, Jesus said, Now has the Son of Man been glorified, and God has been glorified in Him. If God has been glorified in Him, God will also glorify Him in Himself, and He will glorify Him immediately.” At the Feast of the Passover the Lord Jesus exposed Judas and indicated to Peter and John that Judas was the one who was going to betray Him (vv. 23-27). At the end of the Feast of the Passover and before the setting up of the Lord’s table, Judas was exposed. As a Jew, Judas had a right to participate in the Feast of the Passover, but he was not a genuine regenerated believer, so he did not have the right to participate in the Lord’s table. He was exposed, and at that juncture he left. Then he went out to see the Pharisees to carry out his betrayal. While the Lord Jesus was setting up His table, Judas was carrying out his betrayal to bring those Jewish opposers to the Garden of Gethsemane.
When Judas left, Jesus said, “Now has the Son of Man been glorified, and God has been glorified in Him” (v. 31). This meant that the very inner essence of the man Jesus would be released through His death, and when He is released and the Father is released within Him, God is glorified — “If God has been glorified in Him, God will also glorify Him in Himself, and He will glorify Him immediately” (v. 32). These words concerning glorification refer to His death and resurrection. His death and resurrection was a glorification to Him. The glorification of Jesus is His multiplication — the one grain being multiplied into many grains. This is also His expansion, His enlargement. He was expanded, enlarged, multiplied, in His death and resurrection, and that multiplication was His glorification.
After this the Lord went to the Garden of Gethsemane, according to the record of the synoptic Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. According to John, however, after this the Lord did not go directly to the Garden of Gethsemane. He gave a long discourse recorded in John, covering three chapters, plus a long prayer in chapter 17. Most Bible readers realize that John 14 through 16 comprises the Lord Jesus’ last talk with His disciples while He was on this earth on the night of His betrayal. After this talk and the prayer, He and the disciples went to the Garden of Gethsemane, where He was arrested. This fellowship should make us clear concerning the context of chapters 14 through 17.
After the Lord spoke that long discourse in chapters 14 through 16, He prayed a prayer in chapter 17. The first verse in this chapter is quite crucial: “These things Jesus spoke, and lifting up His eyes to heaven, He said, Father, the hour has come; glorify Your Son that the Son may glorify You.” This word matches John 12:23, where the Lord said, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.” The only difference is that in 17:1 that word had become a prayer. The Lord prayed that the Father might glorify Him that He might glorify the Father. For many years I could not understand what the main subject of the Lord’s prayer in chapter 17 was. Now we can see that the subject of this long prayer is the glorification of Jesus.
In 17:21 the Lord prayed, “That they all may be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us; that the world may believe that You have sent Me.” The issue of Jesus being glorified is that His believers will be brought into the Triune God, into the divine “Us.” There is a coinherence in the Divine Trinity. In this verse the Lord said that the Father is in Him and that He is in the Father. This is the coinherence of the Divine Trinity, and this coinherence has to be applied to His believers so that all His believers may be in the divine “Us,” in the Divine Trinity. This is the issue of the glorification of Jesus.
John 17:24 says, “Father, concerning that which You have given Me, I desire that they also may be with Me where I am.” Now we have to ask where Jesus is. John 14:3 says, “If I go and prepare a place for you, I am coming again and will receive you to Myself, so that where I am you also may be.” Many Christian readers and teachers unconsciously change the word Myself in this verse to heaven — “I...will receive you to heaven.” However, the Lord said that He will receive the believers not to heaven but to Himself so that where He is they also may be. Also, many Christian teachers say that He is in the heavens so that we also may be in the heavens. This is their interpretation. To answer the question of where the Lord is, we must let the Lord Jesus Himself answer. In verse 10 of the same chapter, chapter 14, the Lord said, “Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me?” Where is the Lord? He is in the Father. He was going to prepare a place for the disciples so that where He was they also might be. He is in the Father so that we may also be there in the Father. He was going to prepare a place through His death and resurrection to bring us into the Father. His death and resurrection was His preparation to bring us into the Father in whom He was. Then where He is we also may be. He said this at the beginning of chapter 14 in verse 3, and He prayed about this at the end of chapter 17 in verse 24. In verse 24 the Lord said, “Father, concerning that which You have given Me, I desire that they also may be with Me where I am.” The Lord was saying, “I am in You, Father, but they are not. I desire that they all may be in You as I am, that they may be with Me in You.” “That they may behold My glory, which You have given Me, for You loved Me before the foundation of the world” (17:24). The glory in this verse is the glory to be the Son of God, possessing God’s life to express God. This is the glory of Jesus. He has given us this glory, and now we are all the sons of God possessing God’s life to express God Himself.
In John 14:20 the Lord said that in the day of resurrection “you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.” The Lord is in the Father, and we are in Him, so we are in the Father by being in Him. This could transpire by His death and resurrection.
Then 14:23 says, “Jesus answered and said to him, If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make an abode with him.” The Son and the Father through the Spirit come to the lover of Jesus to make an abode with him. In 14:2 the Lord said, “In My Father’s house are many abodes.” What are the abodes? The abodes according to verse 23 are the believers, the lovers of Jesus.
Now we must go on to ask what the Lord meant when He said “My Father’s house” in 14:2. This truth has been thoroughly leavened. After being leavened, this point has befuddled nearly all the Christians. They interpret the Father’s house as the heavenly mansion. In order to see what the Father’s house is in this verse, we must go back to chapter 2, where the Father’s house was already mentioned. John 2:16 says, “To those who were selling the doves He said, Take these things away from here; do not make My Father’s house a house of merchandise.” The same term, My Father’s house, has been used in the book of John twice. Its first mention in chapter 2 indicates God’s temple, not the heavenly mansion. The Lord went on to say in verse 19, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” Then verse 21 says, “But He spoke of the temple of His body.” Now we can see from John 2 that “My Father’s house” is God’s temple, and God’s temple is the Body of Christ. Verse 22 says, “When therefore He was raised from the dead, His disciples remembered that He had said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word which Jesus had spoken.” We need to read verse 19 again: “Jesus answered and said to them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” In resurrection Jesus rose up with all His believers. First Peter 1:3 tells us that all the Lord’s believers were resurrected in Jesus’ resurrection. Therefore, the man Jesus was killed and destroyed as a smaller temple, but Jesus with all His believers was resurrected to be the larger and mystical Body of Christ. This mystical Body is the temple, and this temple is “My Father’s house.” This is the right way to interpret the Bible. My Father’s house in 14:2 must be interpreted based upon chapter 2 of the same book, where “My Father’s house” is God’s temple and where God’s temple is the Body of Christ.
John 12 shows us the expansion, the increase, the multiplication, of Jesus. One man was killed, but in resurrection He was no longer merely one man. One grain was sown into the earth, but after growing up, it remains no longer one grain. It becomes many grains, which are the multiplication of the one grain; this is the real expansion of Jesus to be His mystical Body. His glorification is His multiplication, and His multiplication is His expansion from one person to a corporate Body. Also, this one person with His corporate Body is the house of His Father. In the Epistles we are told clearly that the church is the house of the living God (1 Tim. 3:15). After looking at all these verses, we can see that the house in John 14 actually refers to the church.
Then in 14:3 we can see what the Lord Jesus meant by saying that He was going and that while He was going, He was coming. In 14:3 the Lord said, “If I go...I am coming.” This means that the Lord’s going (through His death and resurrection) was His coming (to His disciples — vv. 18, 28). Through His death and resurrection Jesus has been multiplied. He has been expanded. He brought forth many believers, which are the many grains who are the members of His Body, which is God’s house. According to the context of the sections of the Gospel of John, the Father’s house must be interpreted in this way. To interpret it in another way would be according to the natural, religious concept and according to the traditional teaching.
It is crucial that we see the matter of glorification in these chapters. John 12:24 unveils His multiplication in which we see one grain becoming many grains. This was the time for the Son of Man to be glorified, so His multiplication is His glorification. His multiplication is to produce many grains for making a loaf, and that loaf signifies the mystical Body of Christ, which is today the house of the living God. This house will consummate in the New Jerusalem. Both the New Jerusalem and the church are God’s dwelling place.
The eternal principle is applied to the church and also applied to the New Jerusalem. The eternal principle is this: the Triune God has wrought Himself into His chosen and redeemed people to be their existence, to be their entrance into the eternal kingdom of God, to be their constitution, to be their living, and to be their enjoyment. These items are not only in the ultimate consummation, in the New Jerusalem, but also in the book of John and in the Epistles for our present enjoyment and experience.
Do you not have the Triune God, the Creator, the Redeemer, and the Regenerator, as the source of your existence? Surely you do. Do you not have the Triune God as your entrance into the spiritual and divine realm? Surely you do. Are you not now under the constitution of the Triune God? The Father’s nature as the gold, the Son in His redemptive work as the pearl, and the Spirit’s transforming work as the precious stone are all our present experience. Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 3 that we need to build the church with gold, silver, and precious stones. This is something that we are presently enjoying. Are we not living by the Triune God as our street, as our way, as our food, and as our drink? Surely we are. Are we not enjoying the Triune God as our light, as our tree of life, and as our river of life? We are surely in the up-to-date experience of this enjoyment. All this is here today in the church, and all this will consummate in the coming New Jerusalem for eternity. This principle is eternal. Therefore, the Father’s house is God’s dwelling in the New Testament age, which is the church of Christ. This will consummate eventually in the new heaven and the new earth in the New Jerusalem. In the church today and in the New Jerusalem in the eternal age, the principle is the same. In its intrinsic essence the church in this age is the same as the New Jerusalem in eternity.
In John 14 the Father’s house is a corporate matter, comprising all the believers who are in Christ. Then in chapter 15 is a vine tree, which is again a corporate matter, showing us how we are in Christ, the vine tree, and how Christ is in us, the branches. In chapter 16 we see a newborn child (v. 21). This newborn child is Jesus born as the firstborn Son of God in His resurrection (Acts 13:33; Heb. 1:5; Rom. 1:4). This newborn child includes Jesus as the Head and all His members who have been resurrected with Him. They become the members of this newborn child. Actually, this newborn child refers to the birth of the new man in Ephesians 2:15. In the concluding prayer in John 17 is the oneness. The very oneness in chapter 17 equals the newborn child, which equals the vine tree, which equals the house. These are the same items in different aspects.
The house in chapter 14, the vine tree in chapter 15, the newborn child in chapter 16, and the oneness in chapter 17 are realized by the Triune God wrought into the very being of all the believers as the very source and substance of their existence, as their entrance into this divine realm, as the very essence for their constitution, their building up, as their living, and as their enjoyment. By this the house is built, the tree is growing, the new child is born, and the oneness is practical. This is basically and intrinsically the very essence of the New Testament ministry.
The traditional Christian understanding is that Jesus as the Son of God was sent by the Father and died on the cross for our sins. He was resurrected and ascended to the heavens, and the Spirit was sent down to inspire us to believe in Him. The believers believed, and they were forgiven, justified, redeemed, and saved. These believers were also regenerated. Then when the believers die, they go to the place that the Lord Jesus promised He was going to prepare in John 14. This place is an absolutely objective, physical thing to them, which has nothing to do with their present life. Eventually, according to this interpretation, that mansion will be the New Jerusalem, the holy city. This will be the eternal dwelling place of all the believers. We can see that this kind of understanding is altogether objective, and nothing of it is related to life. In much of today’s traditional theology they do not even talk about life that much.
We need to check with ourselves in this matter. Are we preachers, teachers, and ministers of the Word in the Lord’s recovery in this way? Doctrinally you may say no, but practically you have never stayed away from that kind of objective theology. That kind of theology is altogether off from the New Testament ministry. The New Testament ministry does not minister such an objective theology. It ministers the Triune God passing through the necessary processes (incarnation, human living, crucifixion, resurrection and ascension) and becoming the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit to impart Himself into our very being to give us a new existence, to become our entrance into a new realm, and to become our very intrinsic essence for our new constitution in the Body of Christ. Also, this very processed Triune God is now our life, our living, our way, and our enjoyment, and we have to grow in this life unto maturity, unto the ultimate consummation of the eternal life, which is the New Jerusalem. This is the New Testament ministry.
Traditional theology and the New Testament ministry are absolutely in two different realms, in two kingdoms with two lives. One is the kingdom of objective theology, which is in a line having nothing to do with life. The second one, which is the spiritual one, the one that is ministered by the New Testament ministry, is a kingdom of the Triune God as life and everything to His chosen people; this is altogether in the line of life.
We must realize that if we minister something of the first realm, the realm of objective theology, apparently what we minister is scriptural, and there is nothing against the Bible, but this kind of ministry sows the seed of wrong understanding, which delays the saints’ growth in life and which holds them back and distracts them. This kind of objective theology also misleads people. Actually, this is very, very serious. It may not be that you intentionally do something to sow the seed of wrong understanding. You may have no intention of doing that. Your intention is firstly to save people and then to edify them — “to help people to grow.” Actually, however, this kind of ministry is not the ministry of the New Testament.
I do believe that the Lord has given us a new view of John 14 through 17. This is not a matter of doctrinal debate but a crucial matter concerning the divine life. The house in John 14 and the New Jerusalem in Revelation 21 and 22 are very crucial points. If we interpret the house in John 14 as the heavenly mansion and the New Jerusalem in Revelation 21 and 22 as a physical city for the believers to lodge in with God, we kill the New Testament ministry. This interpretation takes away the heart and kills the pulse of the New Testament ministry. Through this wrong interpretation the New Testament ministry becomes “an empty corpse.” This is not a debatable matter over doctrine. This is a crucial matter concerning the eternal life in which we must live today. We must realize that our destiny is the same way we live today with the Triune God in a fivefold way: the Triune God wrought into our being as our substance, as our entrance, as our constitution, as our living, and as our enjoyment. This is not a small matter. I hope that all of you will be saturated with this and soaked in this. Then you will minister nothing but the New Testament ministry. Even I hope that you brothers will preach the gospel in a new way, in the “New Jerusalem way.” Do not follow traditional theology. Put out some messages for the gospel from the New Jerusalem. You must believe that your listeners will be able to understand. They were created by God in this way. When you preach the items from the New Jerusalem, you will touch their God-created nature. They will understand, and they will be saved in an intrinsic and basic life way. If you are a soldier in today’s United States Army, you must learn many new scientific things. It is not sufficient just to know how to use a rifle. This is too old. This would mean that as a soldier you are out of date. Today we are in the Lord’s up-to-date recovery. I do believe that the Lord has been with us by His mercy. This is the Lord’s up-to-date recovery, and I do beg you to review these chapters, especially the last two chapters, again and again.
My burden in these chapters is to show you the vision of the Lord’s recovery today. I am not giving you a way to learn or some doctrines to get converted to. What you need is a vision with a thorough realization that the traditional theology and that much of the knowledge of the traditional doctrine are altogether a covering. Your natural concept, the doctrines that you have learned in the past, even the doctrines that you have learned in the Lord’s recovery, are veils that cover you from seeing something further. You must remember the Lord’s word in Matthew 5:3: “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” This word was spoken to the self-satisfied Jewish leaders, who were loaded with their Jewish doctrines, Jewish theology, knowledge of the law, and knowledge of the Old Testament things. They were loaded and full of these items. Therefore, the opening word on the mount was that they needed to be poor in their spirit. Perhaps we are full of traditional theology, our natural, religious mentality, and ethics. We could also be full of character improvement, doctrines that we have been holding on to for years to help us seek spirituality and victory, and many other items. All these are veils. Many Christian teachers have been veiled and held back from going on to see what the Lord has shown us in these years, especially to see what is in John 14 and what the New Jerusalem is. There is no seeing of these things, because many are self-satisfied. If you desire to go further and deeper into these mysterious truths, you must spend much time and much energy and pray much. This means that you need to pay a price. You cannot pick up the things covered in the Life-studies so easily. Without the paying of a price in this kind of way, you can never go further.
As we have seen, John 14 through 17 is a section of the word on the multiplication of Jesus, that is, the glorification. The vine tree with its expansion of all the branches is the multiplication and glorification of Jesus. The newborn child in chapter 16 as a corporate new man, with Jesus Christ as the Head and all the regenerated saints as the Body, fits in with the thought, the concept, of multiplication and glorification. Even the oneness prayed for by the Lord Jesus, that all the believers would be one by being in the Triune God, in chapter 17, is the multiplication and the glorification of Jesus. If we interpret My Father’s house in John 14:2 as a physical mansion in the heavens, where would it belong in this section? It would be altogether a foreign body. The thought and the concept of such a thing is foreign to this section. It does not fit the context at all. It has nothing to do with the multiplication and glorification of the Lord Jesus. The only way to interpret My Father’s house so that it fits the context and the thought of the Lord’s multiplication and glorification is to see that this house is the mystical Body of Christ as His multiplication, His increase, to be God’s house today. This not only fits the context, but it also becomes a key to open up the entire chapter of John 14. If you are going to understand and get into the depth of chapter 14, you need such a key — the key of interpreting My Father’s house as the very mystical Body of Christ to be God’s dwelling today, which will consummate in His eternal dwelling, the New Jerusalem.
Merely for you to learn how to present this matter is not what we are stressing. You need to see such a thing, and this seeing will reconstitute you. This is not a matter of learning doctrine. You must be constituted with this vision. Then automatically you will carry out God’s New Testament economy just as the Lord did in the four Gospels, just as the early apostles did in Acts, and just as Paul, Peter, and John wrote in all their writings. Then you will be fully governed, controlled, and directed by such a vision, and you will be restricted in the straight, central lane with its focus of the New Testament ministry. This is what we need.
