In eternity Christ with God will also be the temple (Rev. 21:22). According to the Bible, the temple is where God dwells and where His people worship Him. In eternity Christ with God will be such a temple, a temple that is both God’s habitation and our dwelling place.
In Revelation 21:3 we see that the New Jerusalem, as God’s dwelling place, will be the tabernacle of God with men for eternity. The tabernacle made by Moses was a type (Exo. 25:8-9; Lev. 26:11). That type was first fulfilled in Christ as God’s tabernacle among men (John 1:14), and will eventually be fulfilled in the fullest way in the New Jerusalem, which will be the enlargement of Christ as God’s dwelling place. This tabernacle will also be the eternal dwelling place of God’s redeemed people. Hence, the New Jerusalem will be a mutual dwelling place for both God and us.
In Revelation 21 firstly is the New Jerusalem as the tabernacle, then is Christ with God as the temple. The New Jerusalem is a composition of all of God’s redeemed people, both the redeemed of Israel and the redeemed church. It consists of God’s redeemed people as a tabernacle for God’s dwelling place. In the Old Testament the tabernacle of God was a precursor of the temple of God. The New Jerusalem as the tabernacle of God will be the temple of God. This indicates that in the new heaven and the new earth the temple of God will be enlarged into a city. In one sense the holy city as composed of God’s redeemed people to be the tabernacle of God is for God to dwell in, and in another sense the holy city as constituted of Christ with God to be the temple is for us to dwell in. Therefore, in the new heaven and the new earth the New Jerusalem will be a mutual dwelling place for both God and man for eternity. Actually, the tabernacle and the temple signify one thing—the mutual dwelling place of God and His redeemed people. The tabernacle signifies God’s redeemed people, and the temple signifies Christ with God. These are not two separate things but one thing in two aspects. This indicates that God’s redeemed people and Christ with God are not two separate entities but one corporate entity in two aspects.
In eternity the New Jerusalem as the tabernacle to God and Christ with God as the temple to us will both be for God to dwell among His redeemed people that He may dispense Himself into them. The New Jerusalem will be a gathering of all of God’s redeemed people so that God may have a dwelling place in which to dispense Himself in Christ into them continually for eternity, and that they may eat and drink of the all-inclusive Triune God for eternity.
In the New Jerusalem Christ will not only be the Lamb, the Husband, and the temple; He will also be the lamp. Revelation 21:23 says, “The city has no need of the sun nor of the moon that they should shine in it, for the glory of God illumined it, and its lamp is the Lamb.” Christ is the Lamb to be the lamp. As the lamp, Christ shines out God for eternity. God is light (1 John 1:5), and this light is in the lamp shining forth the Triune God as light into the redeemed ones. This also is a matter of God’s dispensing.
In eternity the Lamb as the lamp will shine with God as the light to illuminate the New Jerusalem with the glory of God, which glory is the expression of the divine light. God as the light, and Christ as the lamp, the light-bearer, indicate that God and Christ cannot be separated. Actually they are one light. God is the content, and Christ is the light-bearer for the expression of God. As the light is in the lamp to be its content and to be expressed through the lamp, so God the Father is in the Son to be expressed through the Son.
God, being the light, needs a lamp. Without the Lamb being the lamp, God’s shining over us would “kill” us. With the redeeming Christ as the lamp, however, the divine light does not kill us; rather, it illumines us. First Timothy 6:16 says God dwells in unapproachable light. In Christ, though, God becomes approachable. Outside of Christ God’s shining would be a killing, but inside of Christ God’s shining is an illumining. Because the divine light shines through the Redeemer, this light has become lovable and touchable, and we may even walk in it (1 John 1:7). Through the redeeming One, the Lamb, God’s killing light becomes an enjoyable shining for God’s dispensing.
Revelation 21:23 is a clear picture of the centrality and universality of Christ. God is the light, Christ, the Lamb, is the lamp, and the New Jerusalem is the container of this lamp. God shines in and through Christ, and Christ shines in and through the New Jerusalem. By this, Christ will be the centrality and universality of the coming eternity, when Christ will be the center, the circumference, and everything in the New Jerusalem.