In this message we will continue to consider Christ as the Husband of the New Jerusalem.
Revelation 21:22 tells us that “the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb” are the temple of the holy city. The city is the aggregate of all the saints, and in the city Christ with the Lord God the Almighty will be the temple. This means that the Triune God as the temple is in the city of the New Jerusalem. The city is the aggregate of the saints, and the temple in this city is the Triune God. In other words, the redeemed saints will be the city, and the redeeming Triune God will be the temple in this city.
The Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb refers to the redeeming Triune God. The Lamb, who is the second of the Trinity, is also the temple. Our God today is the Redeemer as well as the Triune God; hence, the redeeming Triune God is our temple. The fact that the New Jerusalem is a cube of twelve thousand stadia in three dimensions shows the absolute perfection and eternal completeness of our redeeming Triune God, who is the temple and who is the Holy of Holies. With Him there is nothing wrong, and He has no bias, obliqueness, or crookedness.
The designation the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb signifies the many attributes and accomplishments of the Triune God. The temple in Revelation 21:22 is built with the Triune God, with all His attributes plus all His accomplishments. All that He has obtained and attained are the materials for the building up of this wonderful temple that we have today. We are in such a temple built with the Lord, with God, with the Almighty, with the Lamb, and with all His attributes and accomplishments.
The first mention of the tabernacle is in Exodus. After entering the good land, the children of Israel built a temple, which replaced the tabernacle. Even before the temple was built, in 1 Samuel 3:3 the tabernacle was called the temple. This means that the tabernacle and the temple actually refer to one thing. The former could be taken down and moved from place to place in the wilderness; the latter had a settled location in the good land as a more permanent building.
At first the children of Israel had the tabernacle. Then they entered the good land, conquered the enemy, and secured the peace. Afterward they built the temple. The tabernacle was then merged with the temple (1 Kings 8:4). These two, the tabernacle and the temple, were God’s greatest blessing to His people on earth. This is because both were God’s home. As long as God’s people had the house of God, they could locate God. They could tell others where He was. The tabernacle and the temple were the center and focus of the Old Testament.
In the New Testament God’s dwelling on earth was first a single person, Jesus Christ. Jesus was God’s tabernacle, His dwelling place. Then the church as a corporate person became the temple of God, God’s dwelling (Eph. 2:21-22; 1 Cor. 3:16). When we enter into eternity, God’s dwelling will not change from living persons to a lifeless, physical city. We must believe that these living persons, built together as God’s dwelling place, will be enlarged and intensified. In the coming age there will be an enlargement of these living persons as God’s dwelling place.
In the New Testament we see God incarnated. God became flesh. John 1:14 tells us that this incarnated One “tabernacled among us.” John’s particular use of the word tabernacled 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 embodiment of God on earth. This embodiment was God’s dwelling. Colossians 2:9 tells us that all the fullness of the Godhead dwells in Christ bodily, in Christ with a human, physical body. Christ is the embodiment of God, and this embodiment is 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). In John 1 there is the tabernacle, and in John 2 there is the temple. 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 the 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 temple the Lord Jesus built up in three days, that is, in His resurrection, is not a single person but a corporate entity. 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 Jerusalem as the conclusion of the Bible is the tabernacle (Rev. 21:3) and the temple (v. 22).
In the Old Testament the temple was in the city of Jerusalem, but in Revelation 21 and 22 the entire city is the tabernacle and the temple. This temple is not only God’s dwelling but also the dwelling place of all His serving ones. At that time all the saints will be priests with an eternal priesthood. We will all serve Him (v. 3). Our dwelling place then will also be the temple. The New Jerusalem is a great temple where both God and His redeemed dwell together.
We must believe that our abiding in the Lord and His abiding in us will be intensified, enlarged, and uplifted to the uttermost. This is a strong indication that the city is not a physical place. In this city the temple is a person, and this person is God and the Lamb. The Triune God will be the temple. Since the temple within the city is a divine person, the Triune God Himself, the city also must not be something lifeless but an organic entity composed of persons.
Both the Old Testament and the New Testament are focused on the tabernacle and the temple as God’s dwelling. The conclusion of the whole Bible is also the tabernacle and the temple. In the Old Testament the tabernacle typified Christ individually as God’s tabernacle, and the temple typified 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 with the church as His Body together fulfill 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. This is the ultimate consummation of God’s dwelling, which He has been building for centuries. The New Jerusalem is a living composition of all the saints of the Old Testament, as represented by the names of the twelve tribes of Israel, and 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.
Eventually, the New Jerusalem will be a dwelling for both God and His serving ones. In the Old Testament the tabernacle was God’s dwelling, and at the same time it was also the priests’ dwelling in which they served. Both God and His serving priests dwelt in the same tabernacle. To God the New Jerusalem is His dwelling, and to us God is our dwelling. Therefore, the tabernacle is God’s dwelling place, and this God who dwells in the tabernacle is the temple, which is the dwelling place of His serving ones.
Revelation 3:12 says, “He who overcomes, him I will make a pillar in the temple of My God, and he shall by no means go out anymore, and I will write upon him the name of My God and the name of the city of My God, the New Jerusalem, which descends out of heaven from My God, and My new name.” The point in this verse is crucial—in the coming temple of God, the pillar is a person. He who overcomes will be made a pillar in the temple of God. We have already seen in 21:22 that John saw no temple in the New Jerusalem because its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb. If a pillar in the temple is a person and the temple itself is a person, the New Jerusalem cannot be a physical city composed of physical stones, physical pearls, and physical gold. Since both the pillar and the temple are persons, the city must also be a person.