In this message we will continue to consider Christ as the Husband of the New Jerusalem.
Revelation 21:23 says, “The city has no need of the sun or 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 city’s lamp with God as the light in Him. Christ, the Lamb, is the lamp, and in Him is God as the light. Here we see the Lamb as the One who holds God within Him as light because the Lamb is the lamp, and God is the light in the lamp. This indicates that Christ as the overcoming Redeemer holds God within Him. This is the ultimate consummation of the Lamb.
Just as light cannot be separated from a lamp, so God can never be separated from Christ. If light is separated from a lamp, the light is no longer present, and if the lamp is separated from the light, it no longer functions, because it does not have light. Hence, light is one with the lamp. Likewise, God is the light, and Christ as the Lamb is the lamp. They cannot be separated; They are two in one.
As the Lamb, Christ is the redeeming One. Without Him as the redeeming One, we can never come to touch, to contact, God as light since we are so sinful and in darkness. Because no one can stand before God in His light, we need redemption; that is, we need the Lamb. It is only by redemption and by the blood that we can come to contact God. First John 1 says that God is light and that when we come to fellowship with Him, we are in the light (vv. 5, 7a). Then when we are in the light, we see how sinful we are; hence, we need the blood of Jesus to cleanse us (v. 7b). We can testify of this from our experience. Whenever we contact God as light, we have the sense that we need redemption, the redeeming blood of the Lord and the Lord as the Lamb. Christ as the Lamb, the redeeming One, is the Mediator between God and man (1 Tim. 2:5). Through Him and in Him we can contact God, and in Him and through Him God can reveal Himself to us. Today God as light is in the Lamb, the redeeming One, and in eternity Christ will still be the Lamb in whom God as light will be experienced by us.
Furthermore, the Lamb is the expression of God. God is the light, and Christ is the lamp. The light needs the light-bearer. We should never separate Christ from God or God from Christ. Actually, God and Christ are one light. God is the content, and Christ is the light-bearer, the expression. This understanding of the Trinity is different from traditional teaching. Revelation 21:23 describes God as the light and Christ the Son as the lamp. 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.
Just as the light is in the lamp and is one body with the lamp, so God is in Christ and is one body with Christ. God is the content of Christ, and Christ is the expression of God. Christ and God are one. 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.
In the New Jerusalem the Triune God is not only our light but also our lamp. If we have light without a lamp, the light is not properly formed. We may illustrate this by electricity. Electricity produces light, but the light is in a light bulb. Without a light bulb, the electricity by itself might harm us.
Christ is the lamp, and God within Him is the light. This means that the Triune God is our light, and He is properly formed in His embodiment, the Son. The principle is the same with the lampstand. The lampstand is the form, and within the lampstand there is the burning oil. Moreover, seven lamps are on one lampstand (Exo. 25:37; Zech. 4:2; Rev. 4:5) to express the light, and the lamps contain the light of the lampstand. Today our light is not only Christ but Christ as the lamp with God as the light.
In Revelation the Lamb is the redeeming person, and this Redeemer is the lamp (21:23). The Lamb as the lamp is altogether for expression. All the light bulbs are for expressing the light contained within them. The entire New Jerusalem is under the expression of Christ the person as the lamp. We may liken the lamp to a big bulb which is able to enlighten a city whose breadth, length, and height are vast. Such a large entity has only one lamp, which is Christ. God the Father as the light needs a lamp; without an adequate lamp or bulb, an electrical light will not shine in an enlightening way. In like manner, without Christ the Lamb being the lamp, God could not shine in an enlightening way.
If God did not shine, we would not be able to see His golden, divine nature. But God shines within the redeeming Lamb as the lamp in an enlightening way. The Son, being the Lamb in His person, is the lamp to express all that the Father is as the light and as the source of the divine riches. All the divine riches are embodied in this lamp. We may say that a light bulb is the embodiment of the electrical light, that is, the embodiment of the electrical “riches.” Because we are under the shining of the Son as the embodiment of all the divine riches, we can enjoy these riches. The light establishes and confirms us in our experience of the Triune God.
Our Triune God is our lamp, our light, and He shines within us through the lamp. This is our present experience and will be the coming New Jerusalem. The holy city will be the consummation of all that we have experienced for so many years. It will be an intensification and a consummation of our present experience. The New Jerusalem will not be something new to us in eternity future if we are now experiencing it.
Light is the nature of God’s outward expression (1 John 1:5). In the New Jerusalem light refers to God Himself who illuminates the entire city for His expression. God as the divine light, the light of life, is contained in the Lamb as the lamp (Rev. 21:23b). Without the redeeming Christ to contain the divine light, the divine light would “kill” us. With the redeeming Christ as the lamp, however, the divine light does not kill us but rather illumines us. First Timothy 6:16 tells us that God dwells in unapproachable light. In Christ, however, God becomes approachable. Outside of Christ, God’s shining is 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. Through the Lamb, the redeeming One, God’s light becomes an enjoyable shining for His dispensing. Since the day we were saved, we began to enjoy God as the divine light in the redeeming Christ illumining us all the time. Even today we should enjoy God in this way.