God in Christ is the center of the New Jerusalem as the divine vessel. We may also say that Christ as the expression of God is the center of this divine corporate vessel. In the picture of the New Jerusalem, the invisible God is likened to light that shines with glory (Rev. 21:11, 23; 22:5). When light shines, it does a work. Light is a ruling power; it rules when it shines. Darkness, on the other hand, brings in confusion and disorderliness without any rule. In order to destroy a government, one must first throw everything in it into darkness. If all the lights in a major city were to go out, the whole city would be in darkness, and there would be robbery, looting, and killing. When the lights come back on, however, there is the ruling and governing, and order is restored.
In the six days of God’s creation for restoration, the first thing restored was light (Gen. 1:3). When God divided the light from the darkness, light came in to rule (vv. 4, 16). Where God is, there is light shining, and where God shines, there is the ruling power. If we have the presence of God in the church, we have light, we are in the light of God, we are in God as light, we are under the light of God, and all of us are ruled. All confusion is subdued, and all things are brought into order. If there is confusion among us, it means that we do not have God as light and that we are in darkness. Today the church is a miniature of the New Jerusalem. In this smaller New Jerusalem, if we have God as the center in Christ, we have the light, and the first thing light does is rule and keep everything in order.
When light shines, it also generates. Life comes from light. When the light of God shines into us, the life of God comes into us. Light always brings life to us. When we have God as light, we first have order and then life. We can see this in Genesis 1. On the first day when light came in, there was a dividing, and the keeping of order began. Before light came in, everything was in chaos. After light came in, light was divided from darkness, and things began to be kept in order. After this, the waters below were divided from the waters above, and life came out of this order. If there is the light of God, there are the ruling power and order, and if there are the ruling power and order, there is the generating power, the yielding of life. All kinds of lives came out because of the light. This is the picture in the New Jerusalem. God is the ruling center of the New Jerusalem as the shining light. From this light come all the riches of life. God is light, and from Him flows the river of water of life, and in this living water grows the tree of life.
The New Jerusalem will have a particular kind of light—the redeeming and shining God (Rev. 21:23). The redeeming God shines as the radiant God. The illuminating glory of God is the light within Christ, and the redeeming Christ is the lamp containing the light. God is always contained in Christ; He is the unique container of God. God’s glory is the light of the city, and God is contained by Christ as the content, shining out through Christ.
In the Bible darkness is a form of punishment. God punished the Egyptians with a thick darkness for three days (Exo. 10:22), and in the future God will punish Antichrist and his kingdom with darkness (Rev. 16:10). Part of the enjoyment in the New Jerusalem is that there will be no night. The city will be full of light, and this light is God the Father. He will be not only the nature of the New Jerusalem but also the shining light as an enjoyment to the entire city. The first enjoyment in the New Jerusalem is God as our light. Our experience today is the same. When we are left in darkness, that is a real punishment. When we open our entire being to Him, however, we are in the light, and the light is God Himself enjoyed by us in our daily life. We cannot live in darkness. We can live only in the light.
In the New Jerusalem there will be no night, for “night will be no more” (Rev. 22:5). In the new heaven and new earth there will still be the distinction between day and night, but in the New Jerusalem there will be no such distinction. Outside the city there will be night, but within the city there will be no night because we will have an eternal divine light, that is, God Himself. For the believers, there will be no night because in the holy city God Himself will be the “sun” that will never go down.