We must remember that our God in His Trinity, with all His plan, economy, and achievements, has been wrought into this city. That means our God in His Trinity with everything He has done and achieved has been wrought into our intrinsic being. Therefore, He and we are blended, mingled together, as a mutual dwelling to Him and to us. He will dwell in us as His habitation, the eternal tabernacle, for eternity, and we will dwell in Him as our dwelling, the eternal temple, for eternity. There should be no consideration in our being that the New Jerusalem is a physical dwelling. Even today in the church age we care for the church as our home. To God the church is His house and to us it is our home. We should not interpret the church in a physical sense, but in the sense of persons. This home, the church, is in the same principle as the New Jerusalem. This home is the Triune God with all His achievements wrought into the believers’ humanity. This home, the church, is a mingling of divinity with humanity. This principle is eternal. It will exist and be applied to the New Jerusalem. The church today is a house of the Triune God wrought into His redeemed ones as their home. The New Jerusalem will continue this principle. The only difference is that today we are in the process and in that day of the New Jerusalem it will be the consummation. The process to reach the consummation and the consummation itself are exactly the same in principle and in nature. Actually, the process is a precursor of the consummation and the consummation is a fulfillment of the precursor. These two are one item. Actually, we should praise the Lord that today we are already in the New Jerusalem. The church life is a miniature of the New Jerusalem.
Galatians 4:24-26 is another portion from the Word which we must consider concerning the New Jerusalem: “These things are spoken allegorically; for these women are two covenants, one from Mount Sinai, bringing forth children unto slavery, which is Hagar. Now this Hagar is Sinai the mountain in Arabia and corresponds to the Jerusalem which now is, for she is in slavery with her children. But the Jerusalem above is free, which is our mother.” The physical Jerusalem represents the law which produces children unto slavery, but the Jerusalem which is above is free who is our mother. In Revelation 21 the New Jerusalem is a wife, but here it is the mother. Therefore, the New Jerusalem is a wife to be our mother. If the New Jerusalem is a physical thing, how could this city produce us as her children? How could our begetting mother be a physical city built with real precious stones, gold, and pearls? None of these items are organic. Neither gold, nor pearls, nor precious stones produce anything. Then how could they have children? These verses again show us that we should not understand the New Jerusalem in a physical sense. Only the natural, uneducated mentality which possesses inadequate biblical knowledge understands in this way. If our mind has ever been renewed, has ever been enlightened, and if we have been fully and adequately spiritually educated, we would never understand the New Jerusalem in such a wrong and superficial way.
The New Jerusalem, which is the Jerusalem above, the heavenly Jerusalem, is our mother. This motherly Jerusalem stands for grace. The physical Jerusalem stands for law, and this heavenly Jerusalem which is our mother stands for grace. In this grace are the Triune God, His plan, His economy, His redemption, His salvation, and all His achievements wrought into His chosen people. This is grace in its totality and we all have been born of this grace, so this grace is our mother. This surely could never be a physical city. This must be the Triune God with His redemption and His salvation, including regeneration, transformation, and glorification, wrought into His chosen ones. This is our mother and this is grace. We do not belong to anything physical. We belong to this divine yet human composition saturated, even constituted, with God’s grace which produces us all. The New Jerusalem is our mother and we are her children.
I hope this principle will help us in understanding this ultimate consummation. I also hope, trust, and expect much of you younger brothers for the future. You must study all the things I have given you. All these hints and principles need our entire life to study. These principles are very basic and very fundamental. This is the vision in the Lord’s recovery, which is not the teaching of theology, but is fully based upon the New Testament ministry.