“The Word was God….And the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us” (John 1:1b, 14a)
“Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will tabernacle with them.” (Rev. 21:3a)
Revelation 21:3 is the speaking of a loud voice from the throne about New Jerusalem. The tabernacle of God here is God Himself, not a thing, because the next phrase of the sentence says “He [God] will tabernacle.”
Revelation also tells us that the New Jerusalem is the tabernacle of God (21:3a). In the New Testament the tabernacle is first Christ and then Christ enlarged. John 1:14 tells us that the Word who became flesh tabernacled among us. When Jesus Christ was incarnated, He was a tabernacle. The tabernacle in the Old Testament was a material building, but the tabernacle in the New Testament is a person. Furthermore, the temple in the Old Testament was a material building, but in John 2 the Lord Jesus indicated that He Himself is the temple (vv. 19-21). The temple is now a person in the New Testament.*
The quote above speaks of Christ enlarged. This matches the word of John the Baptist in John 3:30, “He must increase.” John did not say that Christ’s followers must increase in number but that Christ Himself “must increase.” This increase is the bride of Christ (v. 29) which ultimately is New Jerusalem.
This matches 1 Corinthians 12:13 which says “in one Spirit we were all baptized into one Body.” This is the spiritual, enlarged Body of Christ with all of us as His members which eventually becomes New Jerusalem. In chapter 12 our physical body, with many members, is a picture of the enlarged Christ.
Just as our physical body has grown in life as one unit, so also New Jerusalem grows. Christ’s enlargement begins with His believers being born of the Spirit and baptized in one Spirit and grows with Him as their life.
* From chapter 27, Witness Lee, God’s New Testament Economy, published by Living Stream Ministry, © Witness Lee, 1986.
New Jerusalem - the Consummation 
Linda Vogt Turner
/ November 23, 2022Right! So many Christians miss this. He must increase. Christ must die as a single grain of wheat, corn or barley in order to be The Husbandman–and take his Bride’s hand in marriage. When the followers of John the Teacher of Israel a.k.a Forerunner of Christ suppose he is the Christ, he testifies and says I am not that One. The One who belongs to the Bride is that One (John 3:29). He must increase. I must decrease (John 3:30). When Christ the Everlasting Father’s Bride commits her Spirit into his hands and he receives her, Christ becomes malted grain, sprouted grain. He dies to his single self and becomes a family man, committing himself to raising and nurturing his wife and their offspring. She becomes the sprouted and blooming Almond Tree, the True Vine (the Nazer, the Branch), that Moses the Teacher of Israel and his smithies (prophets) forged with the help of coal into a lamp stand for the Tabernacle to give light to the priests (Exodus 25 https://www.ao.net/~fmoeller/nazer2.htm).
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