New Jerusalem - the Consummation

by Don on October 4, 2023 • Permalink

Tagged coinherence, Colossians, God manifest in flesh, John, oneness in God, resurrection

Posted by Don on October 4, 2023

https://newjerusalem12.wordpress.com/2023/10/04/oneness-with-god-for-his-manifestation-42-1-4/

Experience New Jerusalem’s Heavenly Flow Today

Ephesians 2:5-6 tells us that God “made us alive together with Christ…and raised us up together with Him and seated us together with Him in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus.” This is our spiritual position even though our physical location is on earth.

The source of the divine life flowing within us…is in the heavens, and we are in the heavens (Eph. 2:6)….When we believed, we believed into the Triune God. We were also baptized into the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and the name denotes the person (Matt. 28:19)….So after being baptized, we are in the Triune God. God and we are in the heavens, but also we are in Him, and He is in us. We and God are coinhering. We should enjoy this wonderful coinherence with the Triune God.*

The present reality of New Jerusalem is heavenly and spiritual. God in Christ is in us and this is our spiritual connection to the heavens. Galatians 6:18, Philippians 4:23, and Philemon 25 all say, “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit.” This grace is the flow of New Jerusalem’s river.

Today we need to set aside all the outward problems and distractions to partake of this grace. The coming blessing is that in New Jerusalem, in the new creation, all difficulties will be gone for us to have a pure, uninterrupted enjoyment of the river’s flow of grace.

* From chapter 38, Witness Lee, God’s New Testament Economy, published by Living Stream Ministry, © Witness Lee, 1986.

Graphic courtesy of pixabay.com.

by Don on June 7, 2023 • Permalink

Posted in Life and New Jerusalem

Tagged coinherence, Ephesians 2, experience Christ, Galatians, heavenly Jerusalem, human spirit, riches of grace

Posted by Don on June 7, 2023

https://newjerusalem12.wordpress.com/2023/06/07/experience-new-jerusalems-heavenly-flow-today/

New Jerusalem: Mutual Indwelling of God and Man

The description of New Jerusalem in includes many “twelves.” The city has twelve gates which are twelve pearls with twelve angels and the names of the twelve tribes of Israel (Rev. 12:12, 18). It has twelve foundations with the names of twelve apostles (v. 13). New Jerusalem’s size is twelve thousand stadia (v. 16) and the wall is 144 (12 X 12) cubits high (v. 17).

In the Bible, twelve shows eternal perfection.

There are three gates on each of the four sides of the holy city….The number four refers to God’s creation. In Revelation 4:6 we see that the four living creatures represent all other living creatures (cf. Ezek. 1:5-14). Four refers to us as God’s creatures, and three refers to the Triune God….The number twelve is mingled, or blended, by three times four. This means that the entire New Jerusalem is a blending, a mingling, of the Triune God with us human beings. God is mingled with His creature man in His eternal administration in the New Jerusalem.*

This blending was spoken of by the Lord Jesus in John 14:20 referring to His upcoming resurrection, “I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.” Moreover, in John 15:4-5 He charges us, “Abide in Me and I in you.” This mutual abiding continues from His resurrection unto eternity.

New Jerusalem is an eternal mutual indwelling, a coinherence, of God and man.

* From chapter 35, Witness Lee, God’s New Testament Economy, published by Living Stream Ministry, © Witness Lee, 1986.

Photo courtesy of unsplash.com.

by Don on March 8, 2023 • Permalink

Tagged Bible numbers, coinherence, John, mingling, mutual indwelling, Revelation 21:12-21, twelve

Posted by Don on March 8, 2023

https://newjerusalem12.wordpress.com/2023/03/08/new-jerusalem-mutual-indwelling-of-god-and-man/

The Triune God is the Structure of New Jerusalem

The Triune God is revealed throughout the Bible. God is One yet He has an aspect of three, thus we have the word Triune —ThreeOne. Genesis 1:26 – “God said, Let Us make man in Our image; then 1:27 – “God created man in His own image.” Our image is His image. We cannot explain this in human words but we can praise the Triune God!

If we know the Bible, we can see that the most central and most mysterious point in it is the Divine Trinity. The main and basic structure of this allegory of the New Jerusalem is the Divine Trinity…. Love, light, and life are a few of the many attributes of God’s divine person, but the most basic attribute of God is the Trinity. It is easier to explain what love, light, and grace are as attributes of God, but it is really hard for anyone to define what the Divine Trinity is. The Divine Trinity is the greatest and the basic attribute of God.*

One view of the Trinity, the Triune God, is in John 14. Jesus says, “I am in the Father and the Father is in Me” (v. 10, 11).

The Triune God is clearly seen in New Jerusalem. The city is composed of three materials which represent the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. There are also three gates on each of the four sides of the city. This portrays the Triune God facing every direction on the earth to bring His people into the city.

In New Jerusalem we partake of the Father’s light, the Son’s, the Lamb’s, redemption, and the Spirit’s flowing as the water of life.

* From chapter 33, Witness Lee, God’s New Testament Economy, published by Living Stream Ministry, © Witness Lee, 1986.

by Don on January 20, 2023 • Permalink

Tagged coinherence, Genesis, John, Triune God, twelve

Posted by Don on January 20, 2023

https://newjerusalem12.wordpress.com/2023/01/20/the-triune-god-is-the-structure-of-new-jerusalem/

New Jerusalem: God Mingled with His People

The New Jerusalem is the mingling of the processed and consummated Triune God with His redeemed, regenerated, transformed, conformed, and glorified tripartite people. This aspect of the New Jerusalem brings us to the central point of the divine dispensing. In order to be mingled with us, God had to be processed. The processed Triune God is the One who has gone through incarnation, human living, an all-inclusive death, and a wonderful resurrection.*

We were redeemed by the death of Jesus on the cross and regenerated in His resurrection (1 Peter 1:3). Now we are being transformed by the Spirit’s operation in us (2 Cor. 3:18). We also are being conformed to the image of Christ (Rom. 8:29), and we will be glorified when He visibly returns (Phil. 3:21). All these changes are parts of our process to New Jerusalem.

But God also has to go through a process to be mingled with us in New Jerusalem. From eternity God was perfect in His divinity. There was no need and no possibility of improvement. But, as stated in the quote above, God had to take on humanity to live a model human life and to die for our redemption. Then this God-man rose from the dead and “has regenerated us unto a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.”

As a result of these great steps, God in Jesus Christ came into His believers and brought them into Himself. This is the divine-human mingling. Soon New Jerusalem will come forth in glory.

* This is the ninth of a series with quotes from chapter 28 of The Central Line of the Divine Revelation by Witness Lee, copyright by Living Stream Ministry.

Bible verses quoted in these posts are from The Holy Bible, Recovery Version, published and © by Living Stream Ministry, Anaheim CA, 2003. The New Testament of this Bible, with its outlines, is at online.recoveryversion.org; this too is © by LSM.

by Don on August 2, 2021 • Permalink

Posted in Life and New Jerusalem

Tagged coinherence, death of Christ, regeneration, renewing of the Spirit, resurrection, transformation, Triune God

Posted by Don on August 2, 2021

https://newjerusalem12.wordpress.com/2021/08/02/new-jerusalem-god-mingled-with-his-people/

New Jerusalem, Eternal Tabernacle and Temple

The Old Testament tabernacle was merely a picture. The New Testament tabernacle is Jesus Christ Himself, as seen in John 1:14, “the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us.” Through death and resurrection Christ enlarged the tabernacle by bringing us into Himself. As a result, New Jerusalem becomes the eternal tabernacle: “Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will tabernacle with them” (Rev. 21:3).

The Lord Jesus as a man tabernacled among us. He also presented Himself as God’s New Testament temple in John 2:19-21. New Jerusalem is the ultimate development. Revelation 21:22, describing New Jerusalem, says “the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.”

The New Jerusalem is God’s tabernacle—God’s dwelling in eternity (Rev. 21:3a). It is also God’s temple as God’s redeemed people’s living and serving place (v. 22)….We have to realize that even today in the New Testament we are living in the temple as God’s new creation. We are living in the temple because the church is the temple (1 Cor. 3:16-17). To us it is the temple; to God it is the tabernacle.*

Thus, New Jerusalem as the eternal tabernacle and temple is a mutual habitation. We dwell in the Triune God and He dwells in us. This is the consummation of John 14:20 and John 15:4-5, “Abide in Me and I in you.”

* This is the sixth of a series with quotes from chapter 28 of The Central Line of the Divine Revelation by Witness Lee, copyright by Living Stream Ministry.

by Don on July 26, 2021 • Permalink

Tagged coinherence, mutual indwelling, Revelation 21:22-27, Revelation 21:3-8, tabernacle of God, temple

Posted by Don on July 26, 2021

https://newjerusalem12.wordpress.com/2021/07/26/new-jerusalem-eternal-tabernacle-and-temple/

Oneness of New Jerusalem Displayed Today

The oneness of the Triune God is testified in New Jerusalem by one throne, one river, one tree, and one light. The city also testifies God’s fullness, in three gates on each of the four sides to open the city to every corner of the earth, and in the tree of life bearing twelve fruits for our eternal nourishment.

The three of the Triune God are one by dwelling in each other; this is coinherence. Through death and resurrection the Lord Jesus brought us into the same relationship with God (but not into His Godhead). In John 14:20 He told us that in resurrection we “will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.”

The Lord prayed that we would all participate in this oneness— “That they all may be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us; that the world may believe that You have sent Me….I in them, and You in Me, that they may be perfected into one, that the world may know that You have sent Me and have loved them even as You have loved Me” (John 17:21, 23).

Our oneness is in the Triune God. This oneness will be fully displayed by New Jerusalem. But God desires that oneness also be displayed now, “that the world may believe” and “that the world may know.” We can pray with the Lord that we be perfected into one, not waiting for New Jerusalem but now that the world may know God’s doings.

2 Comments

by Don on May 8, 2020 • Permalink

Posted in Life and New Jerusalem

Tagged coinherence, John, oneness in God, Triune God

Posted by Don on May 8, 2020

https://newjerusalem12.wordpress.com/2020/05/08/oneness-of-new-jerusalem-displayed-today/

God in the Lamb is the Light of New Jerusalem

Revelation 21:23 tells us that New Jerusalem “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.”

Both God and the Lamb are sitting on the throne [Rev. 22:1]. They are not sitting side by side. Rather, God is in the Lamb. God is the light and the Lamb is the lamp (Rev. 21:23). The glory of the light and the lamp are not side by side. The light is in the lamp. The Lamb as the lamp shines with God as the light. This indicates that God is in the Lamb sitting on the throne. They two are actually one, just as the light and the lamp are one unit, one entity. God in the Lamb is the redeeming God. For eternity in the New Jerusalem we shall see the redeeming God, God in the Lamb.*

In New Jerusalem there is one throne and one light because God is one! The oneness of God and the Lamb presented in the paragraph above is not something new in New Jerusalem. Rather, it is an eternal oneness.

In John 14 the Lord Jesus said, “Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me” (v. 11). In John 10:38 He told us to believe Him so that we know and continue to know this divine fact. This fact is for us to experience and live by today (John 14:20) and it will be manifested in full by New Jerusalem.

* The Conclusion of the New Testament, chapter 20, by Witness Lee

by Don on April 29, 2020 • Permalink

Tagged coinherence, God in Christ, John, Lamb-lamp, light of life, Revelation 21:22-27, shine, throne of God and the Lamb, Triune God

Posted by Don on April 29, 2020

https://newjerusalem12.wordpress.com/2020/04/29/god-in-the-lamb-is-the-light-of-new-jerusalem/

New Jerusalem: God and the Lamb are the Temple

In Revelation 21:22 John tells us, “I saw no temple in it [New Jerusalem], for the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.” By faith we have entered.

The New Testament was written in Greek, which has distinct words for “in” and for “into.” According to the New Testament we do not merely believe in Jesus Christ, acknowledging something about Him. Rather, we believe “into Him.”
• “these little ones who believe into Me” Matthew 18:6
• “believe into His name” John 1:12
• “every one who believes into Him may have eternal life” John 3:15, 16
• “Do you believe into the Son of God?” John 9:35

Revelation says that God Himself, God and the Lamb, will be the temple for us who serve Him to dwell in. Our dwelling place in eternity is God Himself….We will dwell in God. He is our temple and we are His tabernacle. He dwells in us and we dwell in Him, and this mutual dwelling is the New Jerusalem, which to God is the tabernacle and to us is the temple. We enjoy a foretaste of this today when we abide in the Lord and the Lord abides in us (John 15:5). This mutual abode will be enlarged in eternity to be the New Jerusalem where God will be our dwelling place and we will be His dwelling place.*

It is not only in New Jerusalem that God will be our dwelling and we will be His dwelling. This is true since the Lord’s resurrection, as He spoke in John 14:20 and 15:5.

* The Divine Economy, chapter 15, by Witness Lee

by Don on February 14, 2020 • Permalink

Tagged abide in God, coinherence, Lamb of God, mutual indwelling, Revelation 21:22-27, temple

Posted by Don on February 14, 2020

https://newjerusalem12.wordpress.com/2020/02/14/new-jerusalem-god-and-the-lamb-are-the-temple/

New Jerusalem is the Mingling of The Triune God with His People

God has been seeking a dwelling with man since creation. Many stages of this dwelling developed through the Old and New Testaments, culminating in New Jerusalem.

An early picture of this dwelling, this building, is Abraham’s tent with his altar in front of it, a miniature of the tabernacle with an altar built centuries later. At that time God told Moses, “Let them make a sanctuary for Me that I may dwell in their midst” (Exo. 25:8).

In the Old Testament, due to the fall of man, God could only dwell with man, not in man. But the redemption obtained by the Lord Jesus cleansed man.

In the New Testament God does not dwell ‘with man’ but ‘in man.’ Even before accomplishing redemption, the Lord Jesus spoke of this. “You will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you” (John 14:20). “Abide in Me and I in you” (John 15:4).

In the epistles many verses speak of us being in Christ and Christ being in us. This is mutual indwelling, also called coinherence or mingling. The ultimate stage of this coinherence is New Jerusalem.

The New Jerusalem is a full picture of the mingling of the Triune God with His redeemed creatures, the mingling of divinity with humanity. Now God is no longer merely a God outside of man. He is a God within man.

For eternity God will dwell in His people and His people in Him. This mutual dwelling is New Jerusalem.

* The Building of God, chapter 1, by Witness Lee.

by Don on January 29, 2020 • Permalink

Posted in God's New Testament Building

Tagged building up is spiritual, Christ in us, coinherence, God's dwelling place, in Christ, John, mingling, mutual indwelling

Posted by Don on January 29, 2020

https://newjerusalem12.wordpress.com/2020/01/29/new-jerusalem-is-the-mingling-of-the-triune-god-with-his-people/

Organic Union with the Triune God

The description of New Jerusalem in Revelation 21–22 is full of spiritual signs. Among these signs are the materials—gold signifying the Father’s divine nature, and pearls portraying the Son’s redemptive death and regenerating resurrection. These become our entrance into the kingdom of God which consummates in New Jerusalem.

In the New Jerusalem the precious stones are we plus the Spirit. The transforming Spirit becomes one with us, His transformed ones. Therefore, the pearls are Christ and we, and the wall of precious stones is the Spirit and we. These two items, the pearls and the precious stones, indicate that the second of the Triune God and the third of the Triune God have made Themselves one with us. Without the Spirit it would be impossible for us as pieces of clay to become jasper, bearing the same appearance as God. But now we have the life-giving Spirit, who is actually the consummated Triune God, in us, making us one with Him. Thus, we are altogether in the organic union with the Triune God.*

The Lord spoke about this organic union in John’s gospel. For example, He said that in resurrection “you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.” The Lord lives in us and we live in Him. In the epistles this thought continues—many verses speak about Christ in us and us in Christ.

Romans 8:9 declares that the Spirit dwells in us and in 2 Corinthians 3:18 we are being transformed by the Lord Spirit. This organic union is for our Christian life today and for eternity in New Jerusalem.

* The Organic Union in God’s Relationship with Man, chapter 6, by Witness Lee.

by Don on January 20, 2020 • Permalink

Tagged Christ in us, coinherence, in Christ, mutual indwelling, one spirit, Revelation 21:12-21, transformation, Triune God

Posted by Don on January 20, 2020

https://newjerusalem12.wordpress.com/2020/01/20/organic-union-with-the-triune-god/

God’s Eternal Purpose in Song (7)

New Jerusalem is the goal of God’s eternal purpose made in eternity past. It is also the goal of all God’s work in time. This post concludes linking a song* about God’s purpose for New Jerusalem with verses in the Bible. The last verse of the song is:

God in man and man in God
Mutual dwelling thus possess;
God the content is to man,
And the man doth God express.

The mutual dwelling of God and man is not a new thought in Revelation. Rather, in John 14 the Lord Jesus said to the disciples, “In that day [His soon-coming resurrection] you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.” Then in 15:4 He said further, “Abide in Me and I in you” with more in 15:5 and 15:7.

God as our content is also not a new thought in Revelation. Multiple verses speak of God in Christ as our life, our righteousness, our wisdom, our grace, our peace, our empowering, our hope of glory, our boast, and much more. He is unsearchably rich.

Man as the expression of God is seen in Acts 19:17, Ephesians 3:10 and 3:21, and in Philippians 1:21. The expression of God in man depends on the development of eternal life in man. We cooperate with Him now for this growth so that He may be expressed to the world today. This same expression, but much richer and stronger, will shine forth through New Jerusalem.

——
* music (composer unknown), words by Witness Lee