ASPECTS OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE AND CHURCH LIFE SEEN IN THE NEW JERUSALEM
Message One
The Throne of God and of the Lamb, the River of Water of Life, and the Tree of Life
Scripture Reading: Rev. 22:1-2
I. Every believer should be a "little New Jerusalem," and every local church should be a miniature of the New Jerusalem, the great God-man, with Christ as the centrality and universality:
A. The vision of eternity is the vision of the New Jerusalem—Rev. 21:9-10.
B. The life of eternity is the living out of the New Jerusalem—Phil. 1:19-21a; Gal. 2:20.
C. The work of eternity is the working out of the New Jerusalem—1 Cor. 15:58; 16:10; 3:12a.
D. God has put eternity in man's heart—Eccl. 3:11:
1. "Eternity" is "a divinely implanted sense of a purpose working through the ages which nothing under the sun but God alone can satisfy" (The Amplified Bible).
2. God created man in His image and formed in him a spirit that man may receive and contain Him (Gen. 1:26; 2:7); in addition, God put eternity, an aspiration for something eternal, in man's heart so that man will seek God, the eternal One.
3. Hence, temporal things can never satisfy man; only the eternal God, who is Christ, can satisfy the deep sense of purpose in man's heart—cf. 2 Cor. 4:18:
a. Christ's name is Immanuel, meaning "God with us"—Isa. 7:14; Matt. 1:23.
b. Actually, the content of the entire New Testament is an Immanuel (v. 23; 18:20; 28:20; Rev. 21:3), and all the believers in Christ, as the members of Christ, are a part of this great Immanuel, the corporate Christ (1 Cor. 12:12; Col. 3:10-11).
c. The sign of Immanuel consummates in the New Jerusalem, which will be the aggregate of Immanuel, the totality of God being with us.
II. The center of God's authority in the New Jerusalem is the throne of God and of the Lamb—Rev. 22:1:
A. The center of a nation is its capital, the place where the central government is located; the New Jerusalem also has a center, which is the throne of our redeeming God, the throne of God and of the Lamb.
B. The throne of God and of the Lamb, showing that there is one throne for both God and the Lamb (cf. 21:23), indicates that God and the Lamb are one—the Lamb-God, the redeeming God, from whose throne proceeds the river of water of life for our supply and satisfaction; this depicts how the Triune God—God, the Lamb, and the Spirit, who is symbolized by the water of life—dispenses Himself into His redeemed under His headship (implied in the authority of the throne) for eternity:
1. God is our Creator (Gen. 2:7), the Lamb is our Redeemer (John 1:29), and the Spirit is our Regenerator (3:6).
2. God was the One who purposed, He became the Lamb who redeemed (1:1, 14), and finally, He became the life-giving, flowing Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45b).
3. The love of God, the grace of Christ, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit are the reality of God, the Lamb, and the Spirit f lowing within us from the throne of grace in our spirit—2 Cor. 13:14; Heb. 4:16; cf. Rom. 5:17, 21.
4. In our daily life, in our family life, in our marriage life, in our business life, and in our church life the center must be God's throne; everything must be submitted to His headship.
5. Every morning after rising up we need to say, "Lord, thank You for a new day for me to take You as my Lord. I subject myself under Your headship for the whole day. Lord, set up your throne in my life. Set up Your throne in the center of my being. Lord, bring my whole day with my daily life under Your throne":
a. If we would offer such a prayer to the Triune God every morning, from that moment, we would have the living water f lowing within us.
b. Whenever we subject ourselves to the Triune God, taking Him as our Head, we enjoy the f low of the water of life within us.
c. If we do not have the f low of the living water within us, this is because we do not accept or recognize the lordship, the headship, and the authority of the Triune God in the very center of our being.
III. God dispenses Himself into us as the river of water of life proceeding out of the throne to supply and saturate the entire New Jerusalem—Rev. 22:1:
A. The river here, typified by the rivers in Genesis 2:10-14, Psalm 46:4, and Ezekiel 47:5-9, signifies the abundance of life in its flow:
1. It is one river, flowing to the four corners of the holy city, like the one river in Genesis 2:10-14, which parts into four heads to reach man in every direction.
2. As indicated in John 7:38, this one river with its riches becomes many rivers in our experience of the different aspects of the riches of God's Spirit of life— Rom. 8:2; 15:30; 1 Thes. 1:6; 2 Thes. 2:13; Gal. 5:22-23.
B. The water of life is a symbol of God in Christ as the Spirit f lowing Himself into His redeemed people to be their life and life supply; it is typified by the water that came out of the riven rock (Exo. 17:6; Num. 20:11) and symbolized by the water that f lowed out of the pierced side of the Lord Jesus (John 19:34).
C. The water of life is bright as crystal, having no dimness or opaqueness; when this water of life flows in us, it purifies us and makes us as transparent as crystal—Rev. 22:1.
IV. That the one tree of life grows on the two sides of the river signifies that the tree of life is a vine that spreads and proceeds along the flow of the water of life for God's people to receive and enjoy (v. 2); this fulfills for eternity what God intended from the beginning (Gen. 2:9):
A. The tree of life was closed to man because of his fall (3:22-24), but it was opened to the believers through the redemption of Christ (Heb. 10:19-20); today the enjoyment of Christ as the tree of life is the believers' common portion (John 6:35, 57).
B. In Greek the word for tree in Revelation 2:7, as in 1 Peter 2:24, means "wood"; thus, the tree of life signifies the crucified (implied in the tree as a piece of wood—v. 24) and resurrected (implied in the life of God—John 11:25) Christ, who today is in the church, the consummation of which will be the New Jerusalem, in which the crucified and resurrected Christ will be the tree of life for the nourishment of all God's redeemed people for eternity (Rev. 22:2, 14).
C. Eating the tree of life, that is, enjoying Christ as our life supply, should be the primary matter in the church life.
D. For the proper church life and the recovery of the church life, that is, for the proper growth in the Christian life, what we need is not merely the mental apprehension of teachings but the eating of the Lord as the tree of life, the bread of life, in our spirit (John 6:57); even the words of the Scriptures should not be considered merely as doctrines to teach our mind but as food to nourish our spirit (Matt. 4:4; Heb. 5:12-14).
E. The heavenly King's ministry in all His visits created opportunities for Him to reveal Himself; in His contact with the Canaanite woman in Matthew 15:21-28, the opportunity was created for Him to reveal Himself as "the children's bread" (v. 26):
1. The Canaanite woman considered Him the Lord—a divine person—and the Son of David—a royal descendant, great and high in His reign; but He unveiled Himself to her as small pieces of bread, good for food.
2. This implies that, as the heavenly King, He rules over His people by feeding them with Himself as bread; we can be the proper people in His kingdom only by being nourished with Him as our food.
3. To eat Christ as our supply is the way to be the kingdom people in the reality of the kingdom.
4. The Canaanite woman came to ask the Lord to heal her sick daughter, but the Lord said that He was the children's bread to feed her:
a. This shows that whenever we have a need, it is proof that we need to eat the Lord Jesus more; we have to learn this secret in our circumstances— eat the Lord more.
b. We need to take the Lord Jesus into us and let Him become our food and our everything; then our circumstances will change.
c. When we eat more of the Lord Jesus, the churches will be enlivened; this is the central viewpoint of the New Testament.