The New Jerusalem is the Real and Consummate Shulammite, a Corporate Shulammite

From the angle of the divine romance, the New Jerusalem is the real and consummate Shulammite – a corporate Shulammite, including all of God’s chosen and redeemed people; the New Jerusalem is the consummation of the divine-human romance in the Bible.

God’s purpose, as seen in His creation of man, is to “get married” – He desires to gain a counterpart that would match Him and would be His wife. For this purpose God created man in His image and according to His likeness, and then God said, It is not good for man to be alone… – this actually speaks concerning Himself, It is not good for God to be alone.

In Himself, in His person and being, God is complete, perfect, and with no need; however, God in His economy has a plan to dispense Himself into His people and make them His counterpart, His bride, His wife, for the two of them (the processed and consummated Triune God and the redeemed, transformed, and glorified people of God) to live a marriage life for eternity.

As human beings we have a human need to get married, and a man marries a woman who matches him. When the Lord Jesus spoke of the kingdom of the heavens He likened it to a king who prepared a wedding feast for His son.

The gospel is being preached for sinners to repent and enter into the kingdom of God so that they may be part of the corporate bride of Christ to match Him and live with Him in oneness.

From the beginning to the end of the Bible we can see that this book speaks of a divine romance, and in Song of Songs in particular we see a very poetic and romantic description of the love between the king (a type of Christ) and the country girl (a type of us, men).

King Solomon fell in love with a country girl, so He became like her to court her, woo her, and make her His counterpart; on her side, she is drawn to the king, she loves Him fervently, and she goes through a process to become the “Shulammite”, which is the feminine form of Solomon.

The loving seeker in Song of Songs becomes the same as Solomon to match him for their marriage life. As sinners we are courted and wooed by the Lord, the King, and we fall in love with Him, are regenerated, transformed, renewed, conformed to His image, and eventually glorified to match Him as His feminine form, His counterpart.

The New Jerusalem is the consummation of the divine romance, and the holy city is the corporate Shulammite, including all of God’s chosen and redeemed people.

The New Jerusalem is the Real and Consummate Shulammite, a Corporate Shulammite

The developing love in the divine romance is portrayed in the Song of Songs, where it all starts in a delightful way, Let Him kiss me with the kisses of His mouth, for Your love is better than wine (S.S. 1:2).

The country girl goes through a long process in which she is dealt with in love, and she becomes the Lord’s coworker in ch. 7 (she wants to go to the vineyards and see if the pomegranates are in bloom, and there she will give Him her love), and in ch. 8 she says, Love is as strong as death.

As believers in Christ we are loving seekers of the Lord; we are inexplicably drawn to Him, and we love His being, His person. This causes us to go through a process of being renewed in our mind with His word, transformed in our soul by His Spirit, and eventually conformed to His image to match Him completely.

In all this time we love the Lord, we open to Him in love, and we are drawn to Him in the divine romance. His love is sweeter than wine – in the beginning, and at the end – His love is stronger than death, and many waters cannot quench it.

It all begins with us asking the Lord to kiss us, and in the end we tell Him, Lord, when I find You outside the realm of the flesh, I will kiss You. We love the Lord with a burning love, and His love burns within our heart, removing any dross of earthly love away.

His love in us enables us to go on from stage to stage; we start as a wild horse in Egypt and we end up as the Shulammite, ready for the rapture, ready to kiss the Lord; this is the New Jerusalem. What an hour sweet when bride and bridegroom meet!

The New Jerusalem is the real and consummate Shulammite – a corporate Shulammite, including all of God’s chosen and redeemed people (see S.S. 6:13; Rev. 21:2, 9-10; 22:17).

All of God’s people, from the Old and the New Testament until the Lord comes back, are part of the corporate Shulammite, the loving seeker who goes through a transformation to match Christ as the real Solomon.

The wonderful Shulammite, the duplication of Solomon, is the greatest and ultimate figure of the New Testament as the counterpart of Christ. As the counterpart of Solomon, the Shulammite became the same as Solomon in life, nature, and image, just as Eve was to Adam (Gen. 2:20-23).

God’s purpose is the same from the beginning of the Bible with Adam and Eve, to the middle of the Bible with Solomon and the Shulammite, and to the end of the Bible with the Spirit and the Bride, the New Jerusalem.

We as lovers of Christ become the same as he is in life, nature, and image to match Him for our marriage. As we behold Him daily we are being transformed into His image from glory to glory (2 Cor. 3:18), and we are being conformed to His image (Rom. 8:29) so that He may be the Firstborn among many brothers.

The New Jerusalem has the glory of God – the holy city is God’s corporate expression, and it is the wife of the Lamb, the consummation of the divine romance. In the New Jerusalem the redeeming God (signified by Solomon) and all of His redeemed (signified by the Shulammite) become one; this city is a mingling of divinity and humanity to express the processed and consummated Triune God in human virtues for all to see.

Lord Jesus, we love You. We are drawn by You. Your love burns in us and removes any earthly dross away. We love You with the first love, and we want to do the first works. Lord Jesus, we want to pursue You in love so that we may be transformed and conformed to Your image and match You in every possible way for our wedding day. Oh Lord Jesus, keep drawing us with Your love and attracting us with Your beauty until we become the corporate Shulammite, the New Jerusalem, to be Your counterpart and wife for eternity!

The New Jerusalem as the Corporate Shulammite Fulfills the High Peak of the Divine Revelation

As ordained by God, a man can only marry a woman, and that woman has to match him.

Eve matched Adam – she was taken out of him, she was bone of his bones and flesh of his flesh, and the two became a couple. Christ was put to “sleep” in His death on the cross, and in His resurrection the corporate Eve, the church, was produced; when the New Jerusalem comes into being, the wife of Christ, His bride, will be presented to Him – and He will acknowledge that she is bone of His bones and flesh of His flesh to be His counterpart.

We are ultimately becoming the wonderful Shulammite who, as the duplication of Solomon, is the greatest and ultimate figure of the New Jerusalem as the counterpart of Christ. Hallelujah!

Just as King Solomon became a country man to court a country girl in order to make her his queen, his duplication, God in Christ became a man to court man in order to make man God in life, nature, expression, and function but not in the Godhead, to be Christ’s bride (Matt. 9:15; Rev. 19:7; cf. Psa. 45:1-3, 9, 13-14). The Bible reveals that God became a man to court us and that now He wants us to court Him by our becoming divine for His expression through our personal, affectionate, private, and spiritual relationship with Him (S.S. 1:1-8; 2 Cor. 2:10; Exo. 33:11; Rom. 8:4, 6; 1 Cor. 2:15). The Shulammite is a figure of us as the reproduction of Christ, who is the embodiment of God. Thus, the many lovers of Christ eventually will become duplications of God in life and in nature but not in the Godhead. This is the fulfillment of God becoming a man that man might become God, which is the high peak of the divine revelation. Witness Lee, The Conclusion of the New Testament, pp. 4372-4373

We as the many lovers of Christ will eventually become duplications of God in life and nature (but not in the Godhead) to match Him as His counterpart, the New Jerusalem.

The New Jerusalem is the fulfillment of the high peak of the divine revelation, which is that God became man so that man may become God in life and nature but not in the Godhead.

As we spend time with the Lord in a personal, private, and affectionate way spiritually, we are being infused with His love, changed in His image, and made like Him to the extent that we love what He loves, we forgive others in the index of His eyes (2 Cor. 2:10), we walk according to the Spirit (Rom. 8:4), we set our mind on the mingled spirit, and we discern all things spiritually (1 Cor. 2:15).

Today we are in the process of becoming the corporate Shulammite, the reproduction of Christ; we are still in the process of becoming the same as God and Christ in life, nature, expression, and function to match Him for our wedding feast and marriage life for eternity. What a glorious destiny! Don’t you just love the Lord even more?

Lord Jesus, thank You for wooing us and captivating us with Your love and tender care to make us Your loving seekers. Thank You for Your desire to work Yourself into us, transform us, and conform us to Your image until we become the corporate Shulammite, the New Jerusalem. We love You, Lord! We are here as Your loving seekers, loving to spend personal, affectionate, and private time with You in our spiritual relationship with You! Amen, Lord, make us the same as Your are for the gaining of the real and consummate Shulammite, the New Jerusalem!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by brother Ron K. for this week, and portions from, The Conclusion of the New Testament, msg. 428 (by W. Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Returning to the Orthodoxy of the Church (2016 fall ITERO), msg. 9 (week 9), The New Jerusalem — the Consummation of the Central Vision of God’s Economy and of the High Peak of the Divine Revelation through the Overcomers, Who Return to the Orthodoxy of the Church.
• Hymns on this topic:
  # Burn, burn, O love, within my heart, / Burn fiercely night and day, / Till all the dross of earthly loves / Is burned, and burned away. (Hymns #208)
  # Lord, Thou wilt soon appear, / Thy day is almost here. / Oh, how we love Thy coming soon! / We have no other / Lord, life, or lover / Than Thou, Lord Jesus, our Bridegroom! / The hour is drawing nigh, / Soon we shall hear Thy cry / And with Thee on the clouds descend. / Oh what an hour sweet / When Bride and Bridegroom meet / And love surpassing comprehend. (Hymns #1314)
  # The Song of Songs depicts our story with God / Of fallen man with the King of kings. / Because of His love for us, / He became a lowly man / To reach us and to die for our sins. / Then in resurrection He / Regenerated me / And now we’re daily being transformed. / To become the same as He with His life and nature / To become His counterpart, His match and bride. (Song on the divine romance)