Seeing a Vision of the New Jerusalem and Living out and Working out the New Jerusalem

We thank the Lord that the vision He gave us in His present recovery is the all-inclusive vision of God’s eternal economy with its ultimate consummation – the vision of the New Jerusalem.

In our daily living we can live out the New Jerusalem to become the New Jerusalem, and we can work out the New Jerusalem to build up the New Jerusalem by the flowing Triune God.

What a high vision, what a high peak of the divine revelation, and how wonderful it is that we can apply it to our daily experience today!

There is a governing vision throughout the Bible, which is the heavenly vision of God’s eternal economy; because of this wonderful, eternal economy all things are, were created, and exist, and it is for this economy that we are here on earth.

The eternal economy of God is God’s eternal intention to dispense Himself into us, His chosen people, to be our very life and nature, so that He may make us the same as He is as His duplication.

The result of such a dispensing of the Triune God into man is that an organism is produced, the Body of Christ as the one new man for the fullness and expression of God.

The consummation of the work of God in and with man throughout the ages, the consummation of the church as the Body of Christ, the one new man, and the bride of Christ, is the New Jerusalem, which is the totality and composition of all of God’s people throughout the centuries. Praise the Lord!

Job went through many sufferings and experienced so much loss, and all these things made no sense to him, yet he knew that there was something hidden deep in the heart of God concerning him. It is true, there is something hidden deep in the heart of God, for God has a heart’s desire, an eternal intention, and His desire is related to man.

For this purpose, He became a man, lived a perfect life on earth for thirty-three and a half years, died and resurrected, and was transfigured to become a life-giving Spirit.

Now God’s economy is no longer merely with God: it includes us, the believers in Christ, those who receive God’s mercy to open to Him and receive Him as life and everything.

There is a way now for man to receive God and enter into a life-relationship with God; there is a way for man to be regenerated, transformed, and even glorified, for God in Christ as the Spirit can now dispense Himself into man to transform man into the image of Christ.

This is God’s economy. When we see a vision of the eternal economy of God, everything will make sense to us, and we will be governed by such a vision, for everything that happens to us – whether we understand it or not – is for the economy of God.

Seeing a Vision of the New Jerusalem and Living out and Working out the New Jerusalem

The New Jerusalem is the ultimate vision in the Bible, the consummation of God’s eternal purpose; the vision that the Lord has given to us in His present recovery consummates with the vision of the New Jerusalem (Prov. 29:18a; Acts 26:18-19; 22:15; Rev. 21:2, 9-11).

The New Jerusalem is the consummation of the entire Bible with its sixty-six books; it is the totality of all the positive things recorded in the Bible.

What the Bible reveals to us is the central line of the divine revelation, which is God’s economy and God’s dispensing; the totality of what the Bible reveals to us is the New Jerusalem.

We don’t know much about what happened in eternity past but, according to the Bible, we know that God had a purpose and made a plan; according to His purpose, He created all things.

Then, He came to redeem us – He came as the Lamb of God to accomplish God’s redemption according to His plan.

In Rev. 22:1 we see the throne of God and of the Lamb in the middle of the New Jerusalem; this denotes that this throne is to carry out God’s plan through Christ’s redemption. Hallelujah!

The totality of what the Bible reveals to us is the New Jerusalem; the New Jerusalem is the total composition of the entire revelation of the Bible, from Genesis to Revelation (Gen. 28:10-22; John 1:1, 14, 29, 32, 42, 51; Rev. 21:3, 22).

In the Chinese culture, there’s something called “Riverside Scene at Qingming Festival” mural, a 25.5cm (10 inches) wide x 5.25m (5.74 yards) long mural depicting scenes of the daily life of people and the landscape of the capital, Bianjing, during the Northern Song.

It is a panoramic view of life and people during that time in a particular region of China.

Such a riverside scene can be likened to our vision, which is an all-inclusive vision consummating in the New Jerusalem.

We should live our daily life according to such a vision, especially according to the final scene, the New Jerusalem, which includes all the previous scenes.

We are not “going to the New Jerusalem”; we are becoming the New Jerusalem, and our daily life should be a life of becoming the New Jerusalem, and our service should be the work of the Lord to build up the New Jerusalem.

Our living out the New Jerusalem is for us to become the New Jerusalem, and our working out the New Jerusalem is for us to build the New Jerusalem by the flowing Triune God (Jer. 2:13; John 4:14b; 7:37-39; Rev. 22:1-2a).

The Lord Jesus said that, when we drink the water that He gives us, this water will become a fountain of water springing up into eternal life; the totality of eternal life is the New Jerusalem.

When we drink of the flowing Triune God, the Father becomes a fountain, the Son is the manifestation and emergence of this fountain, and the Spirit is the flowing out of this living water.

This is something that we enjoy today as a foretaste of the New Jerusalem; for eternity, as constituents of the bride, the wife of Christ, we will always be drinking fresh, new, living water! Amen!

Every local church should be a miniature of the New Jerusalem and every believer should be “a little New Jerusalem”, for whatever is ascribed to the New Jerusalem in Rev. 21-22 should be both our corporate and personal experience (Rev. 21:3, 22-23; 22:1-2, 14, 17; 3:12).

This means that we daily need to enthrone the Lord in our being, having the throne of God and of the Lamb set up in the centre of our being.

When we enthrone the Lord in our being, when His throne is set up in us and we submit to His headship and ruling, there will be a river of water of life flowing from the throne.

When the throne of God is the center of our Christian life, when we accept the God who purposed and the Christ who redeemed us as our Head, Lord, and authority, subjecting ourselves to Him and taking Him as our unique authority, we will enjoy the flow of living water and we will eat of the tree of life.

We are not here living dor ourselves but for the accomplishment of God’s purpose; therefore, we experience the One on the throne in His headship and lordship, and we enthrone Him in our daily life, our family life, our marriage life, our business life, and in our church life.

When Christ is on the throne in our being and in everything related to us, we will sense the flow of the river of water of life in our being.

When others contact us, they will receive of the flow of the river of life and there will be something for them to eat of the tree of life.

May we enthrone Christ in our being, drink and flow the living water, eat the tree of life and minister life to others, walk according to the divine nature (the golden street), and be an entrance for many into the New Jerusalem.

Hallelujah for the all-inclusive vision of God’s eternal economy with its ultimate consummation – the vision of the New Jerusalem! Amen, Lord, may we live our life according to and being governed by the vision of the New Jerusalem. We want to live out the New Jerusalem for us to become the New Jerusalem. We want to work out the New Jerusalem to build the New Jerusalem by the flowing Triune God. We enthrone You, Lord, in the center of our being. Set up Your throne in the center of our Christian life and church life. We open to Your flowing into us and out of us as the river of water of life; flow in us, quench our thirst, and gush up from within us as many rivers of living water to water others and into eternal life! Hallelujah, we can enthrone the Lord in our being, we can drink and flow the river of living water, we can eat the tree of life, and we can walk according to the divine nature so that we may live out and work out the New Jerusalem today! Amen, Lord, make us a little New Jerusalem, and make every local church a miniature of the New Jerusalem!

The New Jerusalem is the Embodiment of God’s Complete Salvation with its Judicial and Organic Aspects

A major part of the New Testament revelations deals with God’s complete salvation of two aspects: judicial redemption and organic salvation.

When we see a vision of the New Jerusalem, we will realize that this holy city is the embodiment of God’s complete salvation with its judicial and organic aspects (Rom. 5:10; Rev. 22:14; Isa 42:6; 49:6, 8).

In Isa. 42:6 we see that God gave Christ to be a covenant and a light to the people; as the embodiment of the riches of the Godhead, Christ has become a covenant given to us by God.

God has covenanted to us all that He is – His salvation, His righteousness, His justification, His forgiveness, His redemption, His riches, and all that God has and will do – everything is covenanted to us.

And the reality of all the bequests in the new testament is Christ, who is the all-inclusive, life-giving, indwelling, consummated Spirit in our spirit to be one spirit with us. Hallelujah!

Such a Christ is the surety of the new covenant and the Spirit is the pledge to guarantee that God embodied in Christ is the inheritance to us, His people.

Christ became our righteousness; He justifies us before God, and simply by believing into Jesus we have Christ covering us as our righteousness for our judicial redemption.

Based on this, we can enjoy the resurrected Christ as the light of life and the reality of the new covenant for our organic salvation.

When we look at the New Jerusalem, we see the foundations of many colors, each foundation being of a different precious stone; it has the appearance of a rainbow.

The rainbow in Genesis signifies God’s faithfulness in keeping His word.

Wow, we are becoming the reality of the rainbow – we are becoming the New Jerusalem, and the foundations of this city has the appearance of a rainbow!

In the New Jerusalem, we see the consummation of God’s complete salvation – His judicial redemption (implied by the Lamb of God on the throne) and His organic salvation (implied by the river of water of life, the tree of life, the pearls, and the foundations of the city with the wall).

God’s righteousness is the base of the New Jerusalem; this city has foundations – its foundations are simply the righteousness of God, and He is faithful to His word to make us righteous in Christ.

God’s full salvation is a composition of GOd’s righteousness as the base and God’s life as the consummation (see Rom. 1:16-17; 5:10, 17-18, 21; Luke 15:22-23; cf. Jer. 2:13; 13:23; 17:9; 23:5-6; 31:33).

On one hand, we need to be made righteous; on the other hand, we need to enjoy and experience God’s organic salvation to be made the same as Christ.

The entire New Jerusalem is a matter of life (see the tree of life, the water of life, and the light of life) built on the foundation of righteousness (Rev. 21:14, 19-20; 22:1; cf. Gen. 9:8-17; Psa. 89:14).

God is on the throne, justice and righteousness are the foundation of His throne, and from the throne flows a river of water of life with the tree of life growing on both sides of the river.

On the throne, God in Christ as the Lamb-lamp shines as the life of life. Hallelujah, what an amazing destiny we have – we will enjoy the Triune God for eternity based on His righteousness to express Him corporately as the New Jerusalem!

May we have such a vision of the New Jerusalem and live according to this ultimate consummation of God’s eternal economy in our daily life!

Lord, grant us to see a vision of the New Jerusalem as the embodiment and consummation of God’s complete salvation with its judicial and organic aspects. Hallelujah, for eternity we will enjoy God as the river of water of life, the tree of life, and the light of life on the base of God’s unchanging righteousness! Praise the Lord, we are becoming the reality of the rainbow, for we are becoming the New Jerusalem which has the foundations in the appearance of a rainbow! Praise You Lord for Your faithfulness in keeping Your covenant! Hallelujah, today we can enjoy Christ as the reality of all that God is, has, has done, and is doing for us. And for eternity we will drink the water of life, eat the tree of life, and be under the light of life on the foundation of God’s righteousness. Amen, Lord, may our daily life be governed by such a consummate vision of the New Jerusalem!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Sources of inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by Minoru Chen for this week, and portions from, Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1984, vol. 3, “God’s New Testament Economy,” pp. 459-460, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Vital Factors for the Lord’s Recovery of the Church Life (2021 ITERO), week 2, The Factor of Closely Following the Completed Vision of the Age through the Ministry of the Age.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – Behold the New Jerusalem descends from God. / The Triune God Himself in His intrinsic essence / Now consummately dwells in us and we in Him. / Behold the New Jerusalem descends from God. / Illumined by the light of life we walk the way— / Of life, and eat the tree of life and drink the river. / And thus enjoying God fore’er, we’re one with Him, / As the very processed Triune God dispenses Himself to us. (Hymns #1348)
  – By the flow of life divine, / Man becomes a precious stone / Fit for building God’s abode, / That His glory might be known. (Hymns #972)
  – ’Tis the holy city, / New Jerusalem; / With His saints God mingles, / Makes His home with them. / He becomes their content, / His expression they; / They shall share His glory, / One with Him for aye. (Hymns #971)