[THIRD. A RELATION OF THE GLORY OF THE CITY, ITS WALLS, GATES, AND FOUNDATIONS.]
Now that the temple in this place excluded, can signify nothing else but the outward orderly way of God's worship, which the saints ought with conscience, in faith, to be found in till their Lord comes, consider that our New Testament doth use the word 'temple' three several ways: 1. For the outward order and worship or discipline of the Gospel (Rev 11:1-3). 2. For the body of Christ, which is his church, &c. 3. And lastly, for the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb, which here are said to be the temple of this city.
Now then, when he saith he saw 'No temple therein,' he cannot exclude the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb, for they are here said to be 'the temple of it.' Neither can he shut out the church, which is the body of Christ, for that is the city itself; yea, and the church shall be God's temple, and God and Christ the temple of the church for ever and ever He must therefore by this word 'no temple,' exclude only the outward way of gospel-worship, in which the saints in the times of the New Testament both meet and edify each other, and also meet their God, and are blessed and refreshed by him. Again, that this outward gospel-worship should be laid aside while the church is in this world, before her Lord doth come to be enjoyed by her, as touching his personal presence; it looks too like ranting opinions, and contradiction to Scripture, for me to believe (1 Cor 11:26). For when he comes, but not till then, shall these things be laid aside.
Besides, that which yet confirms me more fully in this opinion, is because herein this New Jerusalem doth most exactly answer the city and temple, which was built after the captivity; which city and temple being once built, it stood till Christ our Lord did visit them in his own personal coming the first time; as the prophets also said it should. 'The Lord, whom ye seek,' saith one, 'shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in; behold, he shall come, saith the Lord of Hosts' (Mal 3:1). And again, 'I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come; and I will fill this house with glory, saith the Lord of Hosts.' Wherefore 'the glory of this latter house shall be greater than [that] of the former, saith the Lord of Hosts: and in this place will I give peace, saith the Lord of Hosts' (Hagg 2:7,9).
Now observe, that from the time of the building of the second temple to the coming of Christ, the worship of the temple order was to be by all most devoutly and continually observed. But when the Lord Jesus was come, and had established his own more honorable and New Testament dispensation, then all the former temple-worship fell to the ground, and became, with all the instruments of worship that thereunto belonged, null and void. Yea, and it was a derogation to his gospel to offer to uphold that former way of worship, after he had by his own personal presence and Spirit brought in that other dispensation. All which, I say, will be answered by our second and New Testament New Jerusalem.
For as the Old Jerusalem was built after the Jews were come out of literal Babylon, so is our New Jerusalem built after our coming out of the antichristian oppression of spiritual Babylon. Again, as that city did after she was built continue and retain her temple-worship, until the personal appearing of Christ the first time, so New Jerusalem shall retain and hold her outward New Testament worship till HE comes in person the second time. After all which, as the second temple was swallowed up of a more heavenly and spiritual dispensation by the personal presence of Christ, so shall also the New Jerusalem temple-worship be swallowed up by the glory of the appearing of the person of Christ the second time; as Paul saith, for he speaks in the person of Christ, 'Till I come, give attendance to reading, to exhortation, to doctrine,' &c. (1 Tim 4:13).
Thus then, when this holy city doth once again appear upon the stage, and in her own situation, and when she hath been showed in the attire of a queen before the face of all nations, and their kings; and when she hath by the glory of the light of her New Testament temple, gathered, as with a net, the number of God's elect; then she is taken into her husband's privy chamber, where she and he alone shall be in that blessed fellowship and communion that shall not again be once eclipsed, or in the least interrupted to eternity.
Thus have I showed you my present light into this portion of the Holy Scripture. If any can give me further, I hope I shall not refuse it. But as yet, methinks this should be the genuine sense of this place, and is the very track of John himself. For after he had seen the wall for present safety, the foundations for continuation, the gates for entrance, and the like, then he comes to tell us of the glory of all, and of the street itself at last; which indeed is the last and end of all the order of God, and to continue till an end be put to it by mortality's being swallowed up of life. As is yet more fully showed you in the next verse of this description.
[The city needs not the light of sun or moon.]
Ver. 23. 'And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it: for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof.'
'And the city had no need of the sun.' That is, after temple-worship is over: this verse is added therefore for further clearing up and illustrating of that which he said before. There he tells us this city had 'no temple,' and here he tells us she needed neither the light of the sun nor moon. There he said, 'The Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it'; and here he saith, they are the light thereof.
The substance of which, in the language of the Holy Ghost, is this: the reason why temple-worship is now gone and over, it is because there is now no need in this city of the light of the sun and the moon; and the reason why she hath now no need of them, is because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are to it instead of both temple and light. 'For the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the temple of it.' 'For the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof.' Whereby we may note, that though the light in which she descended, being the purity of temple-worship, was glorious, yet this city shall, when she is once built, so advance from glory to glory, that at the last she shall be more happy without the help of that light, without which she had been for ever unbuilt, than she was by it in the midst of the fulness of it.
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