In reference to that wonderful verse, Revelation 21:3,3And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. (Revelation 21:3) could you tell us in what sense God will dwell with men? Is it in or by Christ and the church? Or is it God in His Deity, or the Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit? I quite understand the kingdom is delivered up to God, after the reign of a thousand years... Some say we shall see God. —Gateshead.
It is quite clear from the verse to which you refer, that when God dwells with men in the eternal state it will be in His tabernacle that He does so. “The tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them.” But what is His tabernacle? The previous verse shows us that it is, “The holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.”
The question now arises in our minds, What then is this holy city, which yet is as a bride, and also furnishes God with the tabernacle in which He will dwell with men in the eternal state? We have no hesitation in saying that we have the church of God presented to us under this three-fold figure. Amongst men a city is a center of influence and administration. In the eternal state the church will be the center whence heavenly administration will extend, without any rival or challenge, over the earth. It will be this because it is the dwelling-place of God. Then further it will be the object of Christ’s affections, and thus as a bride towards Him.
This we think furnishes in part an answer to your question. But further we note that in these verses (2-4) it is uniformly “God.” The Persons of the Godhead are hot distinguished. This is quite in keeping with what we read in 1 Corinthians 15:2828And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all. (1 Corinthians 15:28). In that day God will be everything, and He will be “in all.” Of old, when He dwelt amongst His people brought out of Egypt, though amongst them all, yet more specially and immediately He dwelt in His tabernacle of curtains and skins. In the eternal state He will be in all, and yet more intimately and immediately in His tabernacle the church. Nevertheless we are assured by the fact that the tabernacle is still the bride, that the Lord Jesus still has His distinctive place.
We shall certainly see God. Job’s confident expectation will not be disappointed (See, 19:26). Yet two Scriptures in 1 Timothy (1:17; 6:16) indicate that in His essential Being — in His Essence, as we speak — He is above all human sight. Though in that day we shall be wholly men of a new order, men in Christ, in bodies of glory like unto Christ’s, we shall still be men. It is possible of course that in both these verses the Apostle has in his thought man in this world, just as we know him to be, and that therefore when he said, “no man... can see,” he did not mean us to understand from it that no man ever would be able to see, not even man in Christ, clothed with a body of glory. Therefore we would not dogmatize on the point. We are very satisfied however with the assurance that we shall see the great “I AM” in Jesus.
“Thou hast made known the Father, whom we’ve seen, In Thy blest Person, infinite delight!”