Now, Jesus came in flesh, but the aim has always been that initial vision, for God to dwell with man, only now on the basis of our betrayal, the means by which this brought about was through Jesus—the fulness of the deity dwelling in a body—coming in flesh.
The Jewish leaders had failed to see that if the tabernacle/temple was a dwelling place for the Lord, then Jesus body—being the Lord himself—was even more a dwelling place for the Lord, in fact he is the Lord. Now, the body of Jesus wasn’t just a shell or host in which the Spirit of God possessed, no, the very body of Jesus is rightly referred to as the Lord God.
But this tabernacle/temple language is what John uses in verse 14 of chapter 1, where he says that God ‘became flesh and dwelt among us’ and the word John actually uses is the word for tabernacle or temple—so Jesus is a walking, talking temple!
But remember, we can’t dwell with the Lord without being burnt up by God’s wrath—that is, unless the Lord is burnt up by God’s wrath instead of us—which is exactly what Jesus did when he died on the cross.
And once Jesus dies and rises again, he begins the process of taking us to be with himself, and with his Father, in the new creation, which is gets us back to what the Lord originally intended for this universe…
A place where the Father dwells with his people. Which is what we see in the final chapter of the Bible—Revelation 21—
“Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.”
