Part of the consecration of the priests in Lev. 8 was their being clothed with priestly garments, which show that our outward expression should be Christ’s divine attributes expressed in human virtues.
As believers in Christ, we are priests to God, and this is a high honor and calling. It is something solemn and serious, and there is a certain consecration that is ongoing which has to be present.
Leviticus chapter 8 shows us the process of the consecration for the priesthood, and so far we have seen the priests enjoying the offerings, being consecrated at the entrance of the Tent of meeting, being washed with water, and being anointed with the holy anointing oil.
As believers in Christ we are not only chosen and appointed to be priests to God, but we also need to be consecrated, even have a daily and moment by moment consecration, to be priests to God.
We need to be consecrated to Christ and the church, having our living and service not only before God but also before and in the church life, the place where the saints meet to contact God and enjoy God.
We need to be washed by the blood of Christ and also by the Word, so that we may be clean and sanctified as priests to God. As we pray over God’s word, the Spirit washes us and cleanses us, removing any negative and old element and adding God’s elements to our being.
Furthermore, we need to be anointed by the Spirit, that is, we need to enjoy the fresh and continual application of the compound life-giving Spirit to our being so that we may enjoy and experience all that Christ is, has, has gone through, and has attained.
As we are anointed by the Spirit and follow the teaching of the anointing within, we are not only taught and led in all things, but we are also painted with the Triune God and all that the Spirit is.
All of Christ’s incarnation, human living, crucifixion, resurrection, ascension, and their effectiveness are included in the Spirit, and they have to be applied to our being to be enjoyed and experienced by us.
Amen, Lord, may this be our experience!
Today we want to see how the priestly garments with their significance are a part of the consecration for the priesthood, and how we as believers in Christ need to have Christ’s divine attributes expressed in our human virtues in our daily living, so that we may have the proper expression of Christ as priests.
Being Adorned with the Expression of Christ as our Priestly Garments in our Consecration for the Priesthood
In Lev. 8:13 Moses clothed the sons of Aaron with priestly garments, as Jehovah commanded him, for their priestly service in their consecration for the priesthood. Garments in typology signify expression, for what we wear expresses us (see Isa. 64:6; Rev. 19:8).
The priestly garments signify that we as serving priests should express Christ, who is the real expression of God. These priestly garments, which is our expression of Christ, separate us and sanctified us to God (Exo. 28:3).
The priestly garments were beautiful, and they were mainly for glory and for beauty; this signifies the expression of Christ’s divine glory and human beauty. Glory is related to Christ’s divinity, His divine attributes, and beauty refers to Christ’s humanity, His human virtues.
What qualifies us to be priests, part of the holy priesthood serving God, is a life that expressed Christ with the divine glory and the human beauty; such a living sanctifies us and qualifies us to be the priests.
The priestly garments included the tunic, the girding sash, the robe, the ephod, the breastplate with the Urim and the Thummim, and the turban on the head with the golden plate – the holy crown (see Lev. 8:7-9).
Christ is our High Priest; He is adorned with all the excellencies of His divine attributes and human virtues, which are His beautiful and glorious garment.
The priestly garments, being mainly for glory and for beauty, signify the expression of Christ’s divine glory and human beauty. Glory is related to Christ’s divinity, His divine attributes (John 1:14; Heb. 1:3), and beauty, to Christ’s humanity, His human virtues. Christ’s divinity, typified by the gold of the priestly garments, is for glory, and His humanity, typified by the blue, purple, and scarlet strands and the fine linen, is for beauty. A life that expresses Christ with the divine glory and the human beauty sanctifies us and qualifies us to be the priesthood. Exo. 28:2, footnote 2, Recovery Version Bible
The fact that Moses clothed the sons of Aaron with the priestly garments signifies that we, as New Testament priests, also need to be adorned with all the attributes and virtues of Christ.
As part of our consecration for the priesthood, we need to wear the priestly garments, the expression of Christ in His divine attributes and human virtues. We cannot serve God in a natural way, in a way that is not proper or ordained by Him.
Christ’s divine attributes mingled with his human virtues need to be our outward expression. It is not so easy to serve God, for to serve Him requires that we have a certain kind of expression, a particular living a beautiful adorning that we are covered with, and a clothing in our living and walk.
God has a high standard for His serving ones, as indicated by the priestly garments.
Our garments separate us and set us aside from anything common unto God. This doesn’t mean that we should put on some religious garments and walk in a particular way, but that we should have the expression of Christ for our consecration for the priesthood.
Our expression of Christ – the result of our being constituted with Christ as the reality of all the offerings – is what separates us from others, setting us aside to God, and this expression of Christ in our living qualifies us to be the priests to God.
Lord Jesus, we consecrate ourselves to You to be priests to God, those who wear the priestly garments by having the beautiful and glorious expression of Christ. We want to be adorned with Christ’s divine attributes mingled with His human virtues. May our outward expression be Christ’s divine attributes expressed through our human virtues so that we may have the priestly garments for our service to God. Oh Lord, what about our living, our expression, and our adorning! May we have the expression of Christ in our daily living as priests to God!
The Mingling of the Divine Attributes and the Human Virtues is our Priestly Garment
As New Testament priests, we need to be adorned with all the divine attributes and human virtues of Christ. Our outward expression needs to be the expression of Christ’s divine attributes being expressed through our human virtues.
A life that expresses Christ in the divine glory and human beauty sanctifies us and qualifies us to be part of the priesthood.
Christ’s attributes include the divine love, light, holiness, righteousness, kindness, and compassion. These attributes are expressed in human life as virtues; the divine attributes become human virtues, and the human virtues are the expression of the divine attributes.
In Christ the divine attributes are not merely combined or united but mingled – they were mingled together to the extent that what men saw was a proper human being that expressed God in everything.
This is what we should be today; we should be proper human beings who have the divine attributes of Christ mingled with our uplifted human virtues so that our love expresses His love, our patience is an expression of His patience, and our joy is His joy being expressed in us.
When we have the divine attributes being mingled with our human virtues, our human virtues become extraordinary; they are no longer ordinary, common, and lacking, but they are extraordinary, for they have the divine attributes as their strength and empowering element.
The mingling of the divine attributes and the human virtues has become our clothing as priests to God, for we who have been baptized into Christ have also put on Christ (Gal. 3:27).
We have been put into Christ through baptism, and we have also put on Christ as our priestly garments; our priestly garments for our consecration for the priesthood is nothing that we can do or should do – these are just Christ Himself.
We need to put on Christ, the One who is the mingling of God and man, the One whose living is the mingling of the divine attributes and the human virtues; when we put on Christ, we put on the mingling of the divine attributes and the human virtues, and we have the expression of Christ.
The expression of Christ should be our uniform, our priestly garment.
As we contact others, as we live our daily life as parents, children, teachers, students, husbands, wives, employees, etc, we need to wear the garment that is the expression of Christ. He ordained us as priests, He clothes us with Christ, and we simply need to express Christ.
We need to eat Christ, be filled with Christ, be in Christ, and put on Christ as our priestly garments so that our living and service would be just the expression of Christ.
When we consecrate ourselves to the Lord to be a priest, He comes in and God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit adorn us with the priestly garments for our service as priest to God.
Lord Jesus, we want to put on Christ as our priestly garments, being clothed with the mingling of the divine attributes with the human virtues. Amen, Lord, may the expression of Christ be our uniform, our priestly garment. Mingle Yourself with us more and more each day, Lord, until Your divine attributes are mingled with our resurrected and uplifted human virtues, and what we express is Christ Himself. We give ourselves to You, Lord, to be clothed and adorned by You with the expression of Christ for our priestly service to God.
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by Minoru Chen for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Leviticus, msg. 28 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallization-Study of Leviticus (2), week 1, The Consecration of the Priests.
- Hymns on this topic:
# As Spirit of the life divine, / Thru us abundant fruit He bears; / Expressing God-like attributes, / To others Christ in life He shares. (Hymns #244)
# Flesh He became, the first God-man, / His pleasure that I God may be: / In life and nature I’m God’s kind, / Though Godhead’s His exclusively. / His attributes my virtues are; / His glorious image shines through me. (Song on, What Miracle! What Mystery!)
# Putting on the Lord as clothing, / Christ without he doth express; / Eating, drinking, with Him mingled, / Christ within doth him possess. / O how blessed is the priest’s life, / Christ to him is all in all: / All his clothing, food, and dwelling, / And his portion therewithal. (Hymns #911)
