These past six weeks we have been enjoying visions after visions and revelations after revelations in the book of Daniel, and it is very encouraging and inspiring to see how Daniel and his companions overcame in that dark situation and even prayed to release God’s will on the earth.
In the following six weeks we will get into the book of Zechariah, who was a prophet at the same time as Haggai, at the return of the people of Israel to rebuild the temple and the city of Jerusalem.
Haggai encouraged the disheartened people of Israel to be strong and build God’s house, and his word was straightforward: come and rebuild the temple, and the Desire of the Nations will come!
Following Haggai, Zechariah spoke in a very mysterious way: he presented Christ in many visions, very mysterious. In Zechariah we see how all-inclusive and all-extensive Christ is, how excellent He is, and how God wants His Christ to be everything to us.
We need to be strengthened into our inner man that we may see the all-inclusive Christ and have Christ recovered as everything to us. Christ is all-inclusive, all-extensive, and He desires to fill the whole universe with Himself – starting from our personal universe!
In our personal universe Christ must be the center and the circumference, the only One appreciated and lifted up, the exulted One and the One who is our everything!
God Desires that Christ would be Preeminent
God’s will and His desire is that His Christ would be preeminent in us, and that He would be our all in all. Unfortunately in Christianity as a whole today this kind of exultation of Christ is diminishing, waning, and less and less.
A.W. Tozer wrote an article entitled, The Waning Authority of Christ in the Church (read it online here), sometimes in the beginning of the 20th century, in which he really exposed what Christ’s position in many evangelical churches is.
He is like a King who looks nice but is never consulted on any matter or decision. The Lord may not control the schedule of the meetings, the meetings themselves, the decisions and services in the church, etc.
Do we consult the Lord before we do anything, waiting on His answer concerning things and situations? Do we practically give Christ the first place in our personal universe?
While we in the Lord’s recovery are so burdened to speak of and be recovered to the preeminence of Christ, there is a decline of the position of Christ in the personal life of many believers.
The Lord needs to recover us to the centrality and universality of Christ – Christ must be everything to us in all things in all our personal life, family life, church life, work life, etc.
We need to drop anything that replaces Christ as our everything: drop the concepts, doctrines, and teachings that try to replace Christ; drop any different ways of practice that replace Christ; drop any activities or movements that replace Christ, and drop any organization that replaces Christ’s authority. Christ must be our all – Christ must be preeminent!
The Tabernacle and the Temple in the Old Testament
The goal of God’s economy is NOT many “spiritual giants”, some who are extremely shining and very victorious, while others “are on the way”… God’s economy has a goal, and this goal is the building of God. God desires the Body of Christ, the church. He needs a building as the completion and goal of His New Testament economy.
We can see this clearly from the Old Testament, where God gained a people – Israel – and took them out of Egypt to bring them into the good land. In the wilderness, God wanted them to build a tabernacle, which later was enlarged and expanded to be the temple built by Solomon.
All of God’s relationship and dealings with His people has always been related to either the tabernacle and the temple. The tabernacle was the place where God dwelt and met with His people, it was the house of God.
God was brought to the earth to meet with His people, He would appear to them, and He would commune with them.
The Temple of God: the Goal of God’s Eternal Economy!
In the New Testament we see that 2000 years ago the Lord Jesus came as God incarnated, and He tabernacled among us – He came to be the reality of the personal tabernacle of God (John 1:14).
The type of the tabernacle in the Old Testament was fulfilled and personalized in the Lord Jesus. He lived a perfect human life on earth for 33.5 years, died an all-inclusive death on the cross, and resurrected to become the life-giving Spirit and enter into His believers to be enlarged as the temple of God!
Now we are Christ’s enlargement, expansion, and multiplication to be the temple of God (1 Cor. 3:16), having the Spirit of God dwelling in us! The temple first signified the incarnated Christ, the embodiment of God (Col. 2:9) as God’s dwelling on the earth (John 2:19-21).
The temple as the goal of God’s economy also signifies the church, the members of Christ, the enlargement of Christ as God’s dwelling on the earth (see 1 Cor. 3:16-17; 6:19; Eph. 2:21-22).
Now God has a dwelling place, a house, a home, in the church! Christ today has been enlarged, expanded, from an individual Christ to many millions of “little Christs” who express Him and live out Christ.
The New Jerusalem: the Consummation of God’s Goal
At the end of the Bible we see the New Jerusalem, which is called the tabernacle of God with man (Rev. 21:3). The New Jerusalem is the consummation of the tabernacle of God and the temple of God, and in this city there’s no temple, because the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb are its temple (Rev. 21:22).
The temple of God – which we are now as the church, the Body of Christ – will be enlarged to become a city, the New Jerusalem, in the new heaven and the new earth! The city as a whole will be the Holy of Holies – a cube, the enlargement of the Holiest of all – and the whole city is the temple of God!
The goal of God’s economy is to obtain the temple of God – starting from the Old Testament with the tabernacle and the temple and being enlarged in the New Testament in the church, this temple is consummated as the Triune God and the church in the New Jerusalem, a mutual dwelling place of God in man and man in God!
This is God’s goal, to gain a corporate building, a built-up temple, which is God in us and us in God. We are God’s temple, and the temple is the Triune God – we are becoming God in life, nature, and expression, but not in the Godhead! Hallelujah!
Lord Jesus, recover Christ to be everything to us in our daily life. We want to give Christ the first place in all things in our personal universe and in all our living. Lord, increase in us and be enlarged in the Body of Christ. Thank You for making us the temple of God. Increase this temple, enlarge it, until it is being consummated to become the New Jerusalem with the Triune God as the temple! Lord, grow in us and make us the same as You are in every possible way that we may match You and dwell in You as You dwell in us!
References and Further Reading
- Sharing inspired from brother James Lee’s speaking in this message and portions in, God’s New Testament Economy (ch. 37), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on Crystallization-Study of Daniel and Zechariah, week 7 (entitled, Christ as Everything for the Building of the Temple of God).
- Further reading: Three Aspects of the Church, Book 1: The Meaning of the Church, ch. 17.
- On the same topic:
# New Jerusalem is the eternal development of the Triune God’s relationship with man (via, newjerusalem blog).
# The New Jerusalem in Eternity (via, allinclusivechrist website).
# The Economy of God – a must read book for every Christian (via, holdingtotruth.com). - Hymns on this topic:
# God intends in everything / Christ should have preeminence, / And that such a Christ of all / We should now experience.
# This is the time for building the temple of the Lord / That all the local churches may fully be restored.
# He’s their living water, / And their food supply; / All their thirst and hunger / He doth satisfy. / He’s for them the temple, / In Himself they live, / In His constant presence / Worship ever give. - Pictures credit: 1 Cor. 3:16 and Col. 2:9-10 (from online).
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The temple replaced the tabernacle as God’s dwelling on earth. The temple first signifies the incarnated Christ, the embodiment of God (Col. 2:9), as God’s dwelling on the earth (John 2:19-21; 1:14). It also signifies the church, including all the believers, the members of Christ, as the enlargement of Christ to be God’s dwelling on the earth (1 Cor. 3:16-17; 6:19; Eph. 2:21-22). Christ and the church are one, Christ being the Head and the church being the Body (Eph. 1:22-23; Col. 1:18a). The Body is the enlargement of the Head for God’s dwelling. Hence, God’s dwelling in Christ is God’s dwelling in the church. (1 Kings 6:1, footnote 2)
Hallelujah! amen and amen….
The temple which was God’s dwelling place, firstly typifies the individual, incarnated Christ (John 1:14). He said “Destroy this temple, and in 3 days I will raise it up.” (John 2:19-22). Secondly, every believer is a temple of God (2 Cor 3:16). Thirdly, the believers are being built together into a dwelling place of God (2:21-22). And the church is Christ’s Body, and Christ is the Head of the church (Eph 1:22-23)..
Christ is the real Solomon speaking God’s word and building the church. Christ and His Body, the church are the center, the reality and the goal of God’s eternal economy. There is only ONE church in the universe but its expression is in many localities on earth. Each expression is the temple of God in that locality. God’s building is not an ordinary building; it is the sanctuary of the holy God in which the Spirit of God dwells (1 Cor 3:16). We should be careful that we only build with precious materials of gold, silver, and precious stones which correspond with God’s nature and economy (1 Cor 3:12). In the new heavens and new earth, the temple will be enlarged into a city, New Jerusalem, a mutual dwelling place for God and man for eternity.