We need to see a revelation of God’s people being built up with the Triune God to be His dwelling place on earth, as revealed in the pictures and types in the tabernacle.
First, as God’s people we need to see a revelation of God Himself so that we may see who He is, what He is like, what He likes and dislikes, and what He intends to do.
In the Old Testament this revelation of God and who He is can be seen not in the book of Genesis with the creation or calling of man, but in the book of Exodus, when God brought His people to His mountain and gave them the law.
The Law given by God to His people was not for them to outwardly keep and make sure they fulfill; rather, the law was given to show them who God is. By means of the law, God’s people saw and realised that their God was full of love, light, holiness, and righteousness, and they loved their God.
Many, however, took the law in an outward way and kept it, and they were killed by the letter of the law.
The Lord’s loving seekers from among His people – such as the psalmists and the prophets – sought after God, loved God, enjoyed God, and knew God by means of the law, which was to them the testimony of God.
Hallelujah, the law is the testimony of God, the portrait of God, and by means of the law we can see who God is, what is He like, and what He wants or does not want in us and with us.
May we be those who love God and seek Him in love, those who stay away from merely keeping the letter of the law but rather, exercise their spirit and their turned heart to know God and love Him in His word!
In the New Testament we see the definitions and the reality of the law, which is Christ Himself as the testimony of God, and we as believers in Christ receive this One, enjoy this One, are filled with this One, and we let this One live in us a life that is the testimony of Jesus for God’s corporate expression.
The result of our enjoyment and experience of Christ as the testimony of God is that we ourselves become His duplication – we become the enlarged and expanded expression of God as we live a God-man life corporately.
As we cooperate with the Lord to live a crucified life by continually denying the self so that we may live Christ, we have the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ to be the enlarged and expanded testimony of God.
Receiving the Divine Revelation concerning God’s Economy to be Built up with the Triune God as His Dwelling Place
On one hand we need to receive the divine revelation concerning God Himself, and on the other, we need to receive the divine revelation concerning God’s economy.
In His economy God desires to build Himself into us and build us together with God in His Divine Trinity so that He and we, we and He, would be a mutual dwelling place for God and man on earth, His testimony.
We need to receive the divine revelation concerning God’s economy so that we may be built up with the Triune God in His Divine Trinity as His dwelling place on earth for His testimony.
The children of Israel – whose history is a type of our Christian experience – first received the divine revelation concerning God Himself, and then they received the divine revelation concerning God’s economy, as indicated mainly by the tabernacle with all its components and furniture.
The fact that God’s people were to be built up together with Him is indicated by the materials that were to be used for the building of the tabernacle.
Looking at the boards of the tabernacle, these were made of acacia wood overlaid with gold; the boards of acacia wood were a type of God’s people, while the gold overlaying the boards is a type of the divine person (Exo. 26:15-30).
So in the boards of the tabernacle made of acacia wood overlaid with gold we see a type of God’s people being built together with God to be His dwelling place. The materials for the building of God are both God’s people – as signified by the acacia wood – and God Himself – as signified by gold.
We need to receive the divine revelation concerning God’s economy so that we may be built up with God to be His dwelling place.
In the tabernacle we can see a picture of the entire Divine Trinity; first, the Son can be seen in the Ark, the table of the bread of the Presence, and the incense altar. Christ the Son is the reality of the Ark, the embodiment of God to be the presence and speaking of God on earth.
Christ is the real bread of God, bringing God’s presence to us and giving us the daily supply we need for our Christian life and our serving life.
Christ is the praying One, the prayer itself, the One who pleases God and satisfies God, ascending to God with a sweet fragrance with prayer and in prayer for God to carry out what He desires.
But where do we see the Father and the Spirit in the type of the tabernacle? The Father is signified by the gold; in typology, gold signifies the divine nature of God, so the Father with His divine nature is mingled with man again and again for the building up of God’s dwelling place.
The Spirit is signified by the oil in the seven lamps in the lampstand; the oil is a type of the Spirit, and if there’s no oil in the lamps, they would be useless, and there would be no light in the tabernacle.
Also, if we look at the lampstand, which was a single entity, we can see that it signifies the entire Triune God – the gold signifies the Father, the form signifies the Son, and both the lamps and the oil signify the Spirit.
The golden lampstand and the entire tabernacle are the revelation of how God’s people are being built up with the Triune God to be His dwelling place on earth.
May we see this revelation, and may we be the people who are mingled with God and built up with the Triune God for His dwelling place on the earth.
The result of our seeing the revelation of God’s economy is that we will allow God to mingle Himself with us and to build Himself into us and us into Him, so that we and Him, Him and us, would become a corporate building, a corporate and mutual dwelling place, for the expression and testimony of God on the earth.
Lord Jesus, grant us the revelation of God’s economy so that we may be built up together with God in His Divine Trinity as His dwelling place on earth for His testimony. Amen, Lord, may we see how God mingles Himself with man and how He builds Himself into man and man into God for the dwelling place of God. Mingle Yourself more with us, today, and build Yourself into our being and us into You so that You may obtain a dwelling place on earth, the church as the corporate testimony of Jesus, the expression of God.
Our God is Enterable – God and man are built to become the Tabernacle of God with man
It is very interesting to see that the forty-eight boards in the tabernacle correspond to the forty-eight cities given to the Levites; this shows that God’s people who serve Him are being built up together and mingled with God for His building.
Six of the cities of the Levites were to be cities of refuge, and the most striking point regarding the cities of refuge is that they were enterable (Num. 35:6-7, 9-34).
The cities of refuge signify the Triune God, and the Triune God is enterable. The cities of refuge were for the manslayer, one who killed a person unintentionally, to run into so that they would be saved from God’s judgement.
These cities of refuge which typify the Triune God are for us, the mistake-making men, to run to and abide into so that we may be saved from God’s judgement.
Amen, we need the Triune God as our cities of refuge into whom we can flee.
Eventually, these forty-eight cities of the Levites will consummate in a unique city – the New Jerusalem; the tabernacle revealed in the book of Exodus is a miniature of this unique city.
So the forty-eight boards in the tabernacle correspond to the forty-eight cities of the Levites, which were enterable, and these cities consummate in the New Jerusalem, the enlargement of God’s testimony in the universe.
In the New Testament, God’s testimony is the church, the Body of Christ, and in eternity this testimony will consummate in the New Jerusalem, which is also called a tabernacle – even the tabernacle of God with man (Rev. 1:2, 9; 19:10; 21:3).
In Rev. 19:10 we see that the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of the prophecy; the testimony of Jesus is the church. The testimony of Jesus is the reality of the prophecy, the substance, the disposition, and the characteristic of the prophecy.
In the Old testament, the tabernacle was with the children of Israel, and in the New Testament the tabernacle is first Christ (John 1:14) and then the church as the enlargement of Christ.
In eternity, however, there will be the ultimate and consummate tabernacle – the New Jerusalem! In each case, both in the Old and the New Testament revelation of the tabernacle, the striking point is that the tabernacle is enterable.
Hallelujah, the Triune God is enterable! We can enter into Him, we can abide in Him, and we can be built up with the Triune God God to become the tabernacle of God with man!
Hallelujah, the Triune God is enterable! Our Triune God is open and enterable for all the mistake-making men to flee into Him and be saved from God’s judgement! Amen, Lord, we come to You, we come into You, and we want to abide in You so that we may be both saved from judgement and be built up together as Your dwelling place for Your testimony! Hallelujah, we can come to God, we can enter into God, and we can be built up together in God and with God to be the testimony of Jesus, the church, the corporate expression of God on earth!
This article can also be read in the Romanian language / Citiți acest articol în limba română vizitând următorul link, O revelație a poporului lui Dumnezeu care este zidit cu Dumnezeul Triunic pentru a fi locuința Sa.
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by bro. Ed Marks for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Numbers, msg. 49 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallization-Study of Numbers (2), week 1, A Vital Sketch of the Divine Revelation in the Books of Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers concerning God’s Economy with His Chosen and Redeemed People.
- Hymns on this topic:
# The ark the God-man, Christ, displays- / God mixed with man, as gold, wood meet; / The law is God’s expression full, / Which dwells in Christ the Son complete. / Thus Christ’s the center of the Church, / Which is to Him a resting-place; / In Christ the Father ever dwells, / And in the Church, Christ’s dwelling-place. (Hymns #838)
# How lovely is Thy dwelling-place! / Within Thy courts I long to be; / Thy presence, Lord, my spirit craves, / For this my heart cries out to Thee. (Hymns #851)
# At Thy two altars, e’en the / Weakest sparrow may draw near. / The swallow come for refuge and / A nest for tender care. / Redeemed may entrance find, / And offer thus in prayer / The resurrected Christ in His / Ascension, fragrance rare. (Song on, How Lovely Are Your Tabernacles)
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