The Lord within us is yearning that He would obtain a solid testimony of the Body of Christ, and for this we need to cooperate with Him to have an enlarged experience of Christ in all His riches so that He may be testified and exhibited through us.
The Lord really wants to gain not only the “tabernacle church life” but the “temple church life” where we have not only experiences of Christ but also a proportion and balance between our experience of Christ and our function in the Body, so that the church may be built up.
Because the needs of the church are multifaceted, we as the members of the Body need to function in our measure, realizing that we all have an indispensable function in the Body, and we need to coordinate with others to function in our measure.
On the one hand we all need to function in the Body, and on the other, we need to be careful what we build the church with – we should not build with the wood, grass, and stubble of our natural life or ability, but we should experience the Triune God and build with the Father’s divine nature (gold), the Son’s redemption (silver), and the Spirit’s transformation (precious stones).
For this, we need to be not only “gilded with God” on the surface but we need to overlaid with God, that is, we need to be mingled with God more! We need to give ourselves to the Lord to be mingled with Him; we need to sink deeply into the Triune God by enjoying Him, pursuing Him, gaining Him, and experiencing Him so that we may build up the church with the experienced God and keep the oneness.
Also, we need to be under the washing of the water in the Word so that the Spirit would renew us by convicting us, judging us, and adding the element of God to us for us to participate in the dwelling of God on earth.
On the negative side, we need to realize that we are under God’s judgment, and in our flesh nothing good dwells; we need to daily follow the Lord as the “man of bronze” by taking up the cross, denying the self, and losing our soul-life so that we may become God’s testimony, pillars in God’s house.
Our daily living needs to be “no longer I but Christ”, that is, we are under God’s judgment and the self should be on the cross, while the Person living in us should be Christ, and the life we now live should be by faith in God, as a lily trusting in the Lord. Hallelujah!
The Stones in the Temple Signify Christ’s Humanity in Transformation, the Transformed Christ
The tabernacle was made mainly of wood overlaid with gold, but the temple was made of wood and stone; the stones in the temple signify Christ’s humanity in transformation, the transformed Christ (see 1 Kings 5:15-18; 6:7, 36; 1 Chron. 29:2; 2 Chron. 3:6).
Christ came out of the seed of David according to the flesh: He was begotten of Mary to be the seed of David, and through incarnation, He put on man’s flesh. As a man in the flesh, a man in the old creation, He needed to be transformed in His human part; therefore, in His resurrection, He was designated Son of God in power (see Rom. 1:3-4).
There was no fault in Christ as God who became man, but because He put on humanity, He had to bring this humanity into His divinity in His resurrection, so that He can become the building material for God’s house.
In His resurrection Christ became a “transformed Christ”, the stone for God’s building; now He is the living stone, the foundation stone, the cornerstone, and the topstone of God’s building.
Christ is the living stone, who was rejected by men but with God chosen and precious; when we come to Him as a living stone, we also become living stones for God’s building (1 Pet. 2:4).
Christ is the foundation stone laid by God for God’s building, and another foundation no other man may lay except that which has been laid, which is Christ Himself (Isa. 28:15; 1 Cor. 3:11).
Christ is the cornerstone: He has made peace between the Jews and the Gentiles, and in Him, we are one; we are joined together in Christ because any middle wall of partition or ordinances has been slain, and now we are together stones in God’s building joined by Christ (see Eph. 2:20). We can look to Him, trust in Him, since He was tested and approved by God, being chosen and precious, and we shall by no means be put to shame (1 Pet. 2:6).
Christ is the topstone of God’s building, and the seven Spirits of God are the seven eyes of the stone for infusing and transfusing Himself into us to make us His enlargement and increase on earth (see Zech. 4:7; 3:9; Rev. 5:6; 4:3; 21:11). Amen! Hallelujah!
Thank You Lord for becoming a man and passing through crucifixion and resurrection to become the living stone, the foundation stone, the cornerstone, and the topstone of God’s building! Praise the Lord, our Christ is now a transformed and transfigured One in resurrection to be the living stone in God’s building! Lord, we come to You as the living stone to be made living stones, to be joined with one another, to be headed up in You, and to be infused and transfused with Your element for God’s building!
The Stones in the Temple are the Believers Transformed by Christ to be Living Stones
The stones in the temple also signify the believers in Christ: we were born as clay, but through regeneration and transformation we are being transformed by Christ as the stones into living stones for the building up of the church as the temple of God (see Matt. 16:18; John 1:42; 1 Pet. 2:4-7; Rev. 21:11, 14, 18-21; cf. Dan. 2:34-35, 44-45). The more we contact the Lord and come to Him as we are, the more He infuses us with Himself to make us living stones for God’s building.
The New Testament speaks of “living stones” (see 1 Pet. 2:5), and the Old Testament speaks of “cut stones” (see 1 Kings 5:15, 17-18; 6:7); this shows us that the stones used for the building up of the church must be living inwardly and cut (dealt with) outwardly (see 2 Cor. 4:16). Inwardly our inner man is being renewed day by day, and outwardly our outer man is being consumed; this is a process of transformation for us to be living stones for God’s building.
Some brothers and sisters can be compared to “wild stones”, stones freshly cut from the quarry and full of sharp edges; when others contact them, they are hurt, and there’s an uncomfortable feeling. For the building up of the church, we all need to be dealt with by the Lord and to be enjoying Him as our life inwardly until we are shaped, prepared, and ready to be fit with others into God’s building.
Some saints are somewhat dealt with, but they are not stable enough: they can’t be built up with others, they can’t fight the battle with the saints, and they don’t bear the Ark with others. They love the Lord, have His life, and pursue Him, but they are not willing to be dealt with; they may be capable, they may know God’s word and love the saints, but they can’t bear the testimony because they haven’t been dealt with.
Some saints are “round and slippery” like rolling stones that slip away from where they are. If they are entrusted with taking care of something, they are willing to do it but after a while, they disappear and slip away….we all need many dealings with the Lord, many conversations with Him, and much time of prayer before Him to confess our need to be dealt with.
Every piece of stone used for the building of the temple was, in principle, already cut and dealt with in the mountains; there was no sound of hammer, ax, or iron tool heard in the temple – the building up of the temple was done quietly, in peace, and all you heard was the singing of the Levites and the priests (see 1 Kings 5:15-18; 6:7; cf. Isa. 30:15).
The church should be built up without any “noise” of the self or the natural man; the only sound we should hear in the church is the music of calling on the name of the Lord, rejoicing in the Lord, praising the Lord, thanking the Lord, and singing to the Lord (see Psa. 100:1-5; Acts 4:10-12; Phil. 4:4; Heb. 13:15; 1 Thes. 5:16-18; Col. 3:16-17; 1 Chron. 6:31-32)!
We should rejoice evermore, make a joyful noise to the Lord, enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise, and bless His name for He is good, kind, and faithful! We should always rejoice, pray-read the word of God, sing the Word, psalm the Word, and seek to be filled with Christ as the living stone to be transformed into living stones and precious stones!
Only when we are filled with Christ do we have a proper weight and we are properly proportioned.
The Bible tells us that it took seven and a half years and the labor of myriads of men to complete the building up of the temple (1 Kings 6:1, 38; 5:13-16; 9:20-21); this indicates that our experience of Christ being renewed, deepened, stabilized, strengthened, intensified, and enlarged in order for us to enter into the reality of the Body of Christ is a gradual “day by day,” “little by little,” and “brighter and brighter” experience in the Body until the day dawns and the morning star rises in our hearts (2 Cor. 4:16; Exo. 23:30; Prov. 4:18; 2 Pet. 1:19). Witness Lee
How much we need to have our experience of Christ renewed, enlarged, stabilized, and strengthened so that we may enter into the reality of the Body of Christ little by little and day by day! We want to cooperate with the Lord for the building of the temple of God for the Lord’s coming.
We want to cooperate with Him to hasten His coming by allowing Him to build Himself into us so that we may be constituted with Him as a living stone as the Man of bronze, and we would be transformed into precious stones for the building up of His house for His testimony! Amen!
Lord Jesus, renew, deepen, stabilize, strengthen, intensify, and enlarge our experience of Christ so that we may enter into the reality of the Body of Christ! May our experience in the Body be day by day, little by little, and brighter and brighter until the day dawns and the morning star rises in our hearts! Lord, we are one with You for Your building! You will build Your church! We want to cooperate and coordinate with You for Your building! Fill us with Your life inwardly and have a way to deal with us outwardly so that we may be living stones fitted with the others in God’s building!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, bro. Dick Taylor’s sharing in the message for this week, and Three Aspects of the Church, Book 1: The Meaning of the Church, chs. 15-16 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Church as the Temple of God – The Goal of God’s Eternal Economy (2015 Thanksgiving Conference), week 3 / msg. 3, The Intrinsic Significance of the Materials of the Temple (2).
- All Bible verses are taken from, Holy Bible Recovery Version.
- Hymns on this topic:
# The chief Cornerstone Thou art, Lord, / Jewish builders did despise; / God by resurrection placed Thee, / Thou art precious in His eyes. / Through Thee we receive salvation, / And, together built by Thee, / Jews and Gentiles are Thy dwelling, / One new man, in harmony. (Hymns #834)
# What Thy heart desires and loves / Are not precious stones alone, / But together these to build / For Thy glory, for Thy home. / Thou, the all-inclusive Christ, / Dost a builded Church require, / That Thy glorious riches may / Radiate their light entire. (Hymns #839)
# Always rejoice, / Unceasingly pray, / In everything give thanks. / For this is the will of God in Christ Jesus, / The will of God in Christ for you. / Therefore always rejoice, unceasingly pray, / In everything give thanks. (Scripture song)
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