Hallelujah, we can possess the all-inclusive Christ as typified by the good land!
This week in our morning revival we come back to the Crystallization-Study of Numbers, the second part, and our focus is, 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.
As we come to this deeper study of the book of Numbers, we want to be open to the Lord to receive His light, be unveiled to see, and be poor in spirit so that He may speak to us what is in His heart.
From the very beginning, in Exo. 3:8, when God called Moses He told him what His desire was – He came to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and bring them into a good land.
God didn’t just want to deliver His people out of Egypt and bring them through the Red Sea but to bring them all the way to be formed together as an army, enter the good land, fight the battle for God’s interest on earth, and gain Christ as the all-inclusive land.
Christ is the reality of the all-inclusive good land, and all believers in Christ are called to enjoy Him, possess Him, and partake of Him as the good land.
Ten Major Items on how to Possess the All-inclusive Christ Typified by the Good Land
There are at least ten major items of how we can possess the all-inclusive Christ as the reality of the good land. God’s desire is that we would enter into the enjoyment and experience of the all-inclusive Christ as the reality of the good land. Here are ten items which show us how to possess the all-inclusive Christ typified by the good land as God’s house and His kingdom.
1. The Passover. Genesis begins with God creating man in His image and according to His likeness (Gen. 1:26) and ends with Joseph being buried in a coffin in Egypt (Gen. 50:26). As Eph. 2:1, 12 says, we were dead in offenses and sins, and we had no hope, but we were without God in the world, having no God and being in the kingdom of Satan.
But praise the Lord, in Exo. 12 we see Christ’s redemption; in 1 Cor. 5:7 we are told that Christ is our Passover – not just the lamb but the entire Passover, and He’s even the house in which we eat Him. We need to be in Christ to enjoy Him.
The Lord told the Israelites that, because He was about to pass through Egypt with the judgement, they would take the lamb, slaughter it, and apply the blood; when He sees the blood, He will pass over them. Many Christians see this and enjoy the fact that we have the blood of Christ, the Lamb of God, for our redemption cleansing us of our sins and accomplishing judicial redemption to satisfy God’s demands on us.
However, we need to also eat the lamb – eat Christ, with everything that He is, including the head, the body, and the legs. The meat of the lamb was for like, and their eating of the lamb was for moving; when they ate the lamb they were energised, strengthened, and empowered to move out of Egypt.
They had to eat the lamb in a particular way (see Exo. 12:11): with their loins girded, with sandals on their feet, with their staff in their hand, eating it in haste. This eating of the Passover was on the first day of the first month of the year; our salvation is our first beginning, and the Lord changed our calendar to have a spiritual calendar, for something is growing, sprouting, budding, of life (the meaning of Abib).
The second beginning was the erecting of the tabernacle, the building of God’s dwelling place. Every believer should have these two beginnings – the experience of salvation and the practical building of God’s dwelling place.
2. The presence of the Lord. In Exo. 33:14 and 13:21 we see that the Lord promised His people that His presence will go with them and He will give them rest, and Moses told Him that, if He doesn’t go up with them, they won’t go up. God’s presence is what makes us, God’s people, distinct from all the people on this earth.
We need to be filled with God’s presence, for this makes us distinct from anyone on this earth. Practically speaking, the Lord’s presence is His smile; when we have the Lord’s smile, we have everything. In our Christian life we need to be governed by the direct, first-hand presence of the Lord.
The children of Israel were led by the pillar of cloud (signifying the Spirit) and of fire (signifying the Word) – see Exo. 13:21. The Lord’s presence is in the Spirit and in the Word.
On one hand the Lord’s presence enlightens us, and on the other it is darkness to our opposers, just as the pillar was of light to the children of Israel and of darkness to their enemies. Our guiding light – the Lord’s presence – becomes our protecting light, and this protecting light becomes darkness to the opposers.
3. We need to enjoy Christ as the daily manna and the spiritual rock with the living water. In Numbers especially we see how the people of God were tired of manna – they were bored of it, and even loathed it, for they longed for the food of the Egyptians, such as fish, cucumbers, melons, leeks, and garlic.
For us to possess the all-inclusive Christ as typified by the good land, we need to be reconstituted with Christ by eating Him as our daily manna and drinking of Him as the spiritual rock with the living water. Our diet needs to change, so that we may eat and drink Christ.
4. We need to experience Christ as the Ark. In the Ark there’s the testimony of God (the law), which is the manifestation of God, the expression of God, and the description of God. The law is not a code of do’s and dont’s; rather, the intrinsic significance of the law is to be God’s manifestation, expression, and description.
The testimony is in the ark, so the Ark became the Ark of testimony; the ark is in the tabernacle, so the tabernacle became the tabernacle of the testimony. The tabernacle of the testimony is the center of God’s people; God’s testimony is our center!
5. We need to experience the tabernacle of the testimony, the enlargement of the Ark, the increase of the Ark. What we have here is 48 boards overlaid with gold (Exo. 26:26-29), each being really high. Our oneness in the church is God as the gold!
And there were five bars going through each of the sides of the tabernacle; the bars were made also of acacia wood overlaid with gold.
Simply speaking, the gold signifies God and acacia wood signifies man. The Lord’s recovery consists of God overlaying His recovered people with Himself. For us to enjoy Christ as the all-inclusive land, we need to let God overlay us with Himself. Our basic problem is that we are sort of God!
6. We need the offerings. In Leviticus we have five major offerings: the burnt offering (Christ as the One absolute for God and His satisfaction), the meal offering (we can feed on Christ with His humanity and His human living, and we can be mingled with fresh oil), the peace offering (Christ is our peace with God and with man, and His peace which surpasses every man’s understanding guards our thoughts and hearts in Christ Jesus), the sin offering (Christ is the sin-dealing life for us to deal with sin and for us to minister to others to cause them to deal with sin), and trespass offering (Christ died for our sins, our misdeeds in our conduct, and we can apply Him as our trespass offering).
7. We need the priesthood with the experience of Christ as the High Priest. For us to enter into the good land and be formed into an army as seen in Numbers, we need to be in the priesthood with the experience of Christ as the High Priest.
What is a priest? A priest is one who lives in Christ and by Christ, applying Christ and making Him everything in his life.
Our priestly garments are the manifestation of Christ for our glory and beauty, for He is our glory in His divinity and our beauty in His humanity. We need to put on the Lord Jesus Christ to live out Christ and live by Christ so that we may magnify Christ.
8. We need the regulations of a holy life. In Leviticus from ch. 11 to ch. 27 we see the regulations of a holy life.
In these regulations we see that we are people who belong to the Lord (1 Cor. 6:19-20 – we are not our own, we have been bought with a price), we have been separated from the world (1 John 2:15, we should not love the world but love the Lord and enjoy Him more than the world), and our Lord is holy so we also need to be holy. Hallelujah, our God is holy, so we are also holy (1 Pet. 1:15).
9. To enter the good land and enjoy Christ we need the formation of the divine army (as seen in Numbers). The people of Israel were numbered two times – the first to form an army to fight the battle in the beginning of Numbers, and the second time at the end of the book to divide and allocate the good land.
A soldier in the divine army must be someone with a matured life. For us to be transformed is for us to be metabolically changed in our natural life, but for us to be matured is for us to be filled with the divine life that changes us.
We need to be good soldiers of Christ Jesus, those who are fresh and young, keeping our freshness and newness with the Lord. We need to be both full of experiences of Christ and void of deterioration, for if we become old, we are discharged or retired from our spiritual service.
- By maintaining the priesthood we will be able to fight the battle to possess the all-inclusive Christ as the good land. If we don’t know how to keep the fellowship with the Lord going on day after day, moment after moment, we will be unable to fight. The holy service of the priest was considered a warfare.
Four Slogans that Summarize certain Crucial Aspects of the Vital Sketch of the Divine Revelation in Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers
Concerning the vital sketch of the divine revelation in the books of Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers concerning God’s economy with His chosen and redeemed people, there are four slogans that summarise certain crucial aspects.
First, God’s chosen and redeemed people are purchased, redeemed, and saved from the bondage of the fall. Second, God’s chosen and redeemed people are enjoying Christ, receiving revelation, and being built up in the Triune God.
Third, God’s chosen and redeemed people are formed into a priestly army to fight for God and to journey with God. And fourth, God’s chosen and redeemed people are possessed by God to possess the all-inclusive Christ as the good land.
These four slogans apply both to the saints in the Old Testament and to us in the New Testament, because the New Testament is hidden in the Old Testament, and the Old Testament is manifested in the New Testament (see Luke 24:25-27, 44-49).
All the things written in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms are concerning the Lord Jesus; the entire Old Testament is a revelation of Christ, and He is the center and the content.
We as believers in Christ have been chose, redeemed, and saved from the bondage of the fall! Amen! It is us, the saints in Christ, that we have been saved from the usurpation of the world and from the bondage of Satan.
Now, having been saved, we are enjoying Christ. Just as the children of Israel did at Mount Sinai, we also received the divine revelation and we are being built up with the processed Triune God!
We have received the divine revelation and we are built up with the Son as the embodiment of the Father and with the Spirit as the realization of the Son. Furthermore, we are being formed into a priestly army, an army which fights for God and journeys with God.
In the church life today we are being formed as the priestly army which God needs, and this army fights for God and journeys with God.
Finally, we have been prepared by God in every way to possess the all-inclusive Christ as the good land. Hallelujah, we have been prepared by God to possess this wonderful, all-inclusive Christ, who is the reality of the good land!
Thank You Lord for choosing us, redeeming us, and saving us from the bondage of the fall. Thank You for saving us from the usurpation of the world and from the bondage of Satan. Hallelujah, having been saved, we are now enjoying Christ! We have received the divine revelation and we are being built up with the Triune God! Thank You Lord, You are forming us into a priestly army to fight for God and journey with God. We give ourselves to You, Lord, to be formed into this army! We trust in You, Lord, for You have prepared us in every way to possess the all-inclusive Christ as the good land! Hallelujah!
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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, The History of God in His Union with Man, chs. 11-12 (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:
# Lord, Thou art our true Passover, / God passed over us thru Thee; / By Thyself and Thy redemption / We with God have harmony. / Thou, the Lamb of God, redeemedst us / With Thyself and with Thy blood; / We apply Thy blood, our ransom, / Eating Thee, our real food. (Hymns #196)
# Lord, Thou art manna true, / Descended from on high, / Who came to be my food, / To fully satisfy. / Thou art the smitten rock, / Whence living waters burst; / At all times I may drink, / And fully quench my thirst. (Song on, Lord, Thou art manna true)
# Lord, Thou art all the offerings / Prepared by God for us; / They are so rich in meaning, / So sweet and glorious. / They have fulfilled God’s purpose / And met His heart’s desire; / They too have satisfied us, / And faced what we require. (Hymns #195)
