the picture of the tabernacle shows us that God is enterable: we can enter into God!

In Psalm 84 we have the secret revelation of the enjoyment of Christ as the tabernacle of God, the enterable God.

The center of this revelation is the house of God – in order for us to see the secret revelation of the enjoyment of Christ we need to see the house of God.

Actually, the house of God is the center of the whole Bible – from the Old Testament (where the history of the people of Israel was centered around the tabernacle and the temple) to the New Testament (where we see that God’s desire is to have the church, the Body of Christ).

God desires to have a dwelling place

God doesn’t want His people to merely worship Him, serve Him, and obey His commandments; rather, hidden in God’s heart is that He would have a dwelling place!

The very first vision in the Bible in Gen. 28 is concerning Bethel, God dwelling in man and man dwelling in God. In Exodus God brought the people of Israel out of Egypt and into the wilderness so that He may reveal His desire for a tabernacle among them.

Moses received the blueprint, the pattern, of the tabernacle, and the arrangement of the furnishings in the tabernacle depicts our experience and entrance into Christ as the embodiment of the Triune God!

Christ is the enterable Triune God

The Father, the Son, and the Spirit coexist (exist at the same time) and coinhere (dwell in one another) – the Father is in the Son, the Son is in the Father, and the Father and the Son are in the Spirit.

In Christ, God has passed through a long process through incarnation, human living, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension, so that He is now the processed and consummated Triune God. This Christ as such a One is the portion allotted to all the saints by God (Col. 1:12) and He is the enterable Triune God so that we may enter into God and enjoy all that He is!

Before Christ came, God could only dwell among men, but after the process Christ passed through, by receiving Christ and experiencing Him as all the furnishing of the tabernacle, we can enter into God!

The way we enter into God is by having all our problems solved (at the bronze altar) and by being washed to become the new creation (at the laver) – these qualify us to enter into the incarnated God (signified by the tabernacle).

We enter further into God by enjoying Christ as our daily supply (at the showbread table), the light of life (at the lampstand), and at the incense altar being accepted by God and having intimate fellowship with God!

God desires that man would enter into God!

From the picture of the tabernacle in the Old Testament, we can clearly see that God desires man to enter into God! God desires to be incarnated in man – and His incarnation is continued every time a sinner calls on the name of the Lord!

After we receive the Lord, we are daily getting out of ourselves and entering into the Triune God by experiencing and enjoying Christ as the reality of all the furnishings in the tabernacle. God doesn’t want us to merely worship Him or fear Him objectively – God wants His people to enter into Him and have intimate fellowship and communion with Him!

The arrangement of the furnishings in the tabernacle is not random or objective but it signifies our experience of Christ to enter into the Triune God as the tabernacle. We first come to the bronze altar, the cross of Christ, where all our sins, problems, issues, trespasses, etc are dealt with and terminated.

From there we go on to the laver, where we need a further washing – we need to be cleansed and purified of anything natural by the washing of the water in the Word.

These two – the bronze altar and the laver for washing – qualify us to enter into the tabernacle for us to further get into the Triune God.

After the bronze altar and the laver, we enter into the Holy Place to enjoy Christ as our food, our life supply, as typified by the showbread table.

Christ is fresh, new, supplying, and “hot” as hot bread, daily available for our supply. Also, we enjoy Christ as the light of life shining on us (the lampstand), exposing us, infusing us, and purifying us.

At the golden altar, we offer Christ as the incense for God’s acceptance – God is satisfied! Through the death of Christ, the veil between the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies has been rent (Matt. 27:51; Heb. 10:20) – now we can come forward into the Holy of Holies to the throne of grace!

On the lid of the ark of the covenant we meet with God – here the blood for propitiation is sprinkled, and here we meet with God to have His speaking.

We enjoy Him as the resurrection life for authority (the budding rod), the law of the Spirit of life (the tablets of the law), and the hidden portion of supply for our nourishment (the hidden manna in the golden pot).

Hallelujah, we can enter all the way into the Holy of Holies, where the ark is, where the shekinah glory of God is! Here we meet with God and here we are infused with God, as Christ in His ascension ascends as the fragrant incense to be approved to God!

Lord, bring us more out of ourselves and into the Triune God! Thank You for being processed and consummated to become the enterable Triune God in Christ. Today we want to take this journey all the way from the bronze altar to the Holy of Holies that we may get into God! Lord, unveil us to see You and to enter all the way into God! May the incarnation of the Triune God be continued in us today as we enter into God and become the corporate incarnation of the Triune God!

References and Further Reading

• Sharing inspired from, the Life-study of the Psalms, msg. 33, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on the Crystallization-Study of Psalms (2), week 14.
• Hymns on this topic:
  # We’re Thy total reproduction, / Thy dear Body and Thy Bride, / Thine expression and Thy fullness, / For Thee ever to abide.
  # Through the Cross, O Lord, I pray, / Put my soul-life all away; / Make me any price to pay, / Full anointing to receive.
  # How wonderful, the Son is God’s expression / Come in the flesh to dwell with all mankind! / Redemption’s work, how perfectly effective, / That sinners we with God might oneness find.
• Picture source: first picture – nice scenery; second: a diagram of the furnishings in the tabernacle.