Press On

Our recent training for the leading and responsible  brothers for the churches in India was on pressing on from the tabernacle church life to the temple church life as seen in the history of the journey of the Ark from being in the tabernacle till the transition into the temple in Jerusalem. In type, there is also the enlargement of the material, size, weight and number typifying the need to press on in our experiences of the Christ.

What the Lord touched my being was in the materials used in the building of the temple, especially that of gold, bronze and stone besides the Cyprus wood, Cedar wood and olive wood.

The Church as the Temple of God—The Goal of God's Eternal Economy, Message Three, The Intrinsic Significance of the Materials of the Temple (2)

      Gold: 

IV. The major parts of the temple were made of wood overlaid with gold, signi-
fying man being overlaid—united, mingled, and incorporated—with God—
2 Chron. 3:7; 1 Kings 6:20-21, 30, 32, 35; 7:48-51:
A. The Lord’s recovery consists of God overlaying His recovered people with Him-
self.
B. Oneness is a matter of sinking deeply into the Triune God until we are fully
overlaid with gold; the only way to be kept in the real oneness is to have an
adequate amount of the experienced God—Eph. 4:3; Col. 2:19.  

Bronze:

VI C. Those who are useful to God are constantly under God’s judgment (bronze), realizing that they are men in the flesh, worthy of nothing but death and burial— Psa. 51:5; Exo. 4:1-9; Rom. 7:18; Matt. 3:16-17:   

1. We must judge ourselves as nothing and as being qualified only to be crucified; whatever we are, we are by the grace of God, and it is not we who labor but the grace of God—1 Cor. 15:10; Gal. 2:20; 1 Pet. 5:5-7.   

2. The reason for both division and fruitlessness among believers is that there is no bronze, nothing of God’s judgment; instead, there is pride, self-boasting, self-vindication, self-justification, self-approval, self-excuse and self-righteousness and condemning and regulating others instead of shepherding and seeking them—Matt. 16:24; Luke 9:54-55.   

3. When we love the Lord and experience Him as the man of bronze (Ezek. 40:3), He will become our extraordinary love, boundless forbearance, unparalleled faithfulness, absolute humility, utmost purity, supreme holiness and righteousness, and our brightness and uprightness—Phil. 4:5-8. 

Stone: 

VII. The stones of the temple signify Christ’s humanity in transformation, the transformed Christ—1 Kings 5:15-18; 6:7, 36; 1 Chron. 29:2; 2 Chron. 3:6: 

D. The New Testament speaks of living stones (1 Pet. 2:5), and the Old Testament  speaks of cut stones (1 Kings 5:15, 17-18; 6:7); the stones used for the building up of the church must be living inwardly and cut (dealt with) outwardly (2 Cor. 4:16): 

1. In the church some brothers and sisters can be compared to “wild” stones, freshly cut from the quarry and full of sharp edges; when they are contacted, they cause people to be hurt and to have an uncomfortable feeling.  

2. They are not stable enough to be built upon, to coordinate and serve with
others, to fight the battle with others, or to bear the Ark with others.  

3. Every piece of stone used for the building of the temple was, in principle, already cut and dealt with in the mountains; thus, the sound of hammer, ax, and iron tool was not heard, and the temple was built quietly—1 Kings 5:15-18; 6:7; cf. Isa. 30:15a.  

4. The church should be built without any “noise” of the self; the only sound in the church that we should hear is the music, “the joyful noise,” of calling on the Lord, rejoicing, praising, praying, thanking, and singing—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. 

The Lord's speaking was so apt. It reminds me to come to the Lord again and gain to gain Him as gold, to sink into Him and to be overlaid with Him; to be judged daily in my daily living, in my words, thoughts and deeds; and to be dealt with and be a transformed stone to fitly framed and joint with other members in the Body. All these are for the building up of the Body of Christ.

Lord, grace me to press on and on.