CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
very
builder who contrives to construct an edifice first makes a plan to suit
the requirements of that which suits the purpose for which he builds.
God, the greatest master builder of all, made three distinct plans or patterns of that which He builds in earth.
- Moses' Tabernacle
in the Wilderness:
The First Temple - Exodus 25:1-9
- Solomon's Temple
in Jerusalem:
The Second Temple - 1st Chronicles 22:9-11
- Jesus Christ the
Man:
The Beginning of the Third Temple - Matthew 24:2
Let us first look at the quality change in the materials which were used in both the building of Moses' Tabernacle in the wilderness as against that used in the building of the Temple of Solomon.
In the Tabernacle of Moses, the materials were wood overlaid with gold, skins of animals, brass, threads of certain symbolic colors, and silver.
- Wood symbolically
means carnal man.
- Gold symbolizes
the Divine Nature.
- Skins of animals,
which are produced by the will of the flesh, symbolize sacrifice and
covering. This, more than anything else, brings us into the realm of
a life of intercession for others and an unselfish surrender for the
good of the Body of Christ.
- Brass symbolizes
judgment and justice against sin.
- Colors: Blue means
purification.
White linen means purity.
Red signifies the blood of Jesus.
Purple stands for kingship.
There were some marked differences between Solomon's Temple and the Tabernacle of Moses in the type of materials used in construction. Skins of animals, which represent the will of flesh, and wood, which represents humanity, though covered with gold (divinity) were used in Moses' tabernacle. In Solomon's temple, stones were used for the walls, which, unlike skins, were not produced by the will of the flesh, but by process of God's own operation. The individual stones were inlaid with golden mortar poured into a pattern of holes drilled into them (more like our cement blocks) and plastered on the outside with pure gold, thus covering the nakedness of their presence in the temple by His own divinity, and at the same time filling them inside also with divine life. God's promise to man is that He would walk in them and talk in them.
2nd Corinthians 6:16, "And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God and they shall be my people."
The work was no more to be just an outward covering up of the nature of man under the nature of God, but even as the GOLDEN MORTAR permeated the inside of the stones, so The Living God would work on the inside of man.
All brass objects were peculiar to the Outer Court, for the Outer Court is the place where God deals with sin.
In Solomon's temple, the size and number of the symbolic furniture were increased. For instance, the candlesticks (lampstands) were multiplied to TEN, which speaks of the massive increase in the "dunamin" power of the Holy Ghost's work in the soul and spirit realm of the individual believer, and the church generally (2nd Chronicles 4:7). The candlesticks were placed, five on the right side and five on the left. The Table of Shewbread was also multiplied to ten. Five tables were on one side and five on the other. Five is the number of the Ministry.
This placing of the ministry - five on the right and five on the left - signifies that there would be a ministry that was carnal and would be like the foolish virgins, and there was a ministry that would be wise and be as the wise virgins.
The cherubim were also greatly multiplied in size. The cherubim on the Mercy Seat were apparently small figures, maybe no bigger than 1 cubit or 18 inches, but the cherubim in Solomon's temple touched from one wall of the temple to the other. They were twenty cubits in their wing span. Wing touched wing and the outer wings touched the walls. This speaks of the increase in the overwhelming abundance of the overshadowing at the Mercy Seat. This means that when the spirit of man is incorporated with the Spirit of God, the soul is overshadowed. Between the soul and the spirit is the place where we meet face to face with God.
1. THE TABERNACLE IN THE WILDERNESS
God gave Moses a detailed plan of a tent he should build, which was portable, to go along with the Israelites as they journeyed from Egypt to Canaan. At once we see Egypt as the type of bondage, sin, and our old carnal Adamic nature, and Canaan as the type of the great promise of salvation and a life free from sin.
The outer fence was made of posts of wood covered with brass and set in sockets of brass. This signifies that humanity will be used of God as part of the means of shutting man into God. The fact that the posts were covered with brass and socketed in brass, signifies that there is a compulsion in their position and ministry, and that there is no latitude for vacillation or change. The whole fence was covered with linen cloth, with hooks and joinings of silver. Linen speaks of righteousness and silver of redemption, that is, their righteousness is held in place by the redemptive power of Christ. Another fact that is pertinent is that they were placed five cubits apart, which means that God Himself would place them in the Body and it would be a ministry. This fence was 100 cubits long and 50 cubits wide, thus making the perimeter 300 cubits, which was the number of Gideon's overcomer company. This plan or pattern contains in symbolic language every iota of God's word, from the Holy Spirit working in the life of the sinner outside of the tent, to bring him in through the gate, to the believer being installed into the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy of Holies with all the attributes of the risen Christ manifested in him.
This pattern therefore contains the very essence of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and His love. This revelation has now come to the Church so that all of God's people might participate and be made ready for that mountaintop experience into which we shall soon enter, through tribulation or fire.
2. SOLOMON'S TEMPLE IN JERUSALEM
The pattern shown by Solomon's temple tells us that there is a second stage that mankind would come to in the development of God's plan where we would be "lively stones built up a spiritual household." These stones would not stand up of themselves, but would have golden bars supporting them inside and plastered with gold outside. Gold speaks of the divine nature. Therefore our old, cold, dead, stone nature would be covered up with God's nature, and our nakedness vindicated by the Almighty. THIS, OF COURSE, SPEAKS OF THE BAPTISM OF THE HOLY GHOST.
The next important point here is that the GLORY of this temple would increase over the glory of Moses'. The glory at one time under Moses was so great that his face shone and the people could not look upon him. This, of course, deals with the subject historically. What is meant by this is that there was a time when God dealt with the church on a lower level spiritually than He is dealing with us now. AT PRESENT WE ARE MOVING OUT OF THE SOLOMON'S TEMPLE EXPERIENCE and going into the third experience, or the COMING FORTH INTO THE NATURE OF THE CHRIST MAN.
According to 2nd Chronicles 3:3, the measurement of the temple was 60 x 20 Cubits equalling 1200 Square Cubits (120 x 10). Ten is the number of government or the perfection of divine order, i.e. The Ten Commandments. (For further information on the number ten, see "Number in Scripture," by E.W. Bullinger).
One hundred and twenty brethren were in the upper room at Pentecost, and it speaks of that victorious indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Moses was 120 years old when he died. His life was divided into three segments of 40 years. Each segment was a time of tribulation, and the third 40 years of tribulation brought him victory over death itself.
The Porch measured 20 x 20 Cubits and its height was 20 cubits and the Holy of Holies was 20 x 20. Twenty is a symbolic figure of the witness of Christ and the Holy of Holies is the place of the total fulfillment of humanity when he comes into the fulness of Christ.
3. JESUS CHRIST THE MAN, OR THE BEGINNING OF THE THIRD TEMPLE
"These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the BEGINNING OF THE CREATION OF GOD." Revelation 3:14
"The first begotten of the dead." Revelation 1:5
Jesus Christ is the beginning of the construction of the THIRD TEMPLE. In Christ, we are that third temple and the final fulfillment of all that has been written about temples in the Bible.
Jesus Christ told the Jews, in effect, that Herod's temple was not the true temple, but that His body was the true temple.
John 2:18-20, "Then answered the Jews and said unto Him, What sign showest thou unto us, seeing that Thou doest these things? Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up. Then said the Jews, Forty and six years was this temple in building, and wilt Thou rear it up in three days? But He spake of the temple of His body."
Paul speaks of this temple.
1st Corinthians 6:19, "What? Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?"
It is very interesting to note that this teaching is believed even in modern Israel. There is, however, one exception in Israel's belief - it being that they think they are that third temple. In a natural sense they are, but in the spiritual sense we, the Israel of God, which includes both Jew and Gentile, are that temple.
The story is told of the reference to the third temple being made by a high-ranking Israeli when things seemed very dark for Israel during the 1973 October war.
His words to Premier Golda Meir were, "This is the end of the Third Temple." In that dark hour for Israel, he would not be playing with words had the meaning not been fully known to the Premier. He was referring to Israel in no uncertain terms.
For a long time, our colleges and seminaries have been teaching that the symbolic meaning of the word Canaan is a glory land beyond death, and thus fostering a doctrine of a far away heaven on some far away planet. Now, through the revelation of the Holy Spirit and the Christ within us, we know for sure that the experiences of heaven are ordained of God for us to have here and now while we are in this life. Jesus, through His life, demonstrated that He dwelt in heavenly places while on earth. For example:
"No man hath ascended up to heaven but He that came down from heaven, even the son of man which is in heaven." John 3:13.
This passage and many others clearly say that Jesus, though He was on earth, also was in heaven. Not just heaven in us, but us in heaven.
TRUE ENOUGH, most Christians have to die before God can get them still enough to bring them into the reality of the Spirit, but now we are understanding the ways and purposes of God, and we know that God will bring heaven down to earth (terra firma) as soon as the saints allow the Kingdom of God to come within them.
"Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven." Matthew 6:10.
LIKE JESUS
We can be like Jesus. This will happen not because we are trying hard to be; as a matter of fact, we will never be by trying, but because we are learning to step out of the way and LET HIM MAKE US LIKE HIMSELF.
JESUS CHRIST OUR LORD is God's final pattern of that which He is creating with His word in the earth. "He spoke and it was done." By the anointed word of God, we are being recreated in His image and likeness. There is a teaching which would disarm you, which says that you can do nothing about it. You have been given of God a free will, and you can prevent God to the point of going to hell if you desire. On the other hand, you can give God the right of way in your life to bring you into conformity with His image. Romans 6:16 states that whatsoever spirit YOU obey, his servant you will become. Thus God expects you to exercise your franchise in submitting yourself to Him that He might put you in alignment with Christ.
THE NECESSITY FOR THE MESSAGE
The necessity for this message lies in the fact of the Gospel of Jesus Christ being a MYSTERY which was never fully revealed in any age, but is to be fully revealed to this generation of the end-time.
Daniel 12:9, "Go thy way, Daniel: for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end."
Paul also, in his letter to the Ephesians (3:3-5), bears out the same idea.
"How that by revelation He made known unto me the mystery, (as I wrote afore in few words, Whereby, when ye read, ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ), which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto His holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit."
Some of my readers may say, "But it has been already revealed to the apostles and the prophets." But Paul says no. He received words which he was commanded not to utter. 2nd Corinthians 12:4.
1) John, in receiving the revelation of Jesus Christ, was given the thing in mystery, and this mystery is only being revealed to the sons of God by the Holy Ghost for our time.
2) In Revelation 10:4, John was commanded not to write that which the SEVEN THUNDERS uttered. I believe some of the revelations we are receiving now are these that John was commanded not to write.
3) In Daniel 12:9, the angel told Daniel that at the time of the end, the mysteries of the Gospel would be revealed. "And He said, Go thy way, Daniel: for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end."
THE CHURCH SYSTEM IN DARKNESS
We are at present at the end of the age of the Laodicean church which is described in Revelation 3:15 as being "neither cold nor hot," but "rich, increased with goods and having need of nothing." This means that all the seven churches with all their rebellion have come together in one church. This is the picture of a church well settled in the world, being the richest institution on the face of the earth, and wielding political and economic power of great proportions. Spiritually, she is inept and sick unto death with divisions and sin. The doctor would say her condition is incurable. The modern church system has slipped into a quagmire of preaching one thing, and finding it totally impossible to practice its own preachings from the Bible. Thus something more like the generation gap exists, ever widening, between her and her Bible. Something has to give. Therefore the Church, instead of giving way to the Bible, has been trying to bend the Bible to the Church.
By 1991, many of the churches had changed their hymnals to suit the trends of the time. Some have printed a new Bible which puts God in the feminine, and now we see the "overspreading of abominations" (Daniel 9:27) in the holy place. This alerts us that there will soon be the desolations and then the consummation of which this passage speaks.
The difficulty is like dealing with a pernicious disease, for the Bible was never written for carnal men and CARNAL INTERPRETATION. To remedy this ailment, every major religion has either done it herself, or embraced a translation of the Bible which appears to support her position doctrinally. In spite of this, the Bible as a whole condemns these organizations of man. Men who lack godliness institute doctrine to bind their adherents. Thus in this late hour of time, we find an influx of translations, with some passages being made clearer, and at the same time, other passages being made darker, increasing the confusion. It is alleged that even the Communists are making a Bible translation.
One POPULAR TRANSLATION changes all the figures in the Bible, bringing them to their English equivalent, thus destroying all their SYMBOLIC meanings. For instance, 12,000 furlongs translated to 1,500 miles destroys the symbolism of 12 with three zeros behind it to a meaningless figure. Not only this error, but others of a far-reaching nature such as errors of making a passage clearer according to the writer's natural scope of understanding, when there is a spiritual understanding beyond the scope of the writer. Because of the number of men who translated and cross-checked the King James Version of the Bible, it does not carry any slant1 of any special doctrine for any particular group, whereas most of the other translations do carry such a slant.
THE INDICTMENT
The indictment against the present church system is:
1) DIVINE ORDER is absent in the rule of our church government. Not Theocratic Rule as was God's intention, but Democratic, Autocratic, Despotic, Plutocratic and even Totalitarian in some widespread instances. EVERYTHING OUTSIDE OF Divine Order is DISORDER, and the worst kind of disorder is an orderly disorder. Disorder which is deliberate and ordered is, in effect, a rebellion. This is exactly how God looks at it. "I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me." Isaiah 1:2.
2) The church system presents God to the world as a God that is slack concerning His promises, and one that is unable to rule His own household, by presenting themselves as His ambassadors while living in every type of sin in which the ungodly participate.
3) In doctrine they say that God is too good to judge and condemn sin, robbing themselves of the knowledge of their own judgment. This doctrine says that God is going to contaminate heaven with a lot of unwilling, self-willed, rebellious and sinful people who hate God and all His works. In doctrine, they distort heaven, making it a faraway dwelling place of spirits, yet with streets of natural gold and walls of natural jasper, upon some carnal, physical, faraway planet. They distort hell, making it nothing but a myth in one rendition, and in another they make it a hole in the ground, in spite of the hint given by the Word of God, "bottomless pit" (Revelation 9:2). A pit without a bottom is not a pit at all. That in itself shows that it is not a natural pit, since every natural pit, to be a pit, must have a bottom.
4) Finally, under the name of God, the churches occupy the most popular corners of every city, and under the guise of charitable organizations, transact business, buying and selling, usurping and lobbying for laws to be passed in all the legislatures of the world to facilitate their pursuit of power. Because of these and more, it is very evident in our time that the church system is at its lowest ebb, while some of the people of God are rising to their highest.
The logical conclusion is that somewhere in the near future, there must be a breakaway of the true Christian from the false church.
I am recording this as a matter of history for the information of those who do not know, that many years ago during the time when Dr. Ramsey was Archbishop of Canterbury,2 the Church of England advocated and lobbied for a law to be passed to legalize homosexuality among consenting adults, and to foster an abominable marriage between consenting males over 21.
Since this blatant example of defiance against God's expressed will for humanity, many of the other churches, one by one, are following suit and some even surpass her in rebellion against God by creating homosexual churches. In 1991, the Episcopal church ordained its first woman lesbian bishop. This is abomination; confusion. The Presbyterian church, however, fought off a strong faction in the church which wanted them to recognize homosexuality, etc. in their 1991 Synod.
In 1993, many Anglican churches in England broke away to join the Roman Catholic church, and to claim the "Pope" as their head. It is inevitable that the daughters of the harlot of Revelation 17 must return to their mother.
The New York Council
of Churches urged the New York legislature to repeal statutes banning
certain sex acts between consenting adults.
| "While adultery, fornication, homosexual acts and certain deviant sexual practices among competent and consenting adults violate Judeo-Christian standards of moral conduct, we think that the penal law is not the instrument for the control of such practices when privately engaged in where adults are involved and where there is no coercion." |
The above represents the published position of a church system which at one time had a name of being alive. In opposition to this, let me quote what God says about these "deviant sexual practices" which the council approves.
Leviticus 18:22, "Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination."
Leviticus 20:13, "If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them."
The judgment for this sin is burning by fire.
Genesis 19:24, "Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven."
The word brimstone is an old one which needs some explanation in modern terms. This word simply means "explosive material." It does include TNT and all other forms of gunpowder. It must be noted that almost all the weaponry in the modern arsenals are weapons of fire.
Genesis 9:11, "And I will establish my covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth."
Genesis 9:13, "I will set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth."
Genesis 8:21, "And the Lord smelled a sweet savour; and the Lord said in His heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done."
God made a covenant with mankind that He would not destroy (a) all living creatures from the earth again, and (b) that He would not do it with water. The implication here under (b) is that even as the rainbow is a fiery aura across the skies that fire will be used in the next judgment. This assumption is borne out by 2nd Peter 3:10, "the elements (the Greek word is 'stoicheion,' meaning 'part of the world') shall melt with fervent heat, the earth (worldliness) also and the works (man's works contrary to God's will) that are therein shall be burned up."
The fundamentalist belief that God is going to destroy the world with fire is only partly correct. The worldliness and all things that offend will be destroyed by fire, but the good things of God will not be destroyed. This would be consistent with the promise of the rainbow, that God would not again destroy all living things from the earth. Contrary to scripture, the rapturists say the Christians will be removed in a rapture, and while they are basking in the heavenlies, God will incinerate the earth, and then they will return to reign and rule with Christ, over nothing but heaps of ashes, or maybe over themselves. We will mention further scriptural proof that the earth will never be destroyed.
Ecclesiastes 1:4, "One generation passeth away and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth for ever."
Other references are in Psalms 104:5 and 119:90.
In the secular world, the governments of the nations are following the lead of the churches and being quite open about their position. At present our children are unsafe in the institutions of learning which are teaching them "sex" in its most perverted forms. What sane parent wants sex taught in kindergarten class? This, however, is what the government of America is making compulsory, beginning from kindergarten school.
THE JUDGMENT IS NOW
Before this book gets into your hands, the judgment might have already begun. Almost all the weapons of the modern war machine are made of some type of fire. FIRE will dominate the next war which is now about to break upon us. The super weapons are not yet revealed to the layman. Sudden death at this moment is lurking in the arsenals, under the oceans, and in outer space, ready to cast that "burning mountain" of Revelation 8:8 into the sea of humanity.
COME OUT FROM AMONG THEM
Now is the time for Christian families to begin to relocate themselves from those who are under the judgment of God. Fire will be poured upon the wicked cities of America, Europe, Asia and the world. Millions of humanity jammed together in the monstrous cities of the United States, Europe and the Far East are ripe for judgment. The holocaust of this tribulation is beyond our imagination. It would make Dante's Inferno look like an afternoon bonfire.
THE MESSAGE IS URGENT. Christian families must remove themselves from these centers of judgment. Lot had a lot of reasons to remain in Sodom, but there was a time to run, and he did not have to lose his shirt in running, but he waited until it was too late. He lost his wife and all his possessions. Nevertheless, be sure when you make a move, it is God who tells you to, and that He tells you where to go.
CHURCHES DISQUALIFY THEMSELVES
Since the bad example set by the Anglican Church, it took a number of years for the other backsliding congregations to come forth boldly, and admit their sins in the newspapers of the land.
The Daily Pantagraph, Bloomington, Illinois, U.S.A., in its issue dated July 21, 1974, states:
12 GAY CAUCUSES
| Minneapolis (UPI) - Lutherans involved in the homosexual world - either through ministry to or participation in - have formed a caucus to support the cause of homosexuals in the Church. 'Lutherans Concerned for Gay People,' which claims ties with homosexuals in all three of the country's largest Lutheran bodies, brings to nearly a dozen the number of gay caucuses in various church groups. |
This is in total contravention to and rebellion against the Word of God. Ephesians 5:15-21 states that no unclean person, whoremonger, homosexual, etc., will inherit the Kingdom of God.
How, then, can people who are supposed to know the scriptures, speak of "homosexuals in the church?" The two things are incompatible; they cannot work together. It is like saying that sin is in God - totally paradoxical.
Because of the failing of the church, and the falling of the leadership of the church into these sins, and also because of the widespread corruption of the people, the legislators of the nations are bringing forth abominable laws and bills to express the will of their homosexually-minded constituents. One example of this is quoted from the San Francisco Chronicle, Thursday, February 20, 1975.
MOVES FORWARD BILL TO LEGALIZE MANY SEX ACTS
| Sacramento - Legal bans against many sexual activities between consenting adults would be removed under a bill approved by an Assembly committee yesterday. The measure by Assemblyman Willie Brown (Dem - SF) would legalize oral sex and anal sex unless committed by force or with a minor. It would also legalize adulterous cohabitation. The bill was approved 5 to 1 by the Assembly Criminal Justice committee. It now goes to the Assembly floor, where a similar bill died last year. It is AB 489. |
Isaiah 28 speaks of those who "stumble in judgment." Surely, this is a strange Criminal Justice Committee. Sometime after this, the Assembly passed the bill and made it law.
POPE PAUL VI: Quoting
from a report in the Newsweek magazine of November 4, 1974, under the
caption, "TO BE OR NOT TO BE," Pope Paul VI was quoted as saying:
| "The church is in difficulty; the church seems destined to die." |
This is an accurate summation of what is about to happen in the near future. The Church of Jesus Christ CANNOT DIE and does not seem to be dying, but the Pope was not speaking of any other church but the Roman Catholic Church. The whole organized church system is patterned after the Catholic system, and in truth and in fact, is really one system with two heads.
The corruption which has engulfed the church system disqualified her as a church, and it is either that the word is now meaningless, or some new modern meaning is being applied which makes it no longer the "called out" and the "separated unto God." Thus in the sight of God, it has a name that it lives, yet it is dead.
LET THERE BE LIGHT
There is HOPE. God would not leave us without light. Men are rising up from every corner with the true light of God, here a little and there a little (Isaiah 28:13), and the spirits of division which haunted the true church in the past are being put under foot by the truth, for the Spirit of God is making us one. Not an organizational oneness based upon color and/or creed and class like the exclusive clubs, but a oneness of Spirit which is not of man but of God, as represented by the Candlestick (Lampstand) with its seven lamps all burning the same oil, yet producing many lights.
This study therefore is beyond all religion and religious sects. It deals with God as a person and a teacher who draws on a blackboard His blueprint called the TABERNACLE, the plan of the ages to the very threshold of eternity.
Anyone, therefore, who begins to understand this MYSTERY, has begun his ascent out of doctrinal bondage, and into the freedom of the image and likeness of God.
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