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Scripture Reading: Exo. 25:31a, 37a; Zech. 4:2; Rev. 1:12b, 20b; Prov. 20:27; Rev. 4:5b; 1 Cor. 6:17; Rom. 8:4, 6; Eph. 6:18; 1 Thes. 5:17, 19
The testimony of God is that He enters into man to be man’s life and even his disposition. God in us is our life, and outwardly we are God’s living.
Because spiritual matters like this are abstract, the Bible uses symbols to portray them. The lampstand in the tabernacle symbolizes the testimony of God. Exodus 25:31-37 gives us a description of how it was to be made. Only one lampstand was to be made, and it was to be entirely of gold. This one lampstand, however, was to have seven lamps. Looked at from the bottom, the lampstand is one. From the top, however, it appears to be seven because of the seven lamps.
The meaning of this lampstand is rich and profound. It symbolizes the very Triune God.
Gold typifies the divine nature. The substance of this lampstand remains constant and unchanged, for gold does not rust or tarnish. The pure gold of the lampstand, then, typifies God’s nature, which is simply God Himself.
This pure gold is not shapeless. It has a form, which denotes its function. A table, for example, has a form, which speaks of its use; we can use it to write on or to eat from. If it had a different shape, it would not serve the same purpose. In what form is this lampstand? This form is the second person of the Godhead, the Son: “No one has ever seen God; the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him” (John 1:18). The Son is the form, or manifestation, of the Father.
How can this lampstand represent the form of God, who is invisible and has no form? Second Corinthians 4:4 tells us clearly that Christ is the image of God. God created man in His own image (Gen. 1:27). Colossians 1:15 describes Christ as “the image of the invisible God.” It is certainly true to say that God has His image.
The seven lamps of the lampstand signify the seven Spirits of God (Rev. 4:5). This is a reference to the third of the Trinity, for the seven Spirits are simply the Spirit of God. The shining of the Spirit is God expressed.
The lampstand portrays God in His substance (the Father), embodiment (the Son), and expression (the Spirit).
This lampstand, representing the Triune God, is His testimony. Because the church is His testimony, it also is the golden lampstand (1:20). It is common to think of the church as a religious gathering, but this is a most inadequate way to regard it. To consider the church as a group of sinners, saved and cleansed by the blood, and then meeting together, is also too low a concept. Yes, we are an assembly in the sense that we do come together for meetings. But in reality the church is a lampstand.
How did this lampstand come about? We have not only been cleansed by the precious blood; we have also been regenerated. This new birth implies that there is another life and therefore a father is involved. Because we have been born again, we have a life that has its source in the Father. Outwardly, we have been cleansed; inwardly, we have been regenerated. Now God is our Father. It follows naturally that we have His nature, just as every son bears his father’s nature. John 1:11-12 says that those who receive Christ are born of God. We are called “partakers of the divine nature” in 2 Peter 1:4. Pure gold has come into us!
By our first birth we are men of clay, formed of the dust of the ground (Gen. 2:7). “The first man is out of the earth, earthy” (1 Cor. 15:47). When we die, we return to the dust: “Dust you are, / And to dust you shall return” (Gen. 3:19).
Before we were regenerated, we were men of clay. One day, however, we got saved, and God came into us. Now, instead of being men of clay, we are men of gold.
Look at yourself. There is gold in you. Because God is your Father, you have His substance and nature. But do you have the form of the Son? To have the shape of the Son means that there has been some transformation in you. “We all with unveiled face, beholding and reflecting like a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord Spirit” (2 Cor. 3:18). How much of the Lord’s image do you have? This depends on the amount of transformation that you have experienced. Yes, you have gold within, but it is surrounded by the clay and has not yet taken shape. In your living, does the clay come out or the gold?
We are in the church. The church, however, is a golden lampstand. It is not made of clay. Since we are part gold and part clay, we are partly the church and partly not the church. We are in the process. The golden lampstand is buried in the clay. Christ is yet to be formed in us (Gal. 4:19). He has been revealed in us (1:16) and lives in us (2:20). Now the gold within needs to take shape. We know there is something shiny and weighty inside us; this substance must be formed into the lampstand. Because of this gold, we hesitate to say that we are not the lampstand. Yet there is so much clay still clinging to us that we wonder if we can be considered the lampstand. When we are in this mixed condition, can we call ourselves the church?
The church is the practical expression of the Triune God. The Father enters into man to be his nature. The Son is in man transforming him to be the form. Then the Spirit in man expresses God. Thus, the church is depicted as a golden lampstand (Rev. 1:20b).
There are three phases to the golden lampstand. The first is in Exodus in the tabernacle, where it represents the Triune God (25:31-37). The second is in Zechariah, where it represents the children of Israel who are in the position of receiving grace (4:2). Those who thus receive grace are His testimony. The last is in the New Testament, where the golden lampstand is the church (Rev. 1:12, 20). This testimony declares that the substance of the Father has been wrought into the believers, the shape of the Son has also been constituted into them, and the expression of the Spirit is realized through them.
How will the gold in us take shape? There is no question regarding our having the gold within us. Our question concerns transformation, not regeneration. How can we be transformed into His image from glory to glory?
The answer lies with the Spirit. The church as the lampstand has seven lamps, which are God’s seven Spirits. God is Spirit (John 4:24). More than this, we are told in Proverbs 20:27, “The spirit of man is the lamp of Jehovah.” Within us, we have two lamps, the Spirit of God and our human spirit. Inside our little lamp is a stronger lamp. Before we were saved, our spirit was a broken lamp. After we repented, the lamp was restored and began to give forth light. Day by day as we prayed, the shining increased. With regeneration this lamp also had another lamp come into it. This was the Spirit of God. It is because of these two lamps that there is so much shining within us. The two become one, for “he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit” (1 Cor. 6:17).
Man’s spirit, Proverbs 20:27 goes on to say, searches all the innermost parts of the inner being, or as Darby’s footnote says, “all the chambers of the soul.” In your soul are various chambers, or rooms. The spirit is searching the chamber of your emotions and of your mind and of your will.
Although we all have the pure gold in us, the inward parts of our soul may not be open. When we pray, we are afraid to open our emotion, for example, to the Lord. After we reach a certain point in our praying, we close up because we are unwilling to open some inner chamber to Him. We may faithfully attend all the meetings, read the Word, and spend time in prayer. Yet there is a door within that is locked. We are aware of this, yet we tell the Lord that there is no way to open that door, even though we love Him and have paid a price in other ways.
The sisters’ way of getting around such a problem is to shed tears. Because they have learned to win out by crying, they try this same tactic on the Lord. The brothers, on their part, react with stubbornness: “No, Lord. I cannot open that part to You. You just have to forgive me.” Whatever way we try, we cannot subdue the Lord. He will not force us, however. He will wait. Meanwhile, in that chamber of our soul we are not being transformed into His image.
To have our spirit regenerated is simple. We confess our sins and receive the Lord. Then we have the Spirit of God within. To be transformed in our soul, however, is not easy. It needs the lamp of the Lord to search all the inner chambers. There are very few who have opened all their inner chambers to Him.
You may love the Lord, and you may pray regularly for your children and your grandchildren. Yet in your soul are two chambers that you reserve for yourself. You keep the Lord locked out of there.
Many Christians are unaware that they have a spirit. They live in the soul. Without the spirit, however, the soul is dark. It needs the lamp of the Lord. A lamp is for use in darkness. Because man has fallen, he is in darkness. Thus, he is corrupt. Because the spirit has lost its function, he has no light. He must repent, that is, turn his being to his spirit.
Before you heard the gospel, you did all kinds of evil things. You utterly neglected your spirit and fully gave yourself to satisfy your soul. You lived according to your emotion, mind, and will. When you heeded the call to repent, however, you turned and experienced the light shining in the spirit. You were saved and regenerated.
Now that you are saved, how are you living? Do you pay attention to your spirit or still live according to the soul? The only way to have light is to walk according to the spirit (Rom. 8:4). That light searches the inward parts of your soul. If you are not in your spirit, you cannot see your true condition. You quarrel with others, certain that you are in the right and unaware that you are in darkness.
It is through prayer that you can be turned to your spirit. When you pray, you pray yourself into the spirit. Your quarreling leaves you in darkness, but after some time you calm down and begin to pray a little. Then comes the shining. You see how wrong your arguing was. You realize that your thought was wrong, that you had a poor attitude, and that what you said should not have been said. The more you pray, the more you are in your spirit, where the light shines.
Both the spirit of man and the Spirit of God are lamps, shining and enlightening our inward parts. As our spirit shines, the Spirit of God intensifies the shining sevenfold, until we find we have no place to hide.
Where this light shines, there the life supply goes. Little by little, chamber by chamber, we are transformed into the Lord’s image. The gold in us takes shape. Christ is formed in us. For us, to live is Christ. In all of us this shining, supplying, and transforming is going on, making us the golden lampstand. Then we are truly the church, the practical expression of God, and His testimony. The Father is in us, the Son has taken form, and the Spirit expresses this reality.
We can liken this golden lampstand to a complicated piece of machinery. Without a certain small screw, the machinery will not operate. The screw for this golden lampstand is that we must be in our spirit. Prayer is the key to our being able to stay in spirit: “By means of all prayer and petition, praying at every time in spirit and watching unto this in all perseverance and petition” (Eph. 6:18). “Unceasingly pray” (1 Thes. 5:17), because as soon as we stop praying, we leave our spirit. All around are things to distract us. We must keep our eyes shut and be in prayer.
Sometimes we have to go shopping. If we really have a need to buy something, when we go into the department store, we must pay no attention to all the alluring things on display. It takes an effort, but we must stay in prayer so that we buy only what we came for. God keeps calling us back to our spirit.
I remember in 1933 when I lived in Shanghai, I had to go from one end of town to the other for a meeting. In those days it was an hour’s ride by electric car. The streets were bustling with activity, and gaudy signs tried to catch the eye. Before I left, I spent time praying for the meeting that night. However, by the time I reached the meeting hall after that car ride, my spirit was gone because of all the distracting things I had seen. I learned a lesson from that experience. Afterward, whenever I took the electric car, I would sit there with my eyes closed, praying, refusing to be enticed by the scenes outside. Then when my ride was over, I would still be conscious of the spirit with me. When I went into the meetings, the spirit would come forth.
With so much to turn you away, it is not easy to remain in spirit. That is why you must heed this exhortation to pray at every time in spirit. Pray with all prayer and petition. Watch unto this in all perseverance. “Do not quench the Spirit” (1 Thes. 5:19). Walk according to spirit. Set your mind on the spirit (Rom. 8:6).
Then you will be kept in life. The two lamps inside you will be shining brightly. All your inner chambers will be transformed into the image of the Lord. Not only will you have the pure gold; it will take shape, and there will be the expression. The crucial point is that you must remain in, or turn back to, your spirit. Then there will be a golden lampstand, the church, the practical expression of the Triune God.
