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In this chapter I want to continue to fellowship concerning the fulfillment in the New Testament of the typology in the Old Testament concerning God’s economy. The whole Bible unveils God’s economy, which is for the accomplishment of His heart’s desire for His good pleasure. The center and the reality of God’s economy is Christ and His Body.
Before the New Testament age, that is, before the Lord’s incarnation, God had chosen a people on this earth called Israel. This people of God’s selection has a long history. Their forefather was Abraham. Then by Moses’ time, at their exodus from Egypt, they became a race that had at least two million people. Since then, they have become a type of the church as God’s elect in the New Testament. Thus, the Old Testament has a people, and the New Testament has a people. The Old Testament has Israel, and the New Testament has the church. These two peoples do not represent two things that God has done. These two peoples are a description of one thing that God has done, and this one thing is the accomplishment of God’s economy. Before God came to accomplish this economy, He first put out a type, a figure, a shadow. In God’s economy the people of Israel are just a type, a figure, a shadow. They are not the real thing. Israel typifies the church.
I would like to present some verses from the New Testament to show that the people of Israel are a type of the church. In 1 Corinthians 5 Paul says, “Our Passover, Christ, also has been sacrificed” (v. 7b). After the descendants of Abraham became a people, they eventually fell into the hand of Egypt and its king, Pharaoh. Pharaoh typifies Satan, and Egypt typifies the world. This means that God’s chosen people fell into the hand of Satan and Satan’s world, so there was the need of God’s salvation to save them.
God’s salvation must first be judicial. God cannot come to save us nonsensically. Because God has to carry out His salvation judicially, there was a need of redemption for God’s salvation. In Exodus we see two things. First, there is redemption, and then immediately following redemption, there is salvation. Redemption is to redeem God’s fallen people back to God, and salvation is God’s saving His people out of the hand of Satan, out of the world, and eventually, even out of themselves for God to come in to make them the same as He is. So in Exodus we see that first a lamb was slain and the shed blood was sprinkled on the houses of Israel. That was called the passover. This means that God, the just God, the righteous God, formed something judicial to redeem His people by fulfilling His righteous requirements. That was God’s redemption.
Then immediately following that redemption, God exercised His salvation to save Israel out of Pharaoh’s hand, out of Egypt, and bring them into the wilderness. In the wilderness God came to be a “tabernacle,” indicating how He would come to dwell with His people to save them further and further so that they might become God in life and nature but not in the Godhead. This is God’s salvation.
Paul says in 1 Corinthians 5 that our Passover is Christ. Christ became our Redeemer to accomplish a passover by which God could pass over us, having our sin judged and dealt with by Christ on the cross. First Corinthians 5 also says that following the Passover, Israel had the Feast of Unleavened Bread (v. 8). After God’s redemption and in God’s salvation, God ordained that His people should have no sin, no leaven, a feast without leaven. This was the beginning of the history of Israel, and this beginning is fulfilled by the church’s experience of Christ. By this you can see that with Israel it is a type, and with the church it is a fulfillment.
At the end of the New Testament, the Lord Jesus called the degraded church, Jezebel (Rev. 2:20). Jezebel was an evil woman as a wife to that evil king, Ahab (1 Kings 16:31; 19:1-2; 21:23, 25-26; 2 Kings 9:7). She did many demonic things. She is a type of the church becoming degraded and falling absolutely into Satan’s hand and even mixed with Satan as one. The fallen church became Jezebel and is called the great Babylon, the mystery (Rev. 17:5). Eventually, the outcome of the church is the same as that of Israel. Israel’s outcome was to be captured to Babylon. Eventually, they became Babylon. In Revelation 17 the Lord called the degraded church the great harlot, the great Babylon, and the mother of harlots (vv. 1, 5). This shows that the church is a fulfillment of the type of Israel. So the entire history of Israel is a type of the church.
In the type of Israel there is a great part concerning the kings. The kings are the representatives of Israel and the top ones. Israel was mainly enjoying the good land. They had everything of their living from the source of the good land. The top ones, who were enjoying the good land on the top level, were the kings. These kings are types of the New Testament believers because all the New Testament believers were saved by God to be kings. Every New Testament believer is to be a king and a priest (1 Pet. 2:9; Rev. 1:6; 5:10; 2 Tim. 2:12).
Both the kings and the priests are the deputy authority of God. The deputy authority of God is composed of God’s oracle to speak and God’s authority to rule. In the Old Testament the first group ordained by God to speak for Him as His oracle was called the priests. Actually, God entrusted to the priests not only the speaking part of His deputy authority but also the ruling part. Thus, the priests were the speakers and also the kings. God, however, does not want a king to replace Him. He just wants His authority to be exercised. So at the beginning of Israel’s history with the priests, there was no king, but they did have the Urim and the Thummim. The Urim and the Thummim were a deputy authority for both God’s speaking and God’s ruling (Exo. 28:30; Lev. 8:8). Because Israel adopted the custom of the nations, they wanted to have a king. Thus, God gave them a negative king named Saul. Actually, God Himself was their King already. Israel’s real king was not a human person but God Himself.
In the New Testament all the believers were saved to be kings and priests. When the priests speak for God, they become God’s spokesmen, God’s mouthpiece, and these are the prophets. So in the New Testament we believers are kings, priests, and prophets. The kings of the Old Testament are a type, and this type is fulfilled by the New Testament believers being kings. These are the people who enjoy Christ to the uttermost.
Romans 5:17 says that “those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life.” John 1 says that when God came in His incarnation, grace came (vv. 14, 17). When God came to be a man, that was grace coming. Grace is the Triune God as our enjoyment. We all have received this grace in abundance. It is not just abundant grace but abounding grace, which is increasing all the time. We have received this grace, and we have received a gift from God, which is also abounding. This gift is God’s righteousness for our redemption judicially. Thus, we have received these two things: grace and righteousness. These are for us to reign in life, to be kings in life.
If we have not reached the level of a king in our Christian life, we are still below the proper standard. We may say that we enjoy Christ, but to what degree, to what extent, do we enjoy Christ? Our enjoyment of Christ may be only “one inch high,” but Christ is unlimited. Our enjoyment of Christ should come up to the kingship level. As the God-ordained prophets and priests, we are also kings to rule over all the enemies of God. God rules, but He does not rule directly. God rules through us, through the believers, as kings. The believers in the New Testament should be the fulfillment of the typology of the kings in God’s economy.
Now we need to see how we can be such kings. We can be such kings only by being men regenerated with God and transformed with God as the element so that we live not by our own life, by ourselves, by our natural man, or by our flesh. Instead, we live by God who is now mingling Himself with us as one. The believers’ life is to live such a human yet divine life. It is in this life that we can be kings to enjoy our God-ordained portion, which is Christ as our good land.
Our fellowship here is not a man’s teaching or some kind of theology discovered by Bible students. This is a revelation, just like the book of Revelation. The book of Revelation presents a view, not teachings. My fellowship here is a revelation showing you a view. It is altogether not a record of doctrines or facts in black and white.
Now we need to consider where we should be according to this revelation. We all have to answer, “We should be in resurrection.” The resurrection of Christ eventually should become the place where we stay. We were God’s created people who became fallen. Now we are God’s redeemed people based upon His choosing of us, and we are also God’s regenerated and transformed people who have been transformed with God’s element to make us God-men. Now we are here in resurrection. To be in resurrection means to deny everything old to become something new and live by the element of newness, which is the divine life, God Himself.
In resurrection we have become God’s new creation (2 Cor. 5:17; Gal. 6:15). This new creation is God’s re-created, regenerated, transformed people. This is also the church in localities and the Body of Christ universally. Whether in the church locally or for the Body of Christ universally, we should be persons in resurrection.
Do not forget that when you open your mouth to speak Christ into people, you become God’s oracle and God’s prophet. Then you become a good priest. Samuel was such a person. He was not a priest from the tribe of Levi according to God’s ordination. But he became a priest by prophesying for God, and this priest brought in the kingship. Thus, when you speak, you will be a prophet. Then your prophetic ministry will bring you into the kingship.
