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The Bible shows us that God’s coming to be man’s life is for His building. God is building His eternal dwelling place with Himself as life and man as the material. Therefore, on the one hand, life is a line that runs through the Scriptures, and on the other hand, building is also a line that runs through the Scriptures. Actually, these two lines are two sides of the same line; they are inseparable. Wherever there is life, there is building. Life and building cannot be separated.
From the beginning Genesis 2 shows the story of life by speaking of the tree of life; at the same time, it also shows us building materials—gold, bdellium, and onyx stone. When we first read the Bible, we may not be clear why it speaks of gold, bdellium, and onyx stone. But when we read further, we can see that these materials are for God’s building. This is because we see the manifestation of a building at the end of the Bible, one which has been built with gold, pearl, and precious stones and in which there is the tree of life.
In the universe the New Jerusalem shows us the story of life and building. Life is inward—the center; building is outward—the perimeter. Life is for building, and building is the issue of life. Therefore, these two points are really two sides of the same matter. We can never separate life and building. Where there is life, there is building. However, we need to look at these two lines separately so that we may understand them more clearly. In the previous chapter we saw the line of life; now we will look at the line of building.
The Bible is the explanation of God; even more, it is the explanation of God’s desire. What does God desire to gain in the universe? This is a big question. Many saints have tried to tell us what God is doing in the universe, yet their explanations never hit the mark. In the recent years we have gradually come to see very clearly, based on the Word of God, that God’s desire is to gain a city—the New Jerusalem. This is because the whole Bible, from the beginning to the end, ultimately shows us that God gains the New Jerusalem. God in Christ puts Himself into the city and makes His home in the city. When the city is manifested, God is fully satisfied. God can rest, because that city is also His resting place.
If we are willing to take the time to survey the entire Bible, we will see clearly the focus of God’s desire. In the beginning of Genesis God did not have a home. Isaiah 66:1 clearly says that even though heaven was His throne and the earth was His footstool, He did not have a resting place. He did not have a place in which He could dwell; He did not have a place in which He could rest. He was a God without a dwelling place; He was a homeless God. Therefore, He created. In particular, He created man. If we read on from Genesis 1 in a thorough way, we can see so many pictures, each one being more definite and more clearly drawn than the one preceding it. The final picture will show that this once homeless God has been able to make His home in a city, a city that is His eternal dwelling place, His eternal resting place. Once we have gained this perspective, we will understand that God’s eternal desire is to gain a resting place. Therefore, what God is doing in this universe is building His dwelling place.
The Bible shows us two crucial points. First, God wants to gain a dwelling place in the universe; second, God is building this dwelling place with Himself as life. Therefore, in the beginning of Genesis, immediately after God created man, He placed Himself as the tree of life in front of man for man to eat and receive. God put Himself in front of man in the form of the tree of life. According to His concept, God is not concerned with man worshipping or serving Him; He cares that man would receive Him and take Him in as food so that He can become man’s inward enjoyment and inward element.
God is doing this so that He and man can be built together. If He wanted man only to worship and serve Him, man would not need to be built by Him. In order for man to be built with Him, He must enter into man and mingle with man to become man’s inward element. Therefore, after He created man, He did not appear to man as One sitting on a throne to be worshipped and served. Instead, He put Himself as an edible tree in front of man to be received.
How do we know that His becoming man’s inward element and man’s life are for building? As we have said numerous times, Genesis 2 is a picture. In the beginning we see the tree of life growing, and later, we see a river flowing. Both the tree and the river are symbols; they both signify life. Next, wherever the river flows, there is gold, bdellium, and onyx stone. These are materials for building. Later, when the children of Israel erected the tabernacle, the things inside the tabernacle were made of pure gold, and precious stones were mounted on the breastplate and the shoulder pieces of the high priest. When the high priest entered into the tabernacle, only pure gold and precious stones could be seen. Thus, we should realize that gold, pearl, and precious stones are for building. After the temple was built and the high priest entered into the temple with his shoulder pieces and breastplate, it was a scene still full of gold and precious stones. In the New Testament the apostle Paul says that the church is built with gold, silver, and precious stones (1 Cor. 3:12). In the end, when the New Jerusalem is manifested, the city is altogether of gold, pearl, and precious stones.
Thus, when we compare the two pictures in Genesis 2 and Revelation 21, we see that the first picture reveals life and building materials, but the materials have not yet been built together. The final picture not only has life and building materials, but the materials have been built into a building. This shows us that God’s building is accomplished when He enters into man to become man’s element and man’s life. The entire Bible shows us that God comes to be man’s life for the sake of His building. God’s building work is being carried out in whomever has God’s life; God’s building is accomplished through Him as life.
God wanted to build His dwelling place with man as the material, but before this task was accomplished, Satan came in to lure away the man that God wanted to use. In order to restore fallen man, however, God established a way of redemption for man through a sacrifice—the killing of the lamb and the shedding of its blood—so that he might come back to God. However, Satan came in again and caused man to refuse and reject God’s way of redemption. Consequently, man fell under the hand of Satan.
The first thing Cain did after he had followed Satan was to build the city of Enoch (Gen. 4:17). The last city in the Bible is the New Jerusalem, and the first city is the city of Enoch built by Cain. This city was the beginning of man producing a culture for himself, making a living for his existence, and fully cooperating with Satan and setting God aside. The ultimate city, the New Jerusalem, will be the union of man and God, the expression of God within man; yet the city of Enoch was the expression of Satan within man. Therefore, the city of Enoch was developed to the extent of being filled with every manner of evil and corruption, and Satan’s evil nature was fully expressed through it.
When God could tolerate it no longer, He destroyed this city with the flood. God’s destruction of the people of that generation included His destruction of that city. But out of that city God saved Noah and his family of eight so that they might serve Him in another position.
However, some of Noah’s descendants still followed and cooperated with Satan; so Satan’s second city appeared—the city of Babel. God destroyed the first city, but Satan built a second city. The city of Babel is the city of Babylon; Babel is Hebrew and Babylon is Greek. From this point on, a city in opposition to Jerusalem has been in existence.
Beginning with Genesis 11 the Bible repeatedly shows us two cities—the city of Babel and the city of Jerusalem. Babel is the city of Satan, a building related to the union of man and the devil; Jerusalem is a building related to the union of man and God. Throughout the whole Bible, Babel is always in opposition to Jerusalem. At the city of Babel the joint rebellion of Satan and man against God reached its peak. Man rejected God’s authority and wanted to exalt himself to the heavens to replace God. Therefore, God was forced to come down and confound his language; He judged man. Both of these cities were preemptive counterfeits by Satan to keep God from completing His building.
After the judgment of Babel, God called Abraham out of this place of man’s rebellion, out from among the rebellious people. God called him out of Babel, telling him to leave his land, his relatives, and his father’s house and to go to the land of Canaan. God promised the land of Canaan to him and to his seed for the building of God’s dwelling place.
God promised Abraham a portion of land and a group of descendants. The portion of land was the base for the building work, and the group of descendants were the materials for the building work. God’s intention was to build the seed of Abraham, the children of Israel, into God’s dwelling place in the land of Canaan. This was God’s selection.
God chose Abraham, called him, and promised him a portion of land and a group of descendants. At that time Abraham did not fully understand why God gave him such a promise. When Abraham passed away, his son Isaac inherited this promise. When Isaac passed away, Jacob came. We all know the story of Jacob. As a young man, Jacob fled to a distant land because he offended his brother. Genesis 28 says that while he was fleeing from his brother, he spent the night in the wilderness and received a revelation in a dream—a revelation concerning Bethel. When Jacob went to sleep, his pillow was a stone. In his dream a ladder was set up on the earth, and it reached to heaven. Angels of God were ascending and descending on it, and Jehovah was standing above it and speaking to him. After he woke up, he said that this place was the gate of heaven. He called the name of this place Bethel—the house of God. He also took the stone from under his head, set it up as a pillar, and poured oil on top of it, saying that the stone would be the house of God, Bethel. Through a dream God revealed His need and desire to have a house.
The significance of this dream is very rich. First, the dream reveals a homeless man and a homeless God. At that time Jacob was a wandering homeless man, and even God did not have a home in the universe. Second, this dream shows that God’s house links heaven and earth and joins God and man. Third, God’s house is not merely a place but a stone with oil poured upon it. It is not merely the land of Luz; it is Jacob, represented by a stone with oil poured upon it, becoming Bethel, the house of God.
A stone denotes a regenerated person. Previously, we were clay, but once we receive the Lord and His life, we are changed in nature to become a stone. As soon as Peter confessed that the Lord was the Christ, the Lord said to him, “You are Peter” (Matt. 16:18). Peter means “a stone.” Later, in his Epistle Peter says that the believers are living stones who are being built up as a spiritual house (1 Pet. 2:5). In the Bible oil always signifies the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the manifestation of God, the transfiguration of God, and God’s reaching of man and entering into man. Oil being poured upon the stone signifies God reaching man and entering into man to be in union with him. This union of God and man is the house of God, Bethel. At this point, God’s desire to have a house in the universe was revealed.
Without Bethel, man would be homeless on the earth and God would not have a resting place in the universe. Both God and man need this house. This house, which links heaven and earth and joins God and man, is built up with God as oil poured upon those who are saved as stones.
Even though Jacob dreamed this dream and received a vision, he foolishly still went on to his uncle Laban in Paddan-aram and foolishly returned from Paddan-aram to Canaan, the land of his father and his ancestors. Later, due to the matter of eating, he went down to Egypt with his sons, altogether forgetting God’s revelation. While in Egypt, his descendants cared only for the matter of eating and ended up falling under Satan’s usurpation. As Abraham’s grandson, Jacob was the seed of Abraham, and his descendants were also the seed of Abraham. God promised seed to Abraham as building materials; but due to the matter of eating, this seed went down to Egypt and was usurped by Satan.
First, Abraham went down to Egypt for food. Then Jacob and his descendants went down to Egypt and stayed there for food. In the entire Bible, whenever God’s people went down to Egypt, it was always for food and pleasure. Egypt had an abundance of food, and the Nile was rich in its produce; so there was food and pleasure. However, do not forget that while the world gives food and pleasure, it also usurps. If we desire its food and pleasure, we will be under its usurpation. Thus, God’s people, whom God prepared as building materials, were kept in Egypt and usurped by Satan.
While the children of Israel were in Egypt, the Bible specifically says that Pharaoh ordered them to build two cities. They had to find straw and make fire to burn clay bricks for building these cities. All these stories have significance in the Bible. As the people of God, the children of Israel should have been building a dwelling place for God. However, due to their desire for food and pleasure, they fell into bondage under the hand of the Egyptians and were building two cities for Pharaoh instead. The city of God is built with gold and precious stones, but the cities of Egypt, like the city of Babel, were built with bricks of clay. Babel is opposite of Jerusalem; Egypt, from another direction, also is opposite of Jerusalem. According to the books of prophecy, when God’s people were not firm in their standing, they either went to Babylon or went down to Egypt. These two places—Egypt and Babylon—are in rivalry with Jerusalem; they are in opposition to Jerusalem. In Babel man built a city with bricks of clay; in Egypt man also built cities with bricks of clay. These cities were clayish and earthly, and they were for man; they were not heavenly, and they were not for God. God wants His people to build a heavenly dwelling place, but the children of Israel fell to Egypt and were usurped by Pharaoh to build earthly cities for Satan.
Of course, God could not tolerate His building materials remaining in Egypt under Satan’s usurpation, so He came in to deliver the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt. After God delivered them, He charged them to set up a tabernacle for Him, in which all the furnishings and boards had to be overlaid with gold and the breastplate and the shoulder pieces of the high priest had to be inlaid with precious stones. In Egypt the children of Israel built Egyptian cities with bricks of clay; after they came out of Egypt, they built God’s tabernacle with gold and precious stones. What a great difference there is when the two cities are compared!
After God delivered the children of Israel, His desire was fulfilled to a certain extent—the children of Israel erected a tabernacle for God. Even though the tabernacle was only temporary and physical, God filled it with His glory, taking it as His dwelling place after its erection. Strictly speaking, the tabernacle was only a figure; God’s real dwelling place was the children of Israel. The tabernacle symbolized the children of Israel coordinated to become God’s dwelling place. God’s dwelling in the tabernacle indicates His dwelling among the children of Israel. This is clearly seen at the end of Exodus 29.
After the children of Israel came to the foot of Mount Sinai and became a corporate entity, in the eyes of God, they were His spiritual house. However, in their midst God had a symbol, a figure—the tabernacle. The tabernacle being among them signified that they were a group of people who were coordinated and built up to become the dwelling place of God. God had a visible dwelling place on the earth, and His glory was able to rest in this tabernacle. At this point God’s desire was fulfilled in figure.
After setting up the tabernacle under God’s leading, the children of Israel went on their journey, defeated enemies on the way, entered Canaan, destroyed enemies in the land, possessed the entire land, and set up and established the tabernacle at Shiloh. Finally, God had a secure dwelling place. Satan, however, came in again to corrupt, in particular, the priests who served God in the tabernacle. During Eli’s time his two sons, who were priests, were very corrupt; they represented the corruptness of all the children of Israel. Not only was the house of Eli corrupt, but the house of Israel was also corrupt. Consequently, the tabernacle and the Ark were both devastated; the Ark was captured, and the tabernacle became desolate. This was Satan’s corruption of God’s building, God’s house, on the earth.
While Satan was carrying out his corrupting work, God raised up Samuel, a Nazarite of voluntary consecration. While the house of Eli was utterly forsaking God, Samuel was absolutely seeking God. According to the account in 1 Samuel, the boy Samuel was in complete contrast to the house of Eli. The house of Eli forsook God, but the boy Samuel sought God. Due to Samuel’s rising up, King David was brought in. Samuel was the heir of the preceding age and a forerunner of the subsequent age. Before Samuel there were priests and judges, and since Samuel was both a priest and a judge, he was an heir of the preceding age. After Samuel there were kings and prophets. Samuel was a prophet who brought in the kingship. He was truly a pivotal figure who gained the inheritance from the preceding age and ushered in the succeeding age. It was Samuel who brought in David.
Once David was raised up, he had the desire to find a resting place for the Ark of God, so he wanted to build a temple for God. However, God allowed him only to prepare the materials. It was his son Solomon who rose up and completed the building of the temple. The temple was more permanent and solid than the tabernacle. On the day of the completion of the building of the temple, the glory of God filled the temple in an unprecedented way. This signified that God had come to the earth to dwell among the children of Israel in an unprecedented way because He had a secure and solid building on the earth.
Regrettably, this condition did not last long; Satan’s destruction came in once again. Just as he had corrupted the tabernacle, he also destroyed the temple. The descendants of Solomon were corrupt, and the house of Israel became desolate; as a result, the Babylonians came. We need to remember that Abraham came out of Babylon, and after he came to the land of Canaan, his descendants built Jerusalem. The Babylonians, sent by Satan, pushed their way into Jerusalem; they destroyed the city, tore down the temple, and carried the descendants of Abraham back to Babylon, to the very place from which Abraham had been delivered. Even the vessels in the temple for the worship of God were carried away to Babylon and placed in the temple of idols. All this shows how Babylon is opposed to God’s building.
At the fulfillment of the seventy years of the captivity of the children of Israel, Ezra brought a group of people back to rebuild the holy temple, and Nehemiah brought a group of people back to rebuild the holy city. The recovery of the children of Israel was the recovery of the building. The children of Israel were free to return to Jerusalem; this did not stir up any opposition. But when they wanted to build the holy temple and the holy city, enemies from all around rose up to oppose them. Here I would like to tell the children of God that there might not be any opposition today as we recover spiritual truth; however, if we are here to recover the building, the enemy will definitely do all he can to oppose this. Satan may allow the recovery of God’s people, but he will fight the recovery of God’s building. This is where Nehemiah’s faithfulness was demonstrated. The book of Nehemiah speaks of how Nehemiah went to Jerusalem and inspected its walls; all his thoughts and concerns were on these walls, that is, on the building. He held a sword with one hand and worked with the other hand. He was fighting while he was building (Neh. 4:17). Where there is building, there is warfare, because what the enemy hates the most is the building work. This brings us to the end of the Old Testament. All these are merely symbols; the tabernacle is a symbol, and Jerusalem is also a symbol.
The building work in the Old Testament was merely a figure; in the New Testament God actually comes to carry out His building work. John 1:14 says, “The Word became flesh and tabernacled among us.” Here we see that the incarnation of the Lord Jesus was God’s tabernacling among men. In John 2 the Lord Jesus also said that the flesh He put on was the temple of God and that the Jews would destroy this temple, but in three days He would raise it up (v. 19). We should not apply the Lord’s raising up of the temple in three days just to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Himself. We should realize that when the Lord Jesus resurrected, He also regenerated all of us who belong to Him (1 Pet. 1:3); thus, in resurrection He built all of us who have received His life into a mystical Body, which is the temple of God. Before the Lord went through death and resurrection, His body was merely His own body. But after His death and resurrection He gained another Body. This is His mystical Body, a corporate Body, which is the church. This Body is the temple that God intends to build in the universe. When the Lord Jesus said in Matthew 16:18, “Upon this rock I will build My church,” He was referring to this building.
According to the major part of the record of the New Testament, the building of the church involves the Lord Jesus coming as the Spirit with His resurrection life to those who have received Him in order to build them as living stones into His Body, the living temple of God. Peter says that the believers “as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house” (1 Pet. 2:5). Paul also says that we are the Body of Christ, “being built together into a dwelling place of God in spirit” (Eph. 2:22). Moreover, Paul says that as God’s fellow workers, the apostles were working together with God for His building (1 Cor. 3:9).
I would like to tell you, brothers and sisters, that in all of Paul’s Epistles, all the words rendered “edify” in Chinese are build in Greek. Today the so-called “edification of the saints” among Christians actually means “building up of the saints” in the original language. Today God’s emphasis is not on edification but on building. Edification is for building. Edification causes people to become vessels and materials; building coordinates the vessels, the materials, together so that they become a dwelling place. The ultimate teaching in the New Testament is not for individual spirituality but for our being built together. Individual spirituality certainly has its value, but without being built together, we cannot attain God’s goal. God’s ultimate goal is not to gain neatly edified stones but to gain a complete, built-up dwelling place.
When the church is built up, a city will be manifested. The final scene, the last picture in the Bible, is a city, which is God’s tabernacle, God’s dwelling place on the earth among men. It is also the bride whom Christ will marry. The New Jerusalem is built with all those who are saved in the Old Testament and the New Testament, and it is also the crystallization of God’s work on the earth throughout the ages. The ultimate crystallization of God’s work of saving people, leading people, and perfecting people throughout the ages is so that they may be built up together to become His eternal dwelling place.
We need to remember that the New Jerusalem is always opposed by the city of Babylon built by Satan. In Revelation we see two women and two cities. One is the harlot, the city of Babylon, and the other is the holy woman, the New Jerusalem. The New Jerusalem is the union of God and man; the city of Babylon is the collusion of Satan and man. The work that God is doing on the earth today is to build the New Jerusalem; the work that Satan is doing among people is to organize the city of Babylon. Just as the New Jerusalem is God’s dwelling place, Babylon is Satan’s lodging place. Just as the New Jerusalem is the expression of God among redeemed humanity, Babylon is the manifestation of Satan among fallen humanity. However, in the end God destroys Babylon, and in Revelation 19 and 21 the New Jerusalem is manifested. At this point God’s building work will be complete.
The Bible presents the tree of life and some materials—gold, bdellium, and precious stones at the beginning; at the end a city built with gold, pearl, and precious stones is manifested, having the tree of life as its content. This is the building that God wants to gain in the universe.
