Message 107
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Scripture Reading: Exo. 27:4-7; 38:5; Isa. 53:8, 10a; 2 Pet. 3:18; 2 Cor. 5:21; Rom. 3:23-26; Heb. 9:14; Gal. 3:13-14; Acts 1:8; 2:38; Eph. 1:13-14; Gal. 3:3
In 27:1-8, verses 1 through 3 are on the outward appearance of the altar, but verses 4 through 8 are on the inward contents of the altar. What is difficult to understand concerning the altar is not the outward appearance; it is the inward contents. The contents of the altar are the grating and the four rings, through which were placed the poles used in carrying the altar.
A part of the altar that is related to the inward contents is the ledge. We have pointed out that the Hebrew word may also be rendered border, margin, or rim. No one can say definitely what this ledge was. I believe that it was used to protect the four walls of the altar from heat. The Bible does not tell us how wide the ledge was. I believe that it went down to the grating, which was at half the height of the altar. There were one and one-half cubits above the grating and another one and one-half cubits below it. Thus, the grating divided the altar in half.
The more I study the portion in Exodus 27 concerning the altar, the more assured I am that the ledge protected the walls from the scorching heat of the fire burning on the grating. The fire burned continually for years. If there had been no protection for the walls, the acacia wood underneath the bronze would have been charred. Therefore, the ledge must have served as a protection. The grating used for holding the wood and the sacrifices was underneath the ledge.
In the foregoing message we pointed out that the four rings typify the Spirit. These rings have two aspects. The first is that they were connected to the grating. This means that the rings were one with the grating. Therefore, the grating was not separate from the four rings. Rather, the rings belonged to the grating and with it formed one piece of work. Second, according to 38:5, these four rings were for the poles used in carrying the ark. There were two rings on each side of the altar.
I would emphasize the fact that the contents of the altar are the grating with the four rings. Some expositions of Exodus speak of the acacia wood and the bronze. These matters, however, are somewhat superficial. It is common for expositors to point out that the acacia wood signifies the humanity of the Lord Jesus, that the bronze signifies the righteous judgment of God, and that the four horns of the altar signify the power and strength of the redemption of Christ. The redeeming blood was sprinkled on these horns. Furthermore, the blood of the same sacrifice was brought into the Holy Place and sprinkled on the four horns on the incense altar, and also brought into the Holy of Holies to be sprinkled on the propitiatory cover of the ark. Since such matters are not so deep or mysterious, it is somewhat easy for expositors to understand their significance. But expositors may not have much to say concerning the grating and the four rings. In this message I am burdened to speak regarding the mysteries of the redemption of Christ as signified by the grating and the rings, which are types, or figures, of these mysteries.
In the human body, the skin, the flesh, and the bones are not as mysterious as the inward parts, especially the soul and the spirit. Our psychological part, the soul, is made up of the mind, the emotion, and the will. The soul, although not as deep as the spirit, is mysterious. Inside the soul and surrounded by it, we have the spirit. Thus, our psychological and spiritual parts are the true mysteries of our being. The inner content of every person is the soul and the spirit. In the same principle, the inner content of the altar is the grating with the four rings.
The grating depicts the mystery of Christ’s redemption. The wood and the sacrifices were placed on the grating to be burned. The grating was the place where the fire was burning. Without the grating, there could be no burning, for the burning was on the grating. Furthermore, we have seen that the grating was at half the height of the altar, reaching from side to side halfway between the top and the bottom. The fact that there were one and one-half cubits below the grating indicates that it was on the same level as the propitiation-cover on the ark in the Holy of Holies. This indicates that the grating comes up to the standard of the propitiation-cover. When Paul speaks of the redemption of Christ in Romans 3:24-25, he definitely says that God made the redeeming Christ our propitiation-cover.
When the altar was carried, the poles were on the shoulders of a number of persons. These poles were placed in the rings. The weight of the grating with the wood and the sacrifices rested upon these four rings. This indicates that the entire redemption of Christ is upon the four rings, which are a type of the eternal Spirit. This should help us to have a clear understanding of the Spirit. Because of shallow, inadequate teaching, not many Christians realize that the redemption of Christ rests upon the power of the eternal Spirit. The wood and the sacrifices were on the grating. Thus, the grating bore the weight to accomplish the burning. This burning signifies the accomplishment of redemption. The weight of accomplishing redemption was on the grating. But what bore the weight of the grating? This weight was borne by the four rings, a type of the eternal Spirit.
It is correct to say that it was not the four rings that accomplished redemption. The burning for the accomplishment of redemption took place on the grating. The grating signifies Christ, and the rings signify the Spirit. Christ, not the Spirit, was the One who accomplished redemption. We have absolutely no doubt concerning this. But where does the grating stand? Is it supported by its own strength? Apart from the four rings, the grating had no support. Both when the altar was at rest and when it was carried, the grating was upheld by the rings. There was no other support, no other upholding power. To repeat, the grating was upheld by the four rings. Yes, the burning was accomplished by the grating. But the upholding power is in the rings, not in the grating itself. Hebrews 9:14 speaks concerning this: “How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.” It was through the eternal Spirit Christ offered Himself to God as our sin offering.
During the years I was with the Brethren, I was never told that Christ offered Himself by the Spirit and through the Spirit. Have you ever heard a message on Christ offering Himself to God by and through the eternal Spirit? Christians do not ordinarily speak this way, for not many have this knowledge. Because they do not have the knowledge, they do not use the language of Hebrews 9:14. Nevertheless, such a word is found in Hebrews 9:14.
The all-inclusive Christ died an all-inclusive death through the eternal Spirit. He died through the Spirit who is eternal, the Spirit who is without beginning or ending. Such a mysterious event actually took place in human history, but it is neglected by unbelieving historians. No history book will ever tell you that the all-inclusive Christ offered Himself through the eternal Spirit.
I first came to know Hebrews 9:14 many years ago. However, I did not understand the meaning of this verse. What does it mean to say that Christ offered Himself to God as a sin offering through the eternal Spirit? This is not easy to understand.
What is the significance of the phrase “through the eternal Spirit”? Why was it necessary for Christ to die on the cross through the Spirit? Was Christ not almighty, and was He not able to do everything necessary to accomplish redemption? Why then did He need the eternal Spirit in order to die on the cross? My burden in this message is to present a picture concerning this matter. This picture will lead to a conclusion, and the conclusion will then become the answer to the question of why Christ offered Himself through the eternal Spirit.
Christ is both God and man. Christ did not become a man suddenly. Rather, He became a man according to the normal process of conception and delivery. He was conceived in the womb of Mary, and nine months later He was born. Then for thirty-three and a half years the Lord Jesus lived on earth as a man. Eventually He went to the cross and died there as a man. But although He lived and died as a man, He was also God; hence, He was a God-man. According to Isaiah 9:6, the Lord as the child born to us in a manger was called the mighty God. But although He was God, He lived on earth not as God, but as a man. Furthermore, He was conceived by the Holy Spirit. According to Matthew 1 and Luke 2, the man Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit. When He came forth to minister as a man from Nazareth, He was anointed by the Spirit. At the time of His baptism, the Holy Spirit descended upon Him (Matt. 3:16). In all His life He was full of the Spirit and continually under the leading of the Spirit (Luke 4:1). He lived, moved, acted, worked, and ministered altogether under the leading of the Spirit. He did not do anything apart from this leading Spirit.
Elsewhere I have pointed out that the Lord Jesus lived a crucified life. Now we must see that He lived such a crucified life according to the leading of the Holy Spirit. Moreover, in Matthew 12 we see that He cast out demons by the power of the Spirit. Therefore, the Lord was a man who did everything under the leading of the Spirit and by the power of the Spirit. He did not act according to His own will, wishes, or desires. He lived, moved, and acted according to the Spirit.
When the time came for the Lord Jesus to die on the cross, He did not go to the cross according to His own wishes or desire. Rather, His going to the cross was according to the leading of the Holy Spirit. His entire life had been lived according to the Spirit. Thus, His going to the cross was also according to the Spirit’s leading. On the cross the Lord Jesus died an all-inclusive death, a death that took away the sin of the world, destroyed Satan, judged the world, terminated the old creation, and abolished the handwriting of the law. Such an all-inclusive death was accomplished through the eternal Spirit.
During His life on earth, the Lord would not do even a small thing apart from the Spirit. Even His going to the wilderness was under the leading of the Spirit. Certainly when He died an all-inclusive death on Calvary, He would not do this apart from the leading of the Holy Spirit. Thus, when Christ died on the cross, He died through the Spirit.
In Hebrews 9 there is a comparison between the animal sacrifices offered by the priests in the Old Testament and the unique sacrifice of Christ offered to God through the eternal Spirit. When the priests offered the sacrifices, they did not offer them through the Holy Spirit. On the contrary, they did it by themselves. Therefore, what they did was of little effect; it could not be powerful. This was the reason the sacrifices needed to be offered again and again each year on the day of atonement. But Christ as the High Priest offered Himself to God as the sin offering through the eternal Spirit once for all, through One who is without beginning or ending. Therefore, what Christ offered is powerful and efficacious.
Now we have an answer to the question of why Christ needed to offer Himself through the eternal Spirit. We have seen that as a man He did not do anything on His own. Everything He did was under the leading of the Spirit and by the power of the eternal Spirit. This is signified by the four rings on the grating. The full weight of the grating was borne by the rings. Therefore, what is accomplished by the grating is powerful and efficacious. This means that the power, the strength, and the efficacy of the redemption accomplished by the grating depends on the four rings. The power of Christ’s redemption depends on the eternal Spirit.
In the New Testament whenever the redemption of Christ is preached, it is preached with the power of the Holy Spirit. It is never proclaimed apart from the Spirit. If we had the grating without the four rings, the grating would lose its strength and power. I repeat, the power of the grating relies on the four rings. This signifies that the power, strength, and effectiveness of Christ’s redemption relies on the Holy Spirit.
Although I was born into Christianity and raised in Christianity, I never heard a message telling me that Christ’s redemption is linked to the Holy Spirit. I heard many messages on Christ’s accomplishment of redemption, but not a word on the connection between redemption and the Holy Spirit. This preaching of the gospel is very different from that of Peter, John, and Paul. When Peter preached the gospel on the day of Pentecost, he did not say that those who were baptized would receive redemption. He said that the ones baptized would receive the promise of the Spirit. God in ancient times promised a great blessing to our forefather, Abraham. That great blessing is the Holy Spirit (Gal. 3:14). We need to be baptized because we need to receive this blessing. This was the reason Peter told the people to repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ in order to receive the promised Spirit (Acts 2:38-39). Paul preached the gospel in the same way. In Galatians 3 he says that Christ bore our curse on the cross so that through Him we may receive the promise of the Spirit.
When I was young, I never heard a message saying that Christ died for our sins so that we might receive the Spirit. I never heard such a gospel. I only heard that Christ died for our sins so that we might be forgiven and one day go to heaven. Those who preached this gospel knew about Christ dying for our sins and they knew about heaven, but they did not know the Spirit.
It is crucial for us to realize that apart from the Spirit the redemption of Christ is a lifeless redemption, a dead redemption. Even a human being is dead apart from the spirit. The reason we are alive is that we have the spirit. As soon as the spirit leaves a person’s body, the body becomes a corpse. The Bible regards sinners as dead ones because their spirit is dead. But we become alive when our spirit is enlivened and recovered. Just as a person is dead apart from the spirit, so the redemption of Christ is dead apart from the Holy Spirit. Many Christians today are preaching a dead redemption. They have a grating without the four rings. The Bible, however, declares a living redemption, a redemption typified by the grating with the four rings.
The redemption of Christ accomplished under the righteous judgment of God was signified by the bronze grating upheld by the four rings at its four ends. Christ’s redemption was accomplished not only through the Spirit but also unto the Spirit. This means that Christ’s redemption has an issue, a result. The result of the redemption of Christ is not merely the forgiveness of sins; it is not simply redemption itself, or salvation through redemption. The unique issue of the redemption of Christ is the Spirit.
In the Gospels Christ spoke of the coming of the Spirit. The Gospels even open with a word about Christ being the One who baptizes with the Holy Spirit. In the Gospel of John Christ spoke of the Spirit as another Comforter who was to come (14:16). Christ was the Forerunner who cut the way so that the Spirit, the other Comforter, could come. This was the reason that when He was about to die, He told the disciples that He would pray for the coming of the Spirit of reality.
The Gospel of John also tells us that the Spirit was not yet until Christ was glorified (7:39). After Christ’s resurrection, that is, after His glorification, He came to the disciples, breathed on them, and told them to receive the Holy Spirit (John 20:22). He told them to receive the second Comforter, the holy pneuma. Actually, this second One was the first. Christ Himself became the life-giving Spirit. Thus, the second is the reality of the first. Now this One has come into all the redeemed ones and is present with them, as revealed in Acts and the Epistles.
The Epistles speak of the Spirit in our spirit, the Holy Spirit in the human spirit. This is the main subject of the Epistles. Nevertheless, it has been neglected by most Christians and allowed to lie buried in the pages of the New Testament. When we bring forth such a “diamond” and minister concerning it, many oppose us and even call us heretical, insisting that it is contrary to the creeds and the councils to say that Christ is the life-giving Spirit. We have dug away many things to uncover this diamond. However, others value the very things dug away, the “dirt,” and depreciate the diamond. By this we can see the difference between the Lord’s recovery and today’s Christianity: they treasure the things that cover the diamonds, the “dirt,” but we sweep the dirt away in order to recover the diamonds. Hallelujah, my pockets are full of diamonds!
The book of Revelation speaks not only of the Spirit, but also of the seven Spirits, the sevenfold Spirit. This sevenfold Spirit can be compared to a seven-way lightbulb, a bulb with a sevenfold brightness. The Lord’s recovery is under a sevenfold light. The churches as the lampstands are under the sevenfold Spirit. How wonderful! Some Christians avoid the book of Revelation, thinking that this book is too mysterious and bothersome. But we are not bothered by this book — we are blessed and enlightened by it. Hallelujah, we have the Spirit, the life-giving Spirit, even the sevenfold Spirit!
According to Revelation 22:17, the Spirit and the bride speak as one. If I had been the writer of Revelation, this verse would have said, “Jesus Christ and His church say, Come.” But this verse clearly says, “The Spirit and the bride say, Come.”
My burden in this message concerns the relationship between the redemption of Christ and the Spirit. If we preach the redemption of Christ without the Spirit, we are pitiful preachers, and we are preaching a dead redemption. Where is the power of Christ’s redemption? The power of the redemption of Christ is in the Spirit.
We have pointed out again and again that the grating was connected to the four rings. These rings were also for the move of the altar. The altar was very heavy. If it were not for the poles in the rings, it would have been difficult to move it. This indicates that the Lord’s move depends on the Spirit. For this reason, the Lord Jesus told the disciples to wait at Jerusalem until they received power by the coming of the Holy Spirit upon them (Acts 1:8). Then they would be witnesses of Him in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and in the uttermost part of the world. This is the redemption of Christ, the cross of Christ, moving by the power of the Spirit upon the shoulders of human beings.
If we analyze the situation among Christians today, we shall see that there are the fundamentalists and the Pentecostalists. The fundamentalists have the objective redemption of Christ. This means that they only have the grating; they lack the four rings. The Pentecostalists, on the contrary, have some kind of rings, but the rings are not connected to the grating. The rings they have may be broken or may not be genuine. Thus, on the one side we have fundamentalists with the grating and no rings; on the other side, we have Pentecostalists with rings but no grating. But in the Lord’s recovery we have the grating, the four rings, and the two poles. Because we have the grating, the rings, and the poles, we can be bold and full of joy.
I would encourage you to read the New Testament again in the light of this picture of the altar with the grating, the rings, and the poles. In the Gospels we see Christ as the grating and the rings in the process of being formed. In the book of Acts the four rings appear. Then all the Epistles from Romans through Revelation reveal more concerning the rings, concluding with the sevenfold Spirit. This is the revelation in the New Testament. By this we see that the contents of the altar require the entire New Testament to be defined. The four Gospels portray the grating, and all the Epistles present a full picture of the four rings with the two poles. Praise the Lord for this clear picture showing how the redemption of Christ is living, powerful, and full of strength and efficacy before God and man!
