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At Bethel Jacob did some very significant things. He built an altar, set up a pillar, poured a drink offering upon the pillar, and then poured oil upon the pillar (Gen. 35:7, 14-15). In this message we shall consider Jacob's pouring the drink offering and the oil upon the pillar he had set up.
Remember that nearly every item mentioned in the book of Genesis is the seed of a truth developed in the following books of the Bible. Because 35:14 is the first mention of the drink offering, this verse is the seed of the drink offering. If we had only this verse, it would be difficult to know the meaning of the drink offering. In order to understand the significance of the drink offering, we must trace its development in both the Old Testament and in the New Testament.
We have pointed out that Jacob twice set up a pillar in Bethel. The first time he did not pour a drink offering upon the pillar; he simply poured oil upon it. The reason Jacob poured oil but not wine upon the pillar the first time was that in the Bible oil does not require very much experience on our part, but wine depends upon our experience. At the time of Jacob's first visit to Bethel, he did not have any experience of the Lord. Rather, he was a young supplanter and had no wine to pour out to the Lord. Thus, in chapter twenty-eight he could not pour out the drink offering. But twenty years later, after he had been touched by the Lord and had been somewhat transformed, he returned to Bethel. Because he had had some experience, he had wine to pour out upon the pillar as a drink offering to the Lord. Please keep in mind that the drink offering is absolutely related to our experience.
Although all the offerings are types of Christ and are for our experience, there is a difference between the basic offerings and the drink offering. The sin offering, one of the basic offerings, was a type of Christ for the experience of sinners. Before sinners come to offer the sin offering, they do not have any experience. They gain experience by presenting the sin offering to God. No experience is required beforehand. Before you can pour out a drink offering, however, you must have a measure of experience. Without experience, you will not be able to have this offering because the drink offering is composed of our experience of Christ.
In the first seven chapters of Leviticus we have the five basic offerings: the burnt offering, the meal offering, the peace offering, the sin offering, and the trespass offering. There is no need to experience Christ before you offer Him as these basic offerings. But the drink offering is absolutely dependent upon our experience. This is quite important. Many believers have no understanding of the basic offerings, much less an understanding of the drink offering. The reason for this is that they are short of the real experiences of Christ. By the Lord's mercy we in His recovery must experience Christ in a practical, daily way. Daily we should experience Him as our burnt offering, meal offering, peace offering, sin offering, and trespass offering. In the beginning we offer Christ only in this way. But as we progress in our experience of Christ, we eventually discover an offering that is in addition to these basic offerings — the drink offering.
Suppose a certain man has been saved for just one day. He certainly has had no time to have the experience of Christ. But if he remains in the proper church life, the saints will help him to realize that he needs to live by Christ, taking Christ as his life in a practical way. As he learns to live by Christ, he will gradually realize that Christ is so much to him. The saints will no doubt help him to see that Christ is his burnt offering. He will realize that he should be absolutely for God; however, he will find that he is not able to be absolute. Nevertheless, Christ is his absoluteness. Through this experience, Christ will become his burnt offering for God's satisfaction. Furthermore, he will enjoy Christ as his meal offering, as the One who not only satisfies God, but who also feeds and supplies him. Then he will daily take Christ as his food, and Christ will nourish him and support him to live in the presence of God that God might be satisfied. In this way he will experience Christ as the meal offering. In like manner, he will experience the other basic offerings. By experiencing Christ in this way, he will eventually become a person filled and saturated with Christ. The very Christ who saturates him will be his wine, and the brother himself will be saturated with this wine and actually become one with the wine.
Some may wonder what ground we have for saying that Christ is wine. This is not my word; it is the Lord's word in Matthew 9:17. In this verse the Lord said, "Neither do they put new wine into old wineskins; otherwise, the wineskins burst, and the wine pours out, and the wineskins are destroyed; but they put new wine into fresh wineskins, and both are preserved." The Lord spoke this word in His answer to some disciples of John the Baptist who asked Him why His disciples did not fast (Matt. 9:14). The Lord wisely answered their question in a marvelous way with two parables. Firstly, He said, "No one puts a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for that which fills it up pulls away from the garment, and a worse tear is made" (Matt. 9:16). Secondly, He spoke about not putting new wine into old wineskins. What is this new cloth and new wine? Both the new cloth and the new wine are Christ. The new cloth is Christ as our new, unique, complete, and perfect righteousness for us to be justified before God. As the new cloth Christ is our righteousness to cover us. The new wine is Christ as the stirring life, as the life that stirs us up to make us happy and even "crazy." To be "crazy" is to be drunken. Christ as the new cloth covers us outwardly and Christ as the new wine stirs us and makes us "crazy" inwardly. In other words, Christ causes us to be drunken. All Christians must be "crazy" like this.
In the summer of 1935 Brother Nee stayed in my home town. During this time we had a conference in which we were all "crazy." Brother Nee did not stir us up to be "crazy"; we were "crazy" already. When he saw how "crazy" we were, he gave us a supplementary message telling us that we all need to be "crazy," beside ourselves (2 Cor. 5:13). He said that if any Christian has never been "crazy," then he is not yet up to standard. He said, "If you are always nice, formal, gentle, and regulated, you are below standard. You must be `crazy' in the Lord like a drunkard."
Most Christians today are cold, quiet, and dead. The dead are formal and never make mistakes. The most regulated place on earth is a cemetery. Everyone there is quiet and orderly and never disturbs others. Most Christians are like this. Although they think this is beautiful, it is actually dreadful; it is a stench. Christians should be living. The reason many are not living is that they are short of the experiences of Christ. If we experience Christ day after day, eventually the Christ we experience will become wine in us. The more we experience Christ, the "crazier" we shall become. Since the time you were saved, how often have you been "crazy" in your fellowship with the Lord? Have you ever been in a state where you were so happy that you were not able to control yourself, even beside yourself with joy? Have you ever been so joyful that you did not know whether to jump, to dance, or to shout? The more we are "crazy" like this with the Lord, the better. Not only the young people, but even the older brothers and sisters should be "crazy" in their inner chamber with the Lord. As we are with the Lord, we must say, "Oh, what joy! What wine! I simply cannot stand it!" This is the experience of Christ as wine.
If we experience Christ as our sin offering time after time, this offering will eventually become wine. The reason is that Christ as the sin offering will make us happy and cause us to rejoice. However, if you very seldom enjoy Christ as your sin offering, it will not become wine in your experience. But if you experience Christ as the sin offering, and as the other basic offerings daily, Christ as all these offerings will become wine and cause you to be exceedingly happy and joyful. The more we experience Christ in all His riches, the more the elements of His riches will make us "crazy." Thus, whatever we experience of Christ will become our new wine.
In Matthew 9:16 and 17 the Lord told the disciples of John the Baptist that He came as the new cloth to cover us and as the new wine to satisfy us and to stir us up. How we need to experience Christ today! We need to experience Him as our burnt offering, meal offering, peace offering, sin offering, and trespass offering. Ultimately, our experience of Christ becomes the element within us stirring us up to be ecstatically happy. As we continue in this enjoyment, we shall even become one with the wine.
A drunkard is a man who has become one with the wine he drinks. Wine has saturated his whole being, and he even has the appearance and aroma of wine. We may say that this man is just wine. We Christians, like a drunkard saturated with wine, must be saturated with Christ until we become wine. Christ is the wine, but the wine must saturate us until it becomes us. When we become drunk of Christ and with Christ, we become wine to satisfy God, and we are qualified and ready to be a drink offering. The drink offering is not merely Christ Himself; it is the Christ who saturates us until Christ and we, we and Christ, become one.
In the first seven chapters of Leviticus, we have the basic offerings, but not the drink offering. The drink offering is mentioned in Leviticus 23:10-13, verses related to bringing the firstfruits of the harvest of the good land to the priest. Although the harvest was for the enjoyment of the children of Israel, they were required to bring the firstfruits of the harvest to God that He might have the first enjoyment. A sheaf of the firstfruits of the harvest was waved before the Lord. Hence, the firstfruits were a wave offering, typifying Christ in resurrection as the firstfruit being waved unto God (1 Cor. 15:20). Along with this sheaf of firstfruits, the children of Israel had to offer a burnt offering with a meal offering and a drink offering. It is in this context that the drink offering is mentioned in Leviticus.
There was no mention of the drink offering in connection with the five basic offerings in Leviticus 1 through 7 because at that time the offerers had no experience of Christ. They were like Jacob at Bethel the first time. But after they had entered into the good land, had experienced Christ, and had gained something to offer God, they were required to offer the drink offering to match their other offerings. Numbers 15:1-10 and 28:6-10 indicate that the drink offering always matched the basic offering. The drink offering was in proportion to the size of the basic offering: a fourth of a hin of wine for a lamb; a third of a hin for a ram; and half a hin for a bullock (Num. 15:4-10). This indicates that the more we experience Christ, the more of a drink offering we become. If you experience Christ only as a little lamb, you will be a drink offering of one fourth of a hin. But if you experience Him as a ram or as a bullock, you will become a larger drink offering. In other words, the more you offer Christ to God, the greater must be the drink offering to match it. Our experience proves that the more we experience Christ, the more we become the drink offering. As we offer Christ to God, spontaneously we have the drink offering to match our offering.
Although the lamb, the ram, and the bullock are types merely of Christ, the wine is not merely Christ. The Bible clearly indicates that the drink offering could not be offered to God by itself. It could only be presented to match one of the basic offerings. The basic offerings are Christ, but the drink offering is not just Christ Himself; it is the Christ who has saturated us until the wine has become us. Although the wine in Matthew 9:17 was only Christ, Paul said, "I am already being poured out as a drink offering" (2 Tim. 4:6, Gk.). The wine in 2 Timothy 4:6 was the Christ of Matthew 9:17 who had saturated Paul and who had made him wine. Formerly, this wine was only Christ; but now it becomes us that we may be poured out as a drink offering. This pouring out depends upon our experience of Christ. Here in Bethel, in God's house, we must be poured out as a drink offering.
Suppose a group of believers assembles every Sunday, but hardly any of them has the real experience of Christ. Could they be the drink offering? Certainly not. Because they cannot be a drink offering, this gathering of Christians cannot be considered as the house of God. The only pillar that can be rightly called the house of God is the pillar upon which the drink offering has been poured. If there is no drink offering poured upon the pillar, then there must be something wrong with that pillar. We must have doubts about any gathering of Christians in which there is no pouring out of the drink offering. In any meeting that is truly the house of God those meeting together will be a drink offering.
By the New Testament alone we cannot clearly and adequately understand spiritual things, especially the things concerning Christ and the church life. We also need the pictures in the Old Testament. We have a very vivid picture in Genesis 35. Here we see Jacob setting up a pillar and pouring the drink offering upon it. In chapter twenty-eight Jacob even called this pillar the house of God. There must have been a reason for all this to be recorded in the Bible. The reason is that the pillar indicates that the house of God is a matter of the building. If we do not have the drink offering poured out upon the pillar, it is questionable that we have the genuine building. Although many are talking about the building — thank the Lord for this — we must still ask whether or not a drink offering has been poured out upon the pillar.
The drink offering does not come from wine out of the winepress; it comes from our experience of drinking the wine. The winepress itself cannot produce a drink offering. God will not be satisfied merely with wine from the winepress. He will be fully satisfied with those who have enjoyed Christ as wine to such an extent that they have become drunk with Christ and have themselves become the wine to satisfy God. This wine is not the direct wine from the winepress; it is the indirect wine from those who drink Christ as the wine. This is deep. I believe that if many among us continue to go on with the Lord for another period of time, they will become such a drink offering and will be able to say, "Lord Jesus, I am already being poured out upon You as a drink offering." No recently saved person can say this. But there are some among us who can faithfully and honestly say with full assurance that they are already being poured out as a drink offering for the Lord. Wherever there is the drink offering, there is also the pillar set up as the house of God. This matter is deep, practical, and touches something deep in our experience. It touches us very deeply to see a person who is so saturated with Christ that his only interest is Christ and the church.
In Exodus 29 is the consecration of the priesthood. In verses 38 through 42 we are told that the priests had to offer the daily continual burnt offering with the drink offering. This indicates that in the priestly service the drink offering is needed to match the continual burnt offering.
The drink offering was also related to the law of the Nazarite (Num. 6:13-17). A Nazarite was a person wholly consecrated to God. When the days of a Nazarite's separation were fulfilled, he had to offer a burnt offering, a sin offering, and a peace offering. Along with these offerings, he also had to offer a drink offering. The Nazarite was qualified to offer the drink offering because he was one who had experienced God to a great degree. This also proves that the drink offering comes from our experiences of the Lord. If we do not experience Him, we cannot have a drink offering. The drink offering is not merely the Lord Himself objectively; it is our subjective experience of being made one with the Lord to the extent that He becomes us. The Christ whom we experience in this subjective way is the wine we pour out to satisfy God for God's building.
We have pointed out that a drunkard's only interest is wine. His mind is constantly preoccupied with thoughts of wine. Even his dreams are dreams of wine. We must be like this about the church, the house of God. Besides Bethel, we should have no other interest. Consider the example of the Apostle Paul. His writings reveal that he was "crazy" for the church; he was drunk with Christ and interested only in God's house, God's temple. His terms for Bethel were "the church" and "the Body." He was drunk for the church. Some have said, "You church people are crazy. The only thing you know is the church." Once a lady approached me after a meeting and said, "Mr. Lee, why do you always talk about the church? Why don't you speak about the family life?" I answered, "I don't talk about the family because you talk about it so much. I must be interested in the church." The church should be our only interest. What is your interest today — school? business? family? My only interest is the church. We all need to be such "drunkards" for the church. Before his martyrdom, Paul said, "I am already being poured out as a drink offering." If our only interest is the church, then we are ready to say the same thing. It has only been through experience that I have come to understand why Jacob set up a stone and poured a drink offering upon it. At Bethel, we who are interested only in the house of God spontaneously become a drink offering.
According to Romans 16:3-5, Aquila and Priscilla were such people. This couple was absolute for the local churches. Their only interest was the church, and they were willing to be martyred for it. They risked their necks for the Apostle Paul and for the churches. Because Aquila and Priscilla risked their necks for the churches and were interested only in the churches, they were undoubtedly a drink offering; they were ready to be poured out.
We need to go over the verses regarding the drink offering again and again. I repeat that the drink offering is in addition to the basic offerings we have experienced. We should not say that it is sufficient merely to have the burnt offering, the meal offering, the peace offering, the sin offering, and the trespass offering. If this is our attitude, then we are poor in experience. Our burnt offering must be accompanied by the drink offering. The basic offering, which is Christ Himself, must always be complemented by a matching offering, the drink offering. The matching offering is not merely Christ Himself; it is the Christ who has saturated us and who has made us one with Him. We must be those who have the drink offering to match the basic offerings. The larger our offering is, the larger our matching offering must be. If we offer only the basic offerings, our offerings will be poor and short of experience. We need to offer Christ daily as our basic offerings. At the same time we must have something to match these offerings. The matching offering comes from our experience of the basic offerings. The more the basic offerings make us one with Christ, the more we become the matching offering, the drink offering. After we have come to this point, we are fully assured that we are at Bethel.
If we fit together the verses concerning the drink offering like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, we shall see that the drink offering is mainly for the church. The first mention of the drink offering is in Genesis 35. The first mention of a matter determines the principle of that matter in the Scriptures. The drink offering is first mentioned in relation to God's building, for this offering was poured out upon the pillar. If we read about the drink offering in Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers without having Genesis 35:14 as a basis, we shall not realize that the drink offering is for the building of God. But we must return to the first mention of the drink offering, where we see that it was not only for the worship of God, but also for the building of Bethel. The last mention of the drink offering is 2 Timothy 4:6. Here the drink offering is also for the church, for Bethel. Therefore, from the first mention to the last, the drink offering is mainly for God's building, not mainly for the worship of God. Apparently, the drink offering is for worship; actually, it is for the house of God, for the building of the pillar, the signboard of God's temple.
We need to have a good number of saints who are ready to be poured out upon God's building. This is genuine martyrdom. Martyrdom is the pouring out of a drink offering full of the experience of Christ. When you are filled to the brim with the experience of Christ, then you will be ready to be poured out, to be martyred, for the building of God. We need this in the Lord's recovery today. We are not told whether or not Aquila and Priscilla were martyred. But we know for certain that in their spirit, attitude, and way of life they had already been martyred. Hence, they were a genuine drink offering, not only for the worship of God, but even the more for God's building.
When Jacob poured the drink offering upon the pillar, he undoubtedly felt that he was worshipping God. To him, the pouring out of that offering was an act of worship. The word "offering" denotes something related to the worship of God. This worship, however, is not a religious ritual; it is for God's building. Today in the Lord's recovery we need many saints to experience Christ to the extent that they are so filled with Him and saturated with Him as wine that they become the very wine to be poured out upon God's building for His worship and satisfaction in His building. This is the meaning of the drink offering.
Genesis 35:14 also tells us that Jacob poured oil upon the pillar. He did this after he had poured the drink offering upon it. I used to think that Jacob was mistaken in doing this and that he should have poured the oil first. But Jacob was not mistaken. According to our experience, it is the pouring out of the drink offering that brings in the oil. If we are ready to be poured out as a drink offering, we are also ready to experience the outpouring of the Spirit. The more we are prepared to be poured out as a drink offering, the more of the oil we shall enjoy.
After the pillar was set up, it was sanctified by being anointed with oil. The same was true of the tabernacle. After it was erected, it was sanctified by the holy anointing oil (Exo. 40:9). The pillar was set up, the drink offering was poured upon it, and then the pillar was sanctified by the oil. The oil poured upon the pillar sealed it. This simply means that the pillar was sanctified. The pouring out of the oil caused the building of God to be absolutely holy, sanctified, and separated unto God. If a good number of us will be ready to be poured out as a drink offering upon God's building, the Holy Spirit will immediately be present to sanctify the church. This is the sealing of the Spirit. No matter how much we experience the Holy Spirit, if we are not ready to be poured out as a drink offering, we do not have a layer of sanctifying oil upon the church. But if many are ready to be poured out as a drink offering, the church will be anointed with oil, and the church life, being sealed with a layer of oil, will be sanctified.
The real experience of the Spirit is in relation to the pouring out of the drink offering. Consider the experience of the one hundred and twenty on the day of Pentecost. As we all know, on the day of Pentecost the Holy Spirit was poured out (Acts 2:33). Before this took place, the one hundred and twenty were ready to be poured out as a drink offering. When Peter stood up with the eleven, he was already being poured out. The result was that the oil, the Holy Spirit, came down upon them. The oil did not come before they were ready to be poured out as a drink offering. You may remark that Peter was not martyred at that time. This, of course, is true. But you must realize that he stood there like a martyr and risked his neck. Although the Jewish religionists were opposing him, he was not afraid of them. In the eyes of the angels, all the hundred and twenty were already being poured out as a drink offering. Thus, the oil was poured out to sanctify and to seal them. On that day the church at Jerusalem was anointed with a layer of heavenly oil. Unlike today's Christian organizations, the church was holy, separated, and sanctified. May all the churches in the Lord's recovery be like this. I hope that a good number of saints will be already poured out as a drink offering so that the Holy Spirit as the heavenly oil will come upon the church to seal it, sanctify it, and make it absolutely separated to God. This is the experience at Bethel.
After Jacob did all these things at Bethel, he called the name of the place Bethel (Gen. 35:15), indicating that he realized that this was the house of God where God spoke to him (Gen. 28:13-15). Today, the church is the house of God (1 Tim. 3:15; Heb. 3:6). Like Jacob at Bethel, we also must have the practical experiences for the church life. We must build an altar of consecration, we must set up a pillar for God's building, and we must be ready to be poured out as a drink offering upon God's building that the divine oil may be poured upon it to sanctify it for God. To do this is to realize the practical church life.
