Message 55
Scripture Reading: Lev. 24:1-23
Leviticus 24 is a parenthesis between chapter twenty-three on the feasts and chapter twenty-five on the jubilee, the feast of feasts that was to take place every fifty years. Actually, chapter twenty-five is the continuation of chapter twenty-three, but chapter twenty-four is inserted between them. This chapter mainly covers four things: the tending of the lamp in the tabernacle, the arranging of the showbread in the tabernacle, the blaspheming of the name of God, and the taking care of human life and animal life.
In order to serve God as priests, we need to take care of two things properly and adequately. These two things are light and food. We are, of course, referring not to the natural and human light and food but to the divine light and the divine food. As priests serving God, we need to live, act, behave, and serve under the divine light. If there had been no light in the tabernacle, it would have been difficult for anyone to enter it and to act, move, and serve God there. Thus, the first thing we need is light. In a sense, light is more important than food.
Along with light, we need food. We need the divine food as our supply so that we may be able to act properly, move, behave, and serve God with sufficient supply and strength. (See messages ninety through ninety-four of the Life-study of Exodus, where the showbread table and the lampstand are covered in a fuller way.)
We need to take care of the two matters of light and food. This means that we need to be enlightened under the divine light, the light which is the light of life (John 1:4). This life requires the food supply. Therefore, we need to have the proper supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ in our spirit (Phil. 1:19) so that we may have the adequate daily life supply. With such a supply we shall be strengthened. Then we shall be able to walk properly, move, and serve God with sufficient strength under His divine light.
Leviticus 24:1-9 covers the arrangement of the lampstand and the showbread table. Here the word arrangement means to take care of, to tend.
Verses 2 through 4 show us the arrangement of the lampstand.
“Command the sons of Israel to bring you pure beaten olive oil for the light” (v. 2a). The pure beaten olive oil for the light signifies the pure Holy Spirit, typified by the water issuing from the side of Christ (John 19:34), coming out of the crucified Christ, typified by the pressed olives, for the shining of Christ as the lampstand in God’s dwelling place.
Olives, which are a type of Christ, had to be pressed that the oil could come out. This signifies that Christ was “pressed” by being crucified that the Holy Spirit could flow out of Him as the living water and also as the oil for the shining of Christ as the lampstand.
The sons of Israel were “to cause the lamp to burn continually” (v. 2b). Verse 3 goes on to say, “Outside the veil of the testimony in the tent of meeting, Aaron shall tend it from evening to morning before Jehovah continually; it shall be a perpetual statute throughout your generations.” This signifies that the divine light of Christ shines continually in the house of God.
“He shall tend the lamps on the pure lampstand before Jehovah continually” (v. 4). This signifies that Christ as our High Priest continually takes care of His divine light, causing it to shine for God continually.
Many of us have experienced Christ’s taking care of the light within us. In the morning we contact the Lord as the High Priest. In our contact with Him, He takes care of the light within us. If in the morning we do not have any contact with the Lord, we shall be short of light the whole day. Although we may not be in darkness, we shall have the sense that there is no light within us. However, if we spend some time with the Lord in the morning, the light will come in spontaneously. Something will be shining within us the whole day. That shining is the very Christ whom we experienced and enjoyed in the morning tending Himself within us as the shining light.
Leviticus 24:5-9 shows us the arrangement of the showbread.
“You shall take fine flour and bake twelve cakes with it; two-tenths of an ephah shall be in each cake” (v. 5). This signifies that the resurrected Christ, the Christ who produced the church (typified by the two-tenths of an ephah of fine flour — 23:13, 17), is the element that constitutes the food in full (typified by the number twelve) for all God’s people and for God to enjoy.
The number twelve in 24:5 certainly refers to the twelve tribes of Israel. This indicates that this kind of food supply is sufficient to nourish all the people of God.
Christ’s being our food is related to the church life. This indicates that if we hope to be nourished adequately, we must live a life that is related to the church life.
“And you shall place them in two rows, six in a row, upon the pure gold table before Jehovah” (v. 6). This signifies that the believers enjoy Christ in parallel for a testimony (typified by the number two) based on Christ’s holding us up (signified by the table) by His pure, divine nature (signified by the pure gold).
“You shall put pure frankincense with each row, that it may be a memorial portion for the bread as an offering by fire to Jehovah” (v. 7). This signifies that it is with the fragrance of His resurrection as a memorial portion that Christ becomes food to both God and us.
Actually, the cakes of bread were food for the high priest and for the priests. But verse 7 tells us that they were an offering by fire for God’s food. From this we see that what we eat is what God eats, and what God eats is what we eat. This indicates that we as God’s serving ones, the priests, are one with God. What we enjoy is God’s enjoyment, and what God enjoys is our enjoyment. God and we, we and God, are one in His service. Here we have the nourishment of Christ.
If we get into the depths of all these points, we shall realize the kind of life we should live by. In this life is an element which is the fragrance of the resurrection of Christ. This kind of enjoyment is always a memorial, something that is worthy of remembrance.
“Sabbath by sabbath he shall set it in order before Jehovah continually; it shall be a perpetual covenant on the part of the sons of Israel” (v. 8). This signifies that our enjoyment of Christ as our food should be set in order afresh that we may have rest with God continually.
The word sabbath brings in the thought of rest. Sabbath by sabbath, that is, rest by rest, the cakes are arranged as food for God and also for us.
“It shall be for Aaron and his sons, and they shall eat it in a holy place; for it is a most holy portion for him from the offerings of Jehovah by fire, as a perpetual due” (v. 9). This signifies that we, God’s serving ones, should enjoy Christ as a most holy portion of the food offered to God in the church as the holy place.
It is necessary that we interpret the holy place in verse 9 as signifying the church. It is in the church that we offer Christ to God as His food supply for His enjoyment. Then we shall enjoy this food. We shall enjoy what God enjoys. Christ is what God enjoys and also what we enjoy.
Here we would note that 24:1-9 unveils that for us, the holy people of God, to live a holy life, we need the arrangement of Christ afresh as the divine light to shine over us and as the divine food to nourish us.
The second main section of Leviticus 24 (vv. 12-23) deals with the death-judgment of the blaspheming of the holy Name. This is very important, for along with the enlightenment and the nourishment we must always honor the divine Name. We must take care of the Name of our God.
The story of the blaspheming of the holy Name is recorded after the record concerning the arranging of the showbread table. This signifies that in our enjoyment of Christ in His fullness we should sanctify the holy Name and not profane it.
In the prayer in Matthew 6:9-11, the first petition is “Let Your name be sanctified” (v. 9). To sanctify the Lord’s name is to separate it as something unique. The Lord’s name is unique, and it should not be put with other names. To sanctify, to separate, the name of the Lord from common names is to honor and respect the holy Name.
In Leviticus 24:10 and 11 we are told that “the son of an Israelite woman, whose father was an Egyptian…blasphemed the Name and cursed.” This story signifies that the joining of a man of God with a man of the world brings forth a result that will profane God, causing the profaning one to be cut off from the enjoyment of Christ in His fullness. According to this chapter, if we profane the name of God, making it common and not sanctifying it, we shall be finished with the enjoyment of Christ as our shining light and nourishing food.
In Leviticus 24 we see that we need to take care of our being enlightened and of our being nourished. In order to enjoy Christ as our light and as our food, we must sanctify the holy Name. This means that we must live a life that always sanctifies our God, a life that always regards our God as the unique One, separate from all other names.
This chapter also reveals that we need to take care of both the human life and the animal life. The human life is for the expression of God, and the main purpose of the animal life is to be offered to God. The human life is to express God, and the animal life is to be the means for us to worship God. Therefore, we need to take care of the human life and the animal life, the life for the expression of God and the life for the worship of God.
