BLOG

The meaning of 46--The Temple, part 3 (final)

The 46^th time that Isaac’s name is mentioned in Scripture is in Genesis 26:31, where we read how Abimelech, king of the Philistines, his advisor and his army commander, came to Isaac to make a covenant with him.

³¹ In the morning they arose early and exchanged oaths; then Isaac sent them away and they departed from him in peace.

This was very similar to the covenant that they made with Abraham some years earlier. Once again, it speaks of the nations adhering to the Abrahamic covenant, which was later known as the New Covenant. The main difference is that this covenant was being made with Isaac, who was the child of promise—the promised son. From a spiritual point of view, this made Abimelech part of the Isaac company, as are all who claim Sarah, the New Covenant, as their mother.

Hence, the underlying theme is about Sonship—how to be a son of God, rather than a child of the flesh. This is a requirement in order to be a temple of God. This is also suggested in the 46^th time that Jacob’s name is mentioned. We read in Genesis 30:1 where Rachel complained to Jacob, “Give me children, or else I die.” She was wanting physical children, of course, so she was unaware that she was prophesying of the need for spiritual children, who are begotten from incorruptible and immortal seed, in order to overcome mortality (death).

The 46^th time that Pharaoh is mentioned is in Genesis 41:41,

⁴¹ Pharaoh said to Joseph, “See, I have set you over all the land of Egypt.”

The sons of God, who are the living stones in God’s temple, are destined to rule “Egypt,” which is prophetic type of the world as a whole.

Baptism

These “living stones” (1 Peter 2:5) have been united with Christ in His death and have been raised with Him to newness of life (Romans 6:5). And so the 46^th time that Joshua’s name appears is in Joshua 4:10, where we read of Israel crossing the Jordan River at the place where Jesus was later baptized.

¹⁰ For the priests who carried the ark were standing in the middle of the Jordan until everything was completed that the Lord had commanded Joshua to speak to the people, according to all that Moses had commanded Joshua. And the people hurried and crossed.

Joshua 4:9 says that the people placed 12 stones in the river as a memorial and also took another 12 stones out of the river and built a memorial at Gilgal (Joshua 4:20). These represent the living stones who have “died” with Christ in the Jordan and who have also been raised to life out of the waters of baptism.

The 46^th time that Noah’s name appears is in Hebrews 11:7,

⁷ By faith Noah, being warned by God about things not yet seen, in reverence prepared an ark for the salvation of his household, by which he condemned the world, and became an heir of the righteousness which is according to faith.

We read in 1 Peter 3:21, 22 that the flood in Noah’s day was a prophetic picture of baptism. The wicked men of that time died in the flood, not having faith to rise in newness of life, but Noah and his family “were brought safely through the water.” The KJV says, “eight souls were saved by water, the like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save us.” Baptism is a legal rite that imputes to us death and resurrection life, which is what saves us.

This gives us a word picture of the laver in the outer court of God’s temple. This is also the origin of water baptism under the Old Covenant.

David and Jonathan

The 46^th time that David’s name appears in Scripture is where he was making a covenant with Jonathan, the son of Saul in 1 Samuel 18:3,

³ Then Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as himself.

Saul was a prophetic type of the church under the anointing of Pentecost, on account of the three Pentecostal signs that Samuel had given him in 1 Samuel 10:2-7. Saul was later crowned on the day of “wheat harvest” (1 Samuel 12:17), which is Pentecost. It is the day when the two loaves of wheat bread were given as first fruits to God, which signaled the beginning of wheat harvest.

So the crowning of Saul, when the thunder and rain fell upon the people (1 Samuel 12:18), prophesied of the outpouring of the Spirit and the utterance of “tongues” (the voice/thunder of God) that occurred in Acts 2:1-4.

Jonathan was Saul’s son. He loved David and understood that David was anointed to rule Israel. So he gave David his royal robe (1 Samuel 18:4) that had designated him as the heir of the throne. This shows that the church under its Pentecostal anointing must eventually defer to the greater anointing of the feast of Tabernacles that rested upon the overcomers—that is, the house of David. Those in the church who, like Jonathan, recognize this and who love the overcomers are in a (new) covenant relationship with Christ, even as Abimelech was with Abraham and Isaac. All such people are temples of God.

In fact, the 46^th time that Jonathan’s name appears is in 1 Samuel 20:4,

⁴ Then Jonathan said to David, “Whatever you say, I will do for you.”

Such was Jonathan’s love and faith in David, picturing those in the church who love Christ and the overcomers. This stands in direct contrast to Jonathan’s father, who persecuted David and was jealous of David’s right to rule the earth. Saul believed that his Pentecostal anointing qualified him to rule forever, even though he had rejected the word of God (1 Samuel 15:26).

Those who, like Jonathan, love David, are not like the wicked of whom we read in Psalm 2:2, 3,

² The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against His Anointed [Messiah], saying, ³ “Let us tear their fetters apart and cast away their cords from us!”

God's answer is found in Psalm 2:7, 8,

⁷ I will surely tell of the decree of the Lord: He said to Me, “You are My Son, today I have begotten You. ⁸ Ask of Me, and I will surely give the nations as Your inheritance, and the very ends of the earth as Your possession.”

This speaks first about the Son of God but also about the sons of God who reign with Him. The earth is Christ’s inheritance, and ours as well. We are in Him as part of His body, and He is in us, because we are His Spirit-filled temple.

Peter

Habakkuk 2:20 says,

²⁰ But the Lord is in His holy temple. Let all the earth be silent before Him.

We see here that the temple of God is ultimately the whole earth which silently and eagerly waits to hear His voice and to respond to His will. This, I believe, is the significance of the 46^th time that Peter is mentioned in the New Testament. Acts 11:7 says,

⁷ I also heard a voice saying to me, “Get up, Peter; kill and eat.” ⁸ But I said, “By no means, Lord, for nothing unholy or unclean has ever entered my mouth.” ⁹ But a voice from heaven answered a second time, “What God has cleansed, no longer consider unholy.”

God’s lesson for Peter (and for us) is that God cleansed the Gentiles by the water of His word. For this reason, Peter was willing to preach to the group of believers in the house of Cornelius, the Roman centurion. They received the baptism of the Holy Spirit—the promise given to the fathers in Israel—which surprised Peter and the Jews as a whole (Acts 11:15-18).

This revelation of inclusion was given to Peter, who needed it the most, but it was also the foundation of Paul’s ministry and gospel.

Herod’s Temple

Solomon’s temple was filled by the presence of God (2 Chronicles 7:1). Two centuries later, however, the glory of God departed from the temple (Ezekiel 10:4, 18, 19; 11:23). Jeremiah had prophesied that God would forsake that place even as He had departed from Shiloh a few centuries earlier (1 Samuel 4:22; Jeremiah 7:12-14).

God never returned to Shiloh but moved to Jerusalem. When God departed from Jerusalem, His presence did not return when the second temple was completed in the days of Haggai. In fact, the ark of God had already disappeared from the pages of history. The Most Holy Place was a dark, empty room with a stone put in place of the ark. The Jews called that stone the foundation stone, according to Alfred Edersheim in his book, The Temple, page 314.

“In the first temple the ark of God had stood there with the mercy-seat overshadowing it; above it, the visible presence of Jehovah in the cloud of the Shekinah, and on either side the outspread wings of the cherubim; and the high priest had placed the censer between the staves of the ark. But in the Temple of Herod there was neither Shekinah nor ark—all was empty; and the high priest rested his censer on a large stone, called the ‘foundation stone’.”

The temple of God is now the body of Christ that is described in Ephesians 2:20-22. Yet there are two types of temples in the patterns of Scripture. There is a temple that is filled with the Spirit of God, and there is a temple that has “neither Shekinah nor ark.” The question for us today is this: Which temple is your pattern? Are you patterned after Solomon’s temple or Herod’s temple?