Crystallization-Study of Leviticus (1)
Message One
God Training His People to Worship and Partake of Him and to Live a Holy, Clean, and Rejoicing Life
Scripture Reading: Lev. 1—25
I. In Leviticus God was in the tabernacle, the Tent of Meeting, and spoke in the Tent of Meeting—1:1; 27:34:
A. The entire book of Leviticus is a record of God’s speaking in the tabernacle, which is a building—1:1.
B. God’s speaking today is in His tabernacle, and this tabernacle is the church—John 1:14; 14:2; 1 Tim. 3:15:
1. According to the principle of the typology, God speaks in the church as His tabernacle; this Tent of Meeting is the oracle, the place of God’s speaking—Lev. 1:1.
2. The preciousness of the tabernacle was God’s speaking; today the preciousness of the church is the speaking God and God’s speaking—27:34.
II. God trained His people to worship and partake of Him through the offerings and the priesthood—chs. 1—10:
A. Christ is the reality of the offerings—John 1:29:
1. The burnt offering, which was wholly for God’s satisfaction, typifies Christ as God’s pleasure and satisfaction, the One whose living on earth was absolutely for God—Lev. 1:3; Num. 28:2-3; John 7:16-18.
2. The meal offering typifies Christ in His perfect humanity as food for God and for those who have fellowship with God and serve Him—Lev. 2:1, 4; John 7:46; 18:38; 19:4, 6.
3. The peace offering typifies Christ as the Peacemaker, the One who became the peace and the fellowship between us and God by dying for us, enabling us to enjoy Christ with God and to have fellowship with God in Christ for our mutual satisfaction with God—Lev. 3:1; Eph. 2:14-15; John 12:1-3; 20:21.
4. The sin offering typifies Christ as the One who was made sin for us and who died on the cross to deal with the sinful nature of our fallen being—Lev. 4:3; 2 Cor. 5:21; Rom. 8:3; John 1:29; 3:14.
5. The trespass offering typifies Christ as the One who bore our sins in His own body and was judged by God on the cross to deal with our sinful deeds that we might be forgiven in our sinful conduct—Lev. 5:6; 1 Pet. 2:24; 3:18; Isa. 53:5-6, 10-11; John 4:15-18.
6. The wave offering typifies Christ as the resurrected One in love—Lev. 7:30; 10:15.
7. The heave offering typifies the powerful Christ in ascension and exaltation—7:32; Exo. 29:27; Eph. 1:21.
8. The drink offering typifies Christ, the One poured out as wine before God for His satisfaction and also the One who saturates us with Himself as heavenly wine to be poured out for God’s enjoyment and satisfaction—Lev. 23:13; Exo. 29:40; Num. 28:7-10; Isa. 53:12; Phil. 2:17; 2 Tim. 4:6; Judg. 9:13.
B. We need to experience Christ as the reality of the offerings—John 1:29; 16:13; 1 John 5:6:
1. The offerings solve our problems and bridge the gap between us and God—John 14:6.
2. The offerings are good for us to enjoy God, to be mingled with God, and to have God assimilated into our being to become our constituent—Gal. 4:19; Eph. 3:17; Col. 3:10-11.
3. The offerings are the way for us to enter into God and become part of the divine-human incorporation—John 14:6, 20.
4. The offerings are not only sacrifices to solve our problems but also presents to God for His enjoyment—Num. 28:2.
C. God’s people were trained to worship and partake of God through the priests, who typify Christ as God’s Priest offering Himself to God for us—Lev. 1:5-8; 2:2; 3:2; 4:5, 10; 5:8; Heb. 5:5-6; 9:14, 26; 10:10.
D. According to the record in the holy Word, the reality of the universe is Christ as the tabernacle and the offerings—John 1:14, 29; 14:6:
1. As the God-man, Christ is the tabernacle to be the dwelling place for God and man, and He is the offerings for man to enter into God—1:14; 14:20, 23; 1:29.
2. Christ, who is the reality of the tabernacle and the offerings, is the reality and content of the universe—vv. 14, 17b.
3. Through Christ as the offerings, we can dwell in God, and God can dwell in us; this is the reality of the universe and the content of the Bible—15:4a.
4. Christ as the tabernacle brings God to man, and Christ as the offerings brings man to God so that man may be united, mingled, and incorporated with God—1:14, 29.
III. God trained His people to live a holy, clean, and rejoicing life:
A. God charged His people to have a holy living according to His holy nature—Lev. 11:44-45; 19:2; 20:7, 26; Exo. 19:6; 22:31; Deut. 14:2; 26:19; 28:9:
1. Being holy because God is holy signifies walking according to God’s holiness, living a holy life—Lev. 19:2; 20:7; 1 Pet. 1:15; 2 Pet. 3:11.
2. Leviticus reveals that in order to live a holy life, we must put off the old life and put on the new (cf. Eph. 4:17—5:21); God charged the people of Israel to put off the former Egyptian conduct (Lev. 18:3a) and not to walk in the statutes of the Canaanites (v. 3b).
3. The mutual enjoyment between God and His people separates His people unto Himself from everything other than Him, making them a holy nation—Exo. 19:6.
4. Before the foundation of the world, God chose us to be holy—Eph. 1:4:
a. Holy means not only sanctified, separated unto God, but also different, distinct, from everything that is common.
b. Only God is different, distinct, from all things; hence, He is holy; holiness is His nature.
c. He makes us holy by imparting Himself, the Holy One, into our being so that our whole being is permeated and saturated with His holy nature—1 Thes. 5:23.
d. For us to be holy is to partake of God’s nature and to have our whole being permeated with God Himself—2 Pet. 1:4.
B. In Leviticus 12—15 God trained His people to live a clean life:
1. Chapter 12 shows us the cleansing from the human impurity by birth, and chapters 13 and 14 speak of being cleansed from leprosy.
2. Chapter 15 reveals that we need to be cleansed from all unclean discharges from the human being; anything discharged from our being, including our words, is unclean.
3. We need the cross of Christ to end our old life and the resurrection of Christ to give us a new beginning—Rom. 6:6; Gal. 2:20; 1 Cor. 15:3; 2 Cor. 5:17.
4. We also need the water of life, which is the washing, cleansing Spirit of life embodied in the word—Eph. 5:26.
C. God trained the people of Israel to live a rejoicing life, a happy life—Phil. 4:4:
1. The weekly Sabbath was the principle denotation of all the annual feasts; these feasts were a Sabbath, which was for God’s redeemed people to rest with God and with one another—Lev. 23:1-3.
2. The monthly new moon feast signifies that we can experience a new beginning in Christ as our joy and enjoyment with light in darkness—Num. 10:10; 28:11-15.
3. The Feast of the Passover typifies Christ as our Passover for our initial and foundational salvation—a time of rejoicing—Lev. 23:4-5; Exo. 12:2-14; 1 Cor. 5:7.
4. The Feast of Unleavened Bread typifies the entire course of our Christian life without sin—Lev. 23:6-8; Exo. 12:15-20.
5. The Feast of Firstfruits typifies the resurrected Christ for our enjoyment as a feast in His resurrection—Lev. 23:9-14; 1 Cor. 15:20.
6. The Feast of Pentecost typifies the enjoyment of the outpouring of the Spirit for the formation of the church—Lev. 23:15-22.
7. The Feast of the Blowing of Trumpets typifies God’s calling together of His scattered people—vv. 23-25; Matt. 24:30-31.
8. The Feast of Expiation typifies the enjoyment for the whole house of Israel after they will be gathered together by God—Lev. 23:26-32; Rom. 11:25-27; Zech. 12:10-14.
9. The Feast of Tabernacles typifies the enjoyment of the age of restoration to be fulfilled in the millennium—Lev. 23:33-44; Matt. 19:28; Rev. 20:4, 6.
10. The Sabbath year typifies Christ as our rest in full—Lev. 25:1-7, 18-22.
11. The jubilee, the Pentecostal year, typifies Christ as our full release, rest, and joy by His redeeming back what we have lost in our rights and have sold in ourselves—vv. 8-17.
D. The book of Leviticus shows us what kind of God our God is; our God wants us to be “Hallelujah people,” who rejoice in the Lord always—Phil. 4:4.