1 CHRONICLES 28 (FROM CAC'S NOTES)
1 CHRONICLES 28 (FROM CAC’S NOTES)
Solomon had been previously charged to build the house but now he is charged in the presence of all those who represented all Israel. The princes, the military men and all who served the king were to understand that the building of the house of rest for the ark of the covenant was the principal thing in God’s mind and that Solomon was to “build my house and my courts”. Jehovah also had chosen him to be His son. All were to be brought into this great matter.
And so it is today. God would have all the people and His servants to know what is for His pleasure here upon the earth, because the house does not typify what is in heaven but a house of rest for God upon the earth. David adds, “and for the footstool of our God” (verse 2). God’s thought is that the earth is to furnish a footstool for Him to convey His thoughts of blessing in a restful position. He has finished the work and is restful. The house is the house of rest for the ark of the covenant, that is, Christ as the Ark can be restful in the affections of saints as finding congenial conditions there. It is Christ as expressive of all that is in the heart of God manward, as seen particularly in Luke’s gospel.
In verse 1 I we read of “the house of the mercy-seat” — a beautiful designation. God can be perfectly restful where He is known as revealed in Christ and through the death of Christ; and He would link all this with the thought of sonship for He has brought it all in by One who is the Son of His love. John’s gospel comes in to give us the full sense [p. 257] of the blessedness of the declaration of God. It has come by One who is in the bosom of the Father. Solomon represents Christ glorified as the Object of the Father’s love. His present place is in the bosom of the Father. As Man He is in the most intimate enjoyment of the Father’s love. We shall not understand the character of the house down here if we do not see that it is built by the Son glorified (Matthew 16). So there is that on earth which corresponds with what is in heaven. Whatever thoughts there are in connection with God being nearer to men — such as the Ark of the covenant and the mercy-seat — behind all and above all is that of Christ’s blessed sonship. What restfulness for God is brought in there! The covenant as known by Israel included all that was in the mind of God for blessing so that in applying it to ourselves it includes sonship.
So we can understand that David could not build the house. Fighting battles and overcoming what is adverse is very essential, but it does not minister rest to God. We may contend for the truth and stand for what is right and yet stop short of being a house of rest for God. Sonship must impress its own blessed character upon the whole system that comes under Solomon. We are thus encouraged to take a very exalted view of these types and to read into them a meaning that harmonizes with what is known in the assembly today.
So that, in the light of this, we are to “keep and seek for all the commandments of Jehovah your God”. This brings in all that is known as the divine will, whether of individual or collective application. If we get careless we may miss the most blessed things; we may, in a practical sense, lose the house and the land. Verse 9 is still true. The perfect heart and the willing mind are needed. God searches all hearts and discerns all the imaginations of the thoughts.
[p. 258] Moses was shown the pattern in the mount. There must be a going up on our part from what is on man’s level or we shall not see the pattern. But David is viewed here as having the pattern of all by the Spirit. He is at the Spirit’s elevation and could write by Jehovah’s hand upon him instructing him as to the pattern. This goes along with the apprehension of sonship in Christ glorified. It is only by being spiritual that we can have things.
The word “weight” occurs nine times in this chapter. The point here is that every detail of the house is known by the Spirit and is a help to us in learning how God has a place here. All these things have their counterpart in the house today. It is noticeable that we do not get, either in Samuel or Kings, anything about the pattern being given by the Spirit. It is Solomon acting in God-given wisdom but there is not much about preparation or the pattern. God in 1 Chronicles would bring us to view things as worked out according to the pattern communicated by the Spirit. The whole house and its various parts and vessels were there in pattern before any of it was built. In a day of recovery we need to see what is in the mind of God in its perfection. David here represents a spiritual man getting light as to the house and understanding that it will only take form as the beloved Son gets His place and sonship comes in to give character to the work of God in His people. It is not that sonship is known in a mature way. Solomon is “young and tender” but he is made king. There is the thought of sonship as supreme in the mind of God. The mature thought is not reached until chapter 29. Nothing is said about his being “young and tender” after that. It is when the divine thought comes to maturity in our souls that conditions are present for the building to proceed. Paul brings in the Son of God in a mature way in his ministry and as the wise architect of the house.
David had the pattern by the Spirit, and in writing by Jehovah’s hand upon him, instructing him in all the works of the pattern. We have to recognise that it is by the Spirit that the pattern has come to us and that attention must be paid to what is written.
The striking thing about this chapter is that all seems to stand connected with the porch. There is no veil in Kings but there is in Chronicles, no brazen altar in Kings but there is in Chronicles. What is to be learned from these? The porch, as I understand it, sets forth what is presented of God manward. It is the most conspicuous feature of the house, ten by twenty by one hundred and twenty cubits. It makes one think of the one hundred and twenty upon whom the Spirit came at Pentecost. There was a setting forth of the great things of God in them. They were all in the light of what had been set forth by the Lord in His service here, and they knew Him as risen and taken up into heaven. I think the height of the porch has reference to that.
Then the houses, treasuries, upper chambers, inner chambers and the house of the mercy-seat were all there behind the porch. Paul speaks of the mystery of the glad tidings, conveying to us that there is a great deal hidden, as it were, behind the glad tidings. If God dwells amongst His people there is a great deal that gives character to the glad tidings but which is in the background. Saints living in the love of God might answer today to the houses, resulting in our being very near to each other. Then the treasuries indicate that there has been an accumulation of what is precious. If we take the last hundred years what an accumulation of precious things has come into the house! Then the upper chambers would refer to what is above the level of man’s thoughts altogether.
The “things above” would suggest the character of those of the upper room whilst the inner chambers would be like chapters 13 to 17 of John’s gospel, the Lord in [p. 260] seclusion with His own. Then the house of the mercy-seat brings us to the holiest where God is known as set forth through Christ and in the value of His blood. He can carry out all that is in His mind in a way of supreme glory. We contemplate His resources in the ark and the mercy-seat.
The courts and the chambers and the treasuries indicate the spaciousness of rooms in which we can move about. We have the freedom of the house in every part of it, but it is all looked at here as lending some richness and fulness to the public testimony of God.
In verse 13 we turn to the service Godward and the instruments of service. We find that the latter are divided into two classes as vessels of gold and vessels of silver; utensils they are called here; they are for use. The saints as utensils of silver think of themselves as of value to God but secured by redemption. We are brought back to God for His pleasure in all the value of the death of Christ. This is largely how we are viewed as eating the Lord’s supper. It is largely Paul’s teaching, that we are justified, reconciled, accepted in the Beloved and receiving sonship. All this is on redemption ground. We are in new creation on that ground.
But utensils of gold refer to what the saints are in nature as born of God and as having fed on Christ so as to live on account of Him.
As redeemed we think of a past history. We have been liberated for God in all the value of what Christ accomplished in death. Our condition was all estimated by God and provided for so that our place before Him brings out the value of our redemption in Christ. Ruth would never forget what Boaz had done that he might have her and take away all the reproach from the inheritance. The right of redemption is one of God’s greatest rights and He has exercised it to the full by His Son. Redemption is something done for us outside ourselves and applies to us so as [p. 261] to secure eventually the redemption of our bodies. Nothing can be added to the value of redemption nor can anything be taken from it. Blessed be God!
But there is another wonderful reality, that God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world: “Thine they were”. We were marked out for sonship in the purpose of God.
If saints are viewed in purpose as not of this world even as Christ is not of this world as in that character they do not need to be redeemed; they need to be kept and guarded. They may be viewed abstractly entirely on the side of what is divinely wrought. We do not connect the thought of redemption with the saints viewed as the brethren of Christ. It needs spirituality to take that ground. John 17 views the saints as golden.
All that comes to us on the ground of the death of Christ constitutes us utensils of silver. All that we are by the work of God constitutes us as vessels of gold. The first we take up by faith, the last by being spiritual.