Leviticus 24:1 ¶ And the
LORD spake unto Moses, saying, 2 Command
the children of Israel, that they bring unto thee pure oil olive beaten for the
light, to cause the lamps to burn continually. 3 Without the vail of the testimony, in the
tabernacle of the congregation, shall Aaron order it from the evening unto the
morning before the LORD continually: it shall be a statute for ever in
your generations. 4 He shall order the
lamps upon the pure candlestick before the LORD continually. 5 And thou shalt take fine flour, and bake
twelve cakes thereof: two tenth deals shall be in one cake. 6 And thou shalt set them in two rows, six on a
row, upon the pure table before the LORD. 7
And thou shalt put pure frankincense upon each row, that it may
be on the bread for a memorial, even an offering made by fire unto the
LORD. 8 Every sabbath he shall set it in
order before the LORD continually, being taken from the children of
Israel by an everlasting covenant. 9 And
it shall be Aaron’s and his sons’; and they shall eat it in the holy place: for
it is most holy unto him of the offerings of the LORD made by fire by a
perpetual statute.
The lamps
must be kept burning. What a contrast with how we are to not quench the
influence of the mind of God within us. In the Bible we see the origin of the
eternal flame in everything from ancient Persian religion down to the flame at
a tomb or memorial in modern times. For the Christian the oil represents the
Holy Spirit, in type, and the light it gives. We have the ability to quench the
light the Holy Spirit gives us although not our salvation.
1Thessalonians
5:19 Quench not the Spirit.
We do this by
sin, by our love of the world and our embracing of its standards, and by not
focusing on God. There are several verses in the Old and New Testaments that
are important to this idea. These are some but certainly not all.
We must keep our minds focused
on God.
Isaiah
26:3 Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee:
because he trusteth in thee.
Philippians 4:6 Be careful
for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving
let your requests be made known unto God. 7
And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your
hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.
We
must not adopt the world’s standards.
Luke 16:15 And he said unto
them, Ye are they which justify yourselves before men; but God knoweth your
hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight
of God.
1John 2:15 Love not the
world, neither the things that are
in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
16 For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the
eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.
Much
of our sorrow comes from misplaced loyalties, idolatry, and covetousness.
1Timothy 6:6 ¶ But
godliness with contentment is great gain. 7
For we brought nothing into this
world, and it is certain we can
carry nothing out. 8 And having food and
raiment let us be therewith content. 9
But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts,
which drown men in destruction and perdition. 10 For the love of money is the root of all
evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and
pierced themselves through with many sorrows.
We, too, have a flame that must be kept burning in the tabernacle
of our hearts. We can let it be quenched by not focusing on God and by loving
things other than Him. We are still saved because it was He who did the saving
and not we who saved ourselves. But, we can walk around blindly in darkness
without the light of the Holy Spirit’s guidance. Of course, typology always
breaks down at some point and while it is good to use types as a way of
learning a principle in the Bible it is not good to ride that horse to death.
We do not provide the fuel for the fire. God provides it. We choose by our
actions to allow the flame to lead us or we by our actions choose to quench it.
It is still there but we are of all people most miserable when it is not our
guide.
Modernists hate the word candlestick
and lampstand is used in most modern Bibles with ignorant preachers who
“prefer” the KJV saying that lampstand is a better rendering of the Hebrew word
here or the Greek word in Revelation. The word, lampstand, is not found in English
lexicons and dictionaries before 1800, first showing up in the language in 1803
according to the Collins English Dictionary at https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/lampstand and if you find it earlier let me know. As the British use the word torch for what we call a flashlight
hearkening back to earlier technology the King
James Bible translators used candlestick
for the apparatus on which a lamp was set.
Zechariah
4:2 And said unto me, What seest thou?
And I said, I have looked, and behold a candlestick all of gold, with a bowl
upon the top of it, and his seven lamps thereon, and seven pipes to the seven
lamps, which are upon the top thereof:
Referencing;
Exodus
25:31 ¶ And thou shalt make a
candlestick of pure gold: of beaten work shall the candlestick be made: his
shaft, and his branches, his bowls, his knops, and his flowers, shall be of the
same. 32 And six branches shall come out
of the sides of it; three branches of the candlestick out of the one side, and
three branches of the candlestick out of the other side: 33 Three bowls made like unto almonds, with a
knop and a flower in one branch; and three bowls made like almonds in the other
branch, with a knop and a flower: so in the six branches that come out of the
candlestick. 34 And in the candlestick
shall be four bowls made like unto almonds, with their knops and their flowers.
35 And there shall be a knop under two
branches of the same, and a knop under two branches of the same, and a knop
under two branches of the same, according to the six branches that proceed out
of the candlestick. 36 Their knops and
their branches shall be of the same: all it shall be one beaten work of pure
gold. 37 And thou shalt make the seven
lamps thereof: and they shall light the lamps thereof, that they may give light
over against it. 38 And the tongs thereof,
and the snuffdishes thereof, shall be of pure gold. 39 Of a talent of pure gold shall he make it,
with all these vessels. 40 And look that
thou make them after their pattern, which was shewed thee in the mount.
Think
of other places where the translators used words that the reader would
understand rather than transliterating a Greek word. Think of furlong for the Greek stadion in Luke 24:13. Think of penny in place of denarion in Matthew 20:2.
The King James Version translators would not have used a word that
didn’t exist in their time.
There
are twelve loaves of bread for the twelve tribes of Israel. This is the
shewbread.
2Chronicles 13:11 And they
burn unto the LORD every morning and every evening burnt sacrifices and sweet
incense: the shewbread also set they in order upon the pure
table; and the candlestick of gold with the lamps thereof, to burn every
evening: for we keep the charge of the LORD our God; but ye have forsaken him.
Frankincense
is also on the table with the bread. See 2:1,2.
Leviticus 2:1 ¶ And when any
will offer a meat offering unto the LORD, his offering shall be of fine flour; and he shall pour oil
upon it, and put frankincense thereon: 2
And he shall bring it to Aaron’s sons the priests: and he shall take
thereout his handful of the flour thereof, and of the oil thereof, with all the
frankincense thereof; and the priest shall burn the memorial of it upon the
altar, to be an offering made
by fire, of a sweet savour unto the LORD:
Frankincense is an aromatic resin used in incense and perfumes and
traded after the Flood from Southern Arabia all the way to China. It was given
as a gift to the child, Jesus, along with gold and myrrh. See Matthew 2:11. The
1500BC Egyptian Ebers Papyrus mentions it, as do Chinese writings and the Greek
historian, Herodotus. Some commentators say it symbolizes righteousness while
others say that it was often offered to deity so that the wise men who visited
the child Jesus knew who He was. Frankincense was also burned in memory of the
recent dead with a classic example being the Roman Emperor Nero who supposedly
burned a year’s supply in memory of a mistress. The Egyptians used it in
embalming.
For everlasting covenant
and perpetual statute I refer you
back to Leviticus 6:14-23 comments. The key verse in this passage to unlocking
the meaning of those two phrases is verse 3 with for ever in your generations. At this time there are two races of
people on earth by God’s ethnic standard; Jew and Gentile. Before Christ comes
there will be unsaved Jews, unsaved Gentiles, and the Church, His body on
earth. The Law, as a justifying principle, was fulfilled in Christ and as we
are brought to Christ by the Law, we are no longer under the Law if we belong
to Christ.
Galatians 3:24 Wherefore
the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we
might be justified by faith. 25 But
after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster.
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