The abandonment of the Son by the Father is made palpable not in the crucifixion of His body, since He willingly laid down His life, but in the darkness which covered the Land for three hours. But perhaps this darkness was a sign of the Father’s nearness rather than His distance.

Matthew, Mark and Luke document the darkness which covered the Land during the last three hours of Jesus’ life, and so do three extra biblical historians, Thallus, Phlegon and Africanus. But what was its purpose? It is wise to look for typological precedents for events in the Gospels, since Jesus fulfilled the Law and the Prophets. Concerning darkness we have the primeval world before the creation of light (Genesis 1:2), and the darkness which covered Egypt as the ninth plague (Exodus 10:21-23).

The details of this plague are interesting, since this was “a darkness to be felt” and “nor did anyone rise from his place for three days.” Only the land of Goshen where the Israelites dwelt was given light. Thus, the three hours of darkness at noonday were a sign of the coming three days in which Christ would be covered by the darkness of the tomb. But there is another instance of darkness and light as a judgment in Exodus, and that occurred at the Red Sea crossing (Exodus 13:19-20). The pillar of cloud gave light to the Israelites but the Egyptians were left in the dark. Thus the two were kept separate throughout the night.

My assertion here is that the darkness in each case was a visit from the glory cloud, the “mobile tabernacle” which served as God’s chariot until the Day of Pentecost. It was presumably this cloud which is described in Genesis 3:8, which would be better translated as “And they heard the sound/voice of the Lord God coming to the garden in the breath/spirit of the day and they hid themselves…” It is likely that this visitation was similar to the cloud which descended upon Sinai and upon the mount of transfiguration. It is also likely the same cloud which, when opened, provided a glimpse into heaven at the baptism of Jesus (with its allusion to Genesis 1, the Spirit hovering over the deep), at His ascension, and again at the martyrdom of Stephen. The Lord always comes “with” or “in” clouds, and when He does, He comes to judge.

Of course, judgment does not necessarily mean punishment. The Lord came down to judge Babel, Egypt and Sodom, and it each case the result was cursing. In the case of Ezekiel, it seems the prophet was actually taken up in or by the chariot in Spirit that he might witness the sins of Jerusalem, God and a “son of man” serving as two legal witnesses, explaining the phrase “Come, let us go down…” in Genesis 11:7, when God brought confusion. The pillar of cloud also brought confusion upon Pharaoh’s armies, and it was likely present when the armies of Midian were confused under the watch of Gideon. But when the cloud came upon the Tabernacle and Temple, upon the Son, and upon His saints on the Day of Pentecost, as a mighty, rushing wind, the Lord was happy to bless. The arrival of the chariot of God, unlike the chariot of Pharaoh, is a chariot which brings not only vengeance but also redemption. It is the chariot of the almighty ga’al, the one who bears a two-edged sword to slay the wicked and cut the bonds of the righteous.

So, is it beyond possibility that the chariot of God was the cause of the three hours of darkness, recorded across the oikoumene, while Christ was on the cross? After all, the final chapters of Ezekiel present this Jew-Gentile social construct as a temple, with the Land of Israel as its holy altar. The Lord was coming to His temple to inspect it for “leprosy.” According to the Law, the leprosy had to be cut out, but if it returned, the house would be destroyed. Jesus was crucified “outside the camp,” like a leper (see Leviticus 14, and The Leprous House). He was the one being “cut out” that the house might be spared. But as Jesus predicted, the cleaned house would be filled with even worse demons (see Seven Spirits More Wicked), and its response to being cleansed would be a return to corruption in an even greater way. The Veil of the Temple was torn, but when the Lord later returned “in the clouds” the Temple was torn down. Not one stone was left upon another.

And he shall break down the house, its stones and timber and all the plaster of the house, and he shall carry them out of the city to an unclean place (Leviticus 14:45)

This means that the entire Land was under judgment, and Jesus was at the center of the court. He had been condemned by the High Priesthood (Garden), by Herod (Land) and by Pilate (World), the entirety of the oikoumene “Tabernacle.” Now He was being judged by heaven, and for the will of heaven be done on earth required the “bowing of the heavens,” that is, a visit from the heavenly court via the glory cloud, a symbolic reunion of the waters above and below in a prefiguring of final judgment (see “Bowing the Heavens” in my book Inquiétude for more discussion.) God was visiting the Garden, and Adam was exposed in His court. The events that transpired recapitulate those of Psalm 18 – including the earthquake –with one major difference: the Father did not hear, and did not deliver, the Man who cried out to Him.

The cords of death encompassed me;
the torrents of destruction assailed me;
the cords of Sheol entangled me;
the snares of death confronted me.

In my distress I called upon the Lord;
to my God I cried for help.
From his temple he heard my voice,
and my cry to him reached his ears.

Then the earth reeled and rocked;
the foundations also of the mountains trembled
and quaked, because he was angry.

Smoke went up from his nostrils,
and devouring fire from his mouth;
glowing coals flamed forth from him.

He bowed the heavens and came down;
thick darkness was under his feet.

He rode on a cherub and flew;
he came swiftly on the wings of the wind.
He made darkness his covering, his canopy around him,
thick clouds dark with water.

What does this mean for the significance of the three hours of darkness? That the Christ who “became sin for us” was trodden underfoot like an enemy, or a serpent, the blood upon the kapporet, the footstool of God (see Peter Leithart, The Footstool of His Feet.) To conquer sin, He became sin. To make His enemies His footstool (Psalm 110:1; Luke 20:43; Hebrews 10:13), He would first be trampled underfoot, and it would please the Lord to bruise Him (Isaiah 53:10). The holy presence which overshadowed Mary at Jesus’ conception (Luke 1:35) now overshadowed the entire nation at His death.

This abandonment of the Son by the Father was not “spatial” but legal. The Father presided over the Son in the seat of Moses, surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses. This courtroom “betrayal,” a perjury in the sense that He changed His previous testimonies concerning the blamelessness and authority of the Son, was as close-to-home as the kiss of Judas. In this final act, the Father crossed the floor and stood with Judas, with Ananias, with those who beat, spat upon and ridiculed Jesus, with Pilate, with the crowd, and with the thief who cursed Him on the cross.

The word “sacrifice” connotes the idea of “near bringing” (see James B. Jordan, Leviticus 1:2). It was this reversal of judgment, through substitutionary atonement, that the angels “standing at the four corners of the Land,” those who stood prepared to vindicate the Son by immediately destroying the city and the Land (as predicted in Daniel 9:25-26), were told: “Do not harm the land or the sea or the trees until we put a seal on the foreheads of the servants of our God” (Revelation 7:1-3).

At the Day of Pentecost, the brightness of the cloud was visited upon those who believed, and the darkness of strong delusion upon those who refused to believe. In the Gospel, this dividing “sword” was extended right across the empire. This “visitation” by the Spirit, whose indwelling turned every believer into a chariot (epitomised and signified in the miraculous travel of Philip in Acts 8:38-39), explains the inspiration and perseverance of the Jew-Gentile saints and the strong delusion which confused and confounded their Jew-Gentile enemies, who turned on each other, eventuating in their destruction at the coming of Christ with all His martyred sons, including Abel (Matthew 23:35), on white horses as a cloud of “witnesses” (martyrs) against the first century “Babylon.” These saints were God’s chariot.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. (Hebrews 12:1-2)

“Just as Circumcision made impossible a global corruption,
so paedobaptism makes impossible a global Gospel.”

Part 1 here.

With so many young people leaving the Church, it is no wonder that there is a push to renew an understanding of biblical Covenant. Giving our children a profound sense of their “Covenant identity” is a crucial means of re-establishing the Covenant framework which has been neglected. Unfortunately, those pushing for these things are going about it in entirely the wrong way, because they are re-establishing the wrong Covenant.

Covenant Obligation

As Christian parents, we want our children to grow up to be like Abel, and not like Cain. The problem with using baptism to impart a “Covenant identity” is that this is not what baptism is for. Cain and Abel both had the same Covenant identity. Although their roles in worship differed, both were under a similar obligation when it came to faith. Abel was to offer blood to cover, once again, the sin in the Garden; Cain was then to offer the firstfruits of the Land. But Cain pushed in and made his offering first, apparently a refusal to acknowledge the sovereignty of God. This was Pentecost before Firstfruits, kingdom before priesthood, a grasping of dominion without prior submission to God. It was the sin of Adam on a grander scale. [1]

Cain’s rebellion resulted in the establishment of a new identity, a pagan one. The curse upon him, though withheld, became a curse upon his children. The human race was divided into two tribes: a priestly clan which still recognised and worshiped God and a kingly order which did not. Intermarriage corrupted the priesthood and only one family remained submitted to God. The question is this: did those in the fortress of the Cainites no longer have any obligation to God? Of course they did, and eventually the entire civilization died in the Great Flood.

After the sin at Babel, humanity was headed for another flood, but God stepped in and divided the entire race in two through circumcision. A Covenant was established with Abraham and his offspring, with specific promises, that they might eventually be a blessing to the nations outside of this Covenant. Under Moses, the continuity of these promised blessings was bound through the Law, which meant that not only was Israel a “cultivated Land,” she would also be “pruned” from time to time, disciplined by God because of His great love for these children, His “firstborn.” Were the other nations under these Covenant obligations? Not directly. The nations surrounding Israel were blessed or cursed depending upon their treatment of Abraham’s offspring, but Israel was the focus. When Israel sinned, God also used these nations to curse and purify her. In all cases, this Covenant concerned only Abraham’s offspring until it was fulfilled. The Gentiles were under no obligation to either the Abrahamic Circumcision or the Mosaic Law.

Split Identities

Israel’s Covenant identity was not a removal of the obligation of the nations but an expansion of the office of Abel in worship, that is, the offering of representative blood. When it came to actual salvation, an Abrahamic “Covenant identity” simply meant that you were the first to hear. While this Covenant was in force, the Gospel always went first to the Jew and then to the Gentile. Likewise, when judgment came, it came first upon Israel and then upon the nations. But both were still under obligation to God.

The Jew was to hear and believe, and through Israel, Gentiles were also to hear and believe. When it comes to salvation, this has always been the case. Israel’s “Covenant identity” in Abraham was a corporate liturgical office, not salvation itself. Hence, the doctrine of “paedofaith” is a wishful contrivance, an illegitimate hybrid of the promise to the believer and this obsolete Old Covenant sacrificial office. As we see in the prophets, God’s blessings and curses came upon all those who heard Israel’s testimony. In all cases, faith, which came by hearing, would result in works, and God always judged their faith (or lack of it) by their works. Through the testimony of Jonah, Nineveh was saved. Despite the testimony of Nahum, Nineveh was destroyed. If their works were faithful, then they were obviously converted. Regarding their offices, they remained Jews or Gentiles, Abels or Cains, brothers with different gifts but both in the service of God. One could be a believer or an unbeliever regardless of whether one was commissioned to offer blood, or to offer fruits from the ground (kingdom riches). The Old Covenant identity was with regard to ministry, not salvation, just as Abel kept sheep and Cain worked in the field. Both were required to repent and believe. Once the offerings were made, these fulfilled offices became meaningless. Once Christ was offered as better Abel, and the Herodian order judged as greater Cain, circumcision and uncircumcision became meaningless.

A Division of Flesh

The cultural separation of Jew and Gentile was for the purpose of preventing the kind of unity of culture which destroyed the original world in the flood and threatened to destroy the new world of Noah. At a global level, it split humanity irrevocably into Church and State. The usurping of priesthood by kingdom, the co-opting of the Church by the State, was impossible without the breaking down of the “wall of enmity,” circumcision and the Law, the Covenant obligations of the Jews. Though similar sins were committed within the bounds of the circumcision, a global corruption was made impossible through the curses of the Law. The Law put a hedge around the ministry of Abel (Genesis 4), and prevented the “Cainites” from intermarrying with the “Sethites” (Genesis 6) or uniting to build a new Babel. Thus, the identity conferred in circumcision was a Covenant within a Covenant, Abrahamites as a priestly people within a Noahic world, Abels among Cains, sheep among wolves. When Israel’s priests, kings and people behaved like Cainites, God gave them over to the real Cainites for discipline and eventual purging. Just as animals died on Israel’s behalf, so Israel was judged on the world’s behalf. Israel would always die as the firstborn, a first fruits of blood separated from the rest of the world. But Israel, unlike the other nations, would also rise from the dead.

The Covenant identity of Israel, conferred due to the personal faith of Abraham, was a sacrificial obligation which was fulfilled in Jesus. Jesus is the sacrificial flesh of Israel, offered in faith on behalf of all nations. The Jewish identity, the offering of the blood of the firstborn, finally ascended to heaven in Christ. True priesthood was finally accomplished and true kingdom could come, a dominion sourced in submission to God and priestly service. The end of Circumcision came because the Abelic ministry was completed in Christ. The end of the Temple avenged not only the blood of Christ but also the blood of Abel. The end of the Jewish identity necessarily ended the Gentile identity, as the submersion of the Land makes the demarcation of “sea” meaningless. All the kingdoms of the world, offered to Jesus at the hand of Satan, are now His at the hand of the Father.

Now that this division of offices is gone, the only Covenant identity which remains is the one common to all men, as it was common to both Cain and Abel, the obligation to repent and trust God. The New Covenant did not introduce a souped-up Abrahamic identity, a new division of fleshly offices. It fulfilled and exalted one which already existed: repentance and faith, something which was always available to both Jew and Gentile, who in the larger picture were under the same Covenant in Noah. This fact was the basis for the decision of the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15 (See A Change Of The Law).

Since the ministry of shedding blood is now fulfilled, there is no such “Covenant-within-a-Covenant” identity in existence. With the Old Covenant completed, there is no “Covenant identity” outside of the call to repent and believe. Since the world is no longer divided into the offices of Jew and Gentile, there is no need to signify separate obligations. Logically, baptism cannot confer a Covenant obligation, because we are all under the New Covenant obligation to repent and believe. Thus, baptism can neither make a “Covenant child,” nor confer salvation in any sense upon an infant.

A Global Covenant

Those who believe that baptism, whether of an infant, a child or an adult, puts that person “into Covenant with God” have not understood what makes the New Covenant new. Circumcision marked out a cultural “office,” the shedding of blood, an obligation which has now been fulfilled in Christ. Baptism marks out a personal response, the answer of a good conscience towards God, which has also now been fulfilled in Christ. But these are not the same. One is death, and one is resurrection. One is an objective execution, the other a subjective profession.

The idea that baptism puts somebody “into Covenant with God” in the way that circumcision put Abraham’s seed into Covenant with God, not only limits the scope of its obligation to the confines of the Church, it leads to the mistaken belief that evangelism is about unbelievers joining the Covenant with its obligations rather than responding to the Gospel because they are already condemned. Evangelism is not an extension of the New Covenant obligation across the world, as though the nations were joining some sort of renovated Old Covenant Israel. God forbid. Evangelism is for the purpose of a response to that obligation, a response which confers complete fulfillment of those obligations on one’s behalf by Christ.

So, how do we give our children a “New Covenant identity”? By teaching them of their “Adamic” obligation to Jesus, one which they possess simply by being born, and that this “death-note” was fulfilled by Christ. They are not born Christians, but neither are they born pagans, because the Gospel sees to it that the world is no longer divided in such a way. It challenges every identity by proclaiming the one common to all.

Using baptism to signify some kind of legal obligation between a child and God is an unwitting testimony that Christ has not come in the flesh, that the ministry of bloodshed is not complete, that the blood of Abel has not been avenged. It makes the Church a wall of flesh between God and the nations rather than a torn veil, a door open to the rebel in us all.

Paedobaptism gives to the world a false picture of both the work of Jesus and the prophetic office of each Christian, the profession of one’s faith. Paedobaptism puts the unbeliever outside the obligations of the New Covenant, which are repentance and faith. It basically tells the world to go and build a city, because God is concerned only with His “Covenant people,” and has not given all the kingdoms of the world to His Son. Thus, paedobaptism not only confers upon infants membership in a Covenant which no longer exists, and thus gives them a false identity by treating repentance and faith as though it were an inherited “office” like that of the Jew, it makes the Church a closed veil between the obligation of all people and the throne of Jesus, the Open Door who Himself is the New Covenant.

There is no “identity” which is outside of the New Covenant, and this is the basis for evangelism. Just as Circumcision made impossible a global corruption, so paedobaptism makes impossible a global Gospel.

NEXT POST: Raising Canaan

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[1] I believe that if Cain had not killed Abel, a third son would have been the Prophet, rather than Seth, a replacement priest. This incomplete architecture was fulfilled in the three sons of Noah. See The Last Sin.

Excerpt from James B. Jordan, Babylon and the Babel Project, Biblical Horizons Occasional Paper No. 39. Available from www.biblicalhorizons.com

In the Latter Days [the Restoration era], Babylon is anti-Jerusalem, apostate Judaism. A careful reading of Zechariah will uncover this fact. Zechariah 2:7 tells Zion to escape from living with Daughter Babylon, but in fact Babylon had been conquered and the people were literally living in the Persian empire. Moreover, there was no need for most of the Jews to return to Jerusalem; God’s missionary purpose involved having them spread out all over the world. Indeed, in context, “Jerusalem” is spoken of as a non-geographical entity (2:2-5). It is clear that the geographical language used here is symbolic of spiritual realities. The righteous were to separate themselves from living in terms of Babylonian principle…

In Zechariah 5:5-11, the prophet is shown a counterfeit of the Ark of the Covenant. The actual Ark had been lost, and so only a “spiritual Ark” was located in the Temple, in the midst of the Temple-People. Similarly, this anti-Ark is located in “Shinar,” which is also Jerusalem and the people of God. The anti-Ark is round instead of rectangular; it has a lead cover instead of a golden one; it is flanked by storks instead of by cherubim; it contains Wickedness instead of the tables of the Covenant; and it has a temple built for it in Shinar instead of Jerusalem.

In the vision, the anti-Ark is removed from Jerusalem and the land of God. We are being told that the exodus of God’s people back to Him will mean the removal of idolatry and apostasy from her midst. Wickedness will make an “exodus” back to Shinar, back to Babel, back to Ur.

This exodus of Wickedness is not, however, to be understood geographically or even socially. Rather, the thought, clearly in view of the preceding history of Israel, is that the new Temple that Zerubbabel was building could be a house of God or a house for Wickedness. Both are at the same location. Which one the Temple will be depends on the people. Indeed, the Temple will be both. For faithful worshipers (like the publican), it will be the Temple of God, but for the proud (like the Pharisee), it will be a Temple of Wickedness.

Thus, the new Babel is not located some place other than Jerusalem. It is a false Jerusalem superimposed on the true one. It is a shadow Temple and City, next to the true ones.

“Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” (Philippians 2:5-11)

This passage (or pericope?) retraces the Covenant pattern, which is also played out in the flow of the history of Israel. We’ll have a look at the structure of the passage and then I want to discuss the significance of the literary placement of “every tongue.”

WARNING: Weird ahead.

[This post has been refined and included in Sweet Counsel: Essays to Brighten the Eyes.]

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or The False Bride Will Never Get A Management Position

“…the only unity that will be allowed by the Father is the unity that Jesus requested from the Father in John 17.”

One of the interesting “universal themes” that James Jordan has uncovered in the Bible is that of Satan’s various attempts to “gather the nations” against the Church. You can read about that in a series of blog posts called Amalek Debunks Hyperpreterism (click here and scroll down).

The history of Israel was the qualification of a Covenant Head, fulfilled in Jesus, who now rules the nations from heaven, with the Old Covenant saints in a crystal city. The evil one has been bound so that he cannot gather the nations against the Church until he is released just before the end. He will immediately attempt to gather the nations but be destroyed. The Church will once again be the bait in a trap, as it was for Pharaoh, and for the Herod/Emperor alliance.

The evil one is currently bound from gathering the nations so that Jesus can gather them plundering the “strong man’s house.”

The Glass Ceiling

The Church on earth is one with the crystal city, and is currently ruling the world through prayer and faithful service. Whenever the nations attempt to build Babel, whether by military conquest or economic unions, they hit the glass ceiling put in place in AD70. Their mortar gives way and the various unions fragment once again.

The nations will not be allowed to unite because they would eventually be united against the Church, and the Church isn’t yet complete. Whatever happens over the next few years in the economy, or environmentally, or internationally, is all about the spread of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He, and His Church, are central to everything that happens.

Final Fantasy

The final feast in Israel’s calendar was Tabernacles (or Booths). This was also known as ingathering, the time when Jews and Gentiles were temporarily one. The first century was the “ingathering” of the Old Covenant. The Herods were making ungodly pacts to unite Jew and Gentile, all the while Paul was gathering the faithful into the New Covenant by the power of the Spirit.

This is what we see now, but on a global scale. We can sing “It’s A Small World” all we like, but the only unity that will be allowed by the Father is the unity that Jesus requested from the Father in John 17.

Tabernacles was the end of the working year, the final harvest, the time of olives and grapes, oil and wine. The Gentiles seek to enter into “God’s rest,” the place reserved for wise judges, a feast of wine. But as long as they reject Jesus, they will continually be turned away — as bread to be broken once again, in the process of the glorification of the world.

Who’s in Control?

The markets might be volatile, the world might be at war, but Jesus is in control and He knows exactly what He is doing. As He scatters His enemies, He is gathering His people. And if we fear Him, we have nothing else to fear.

In Jesus’ economy, the false bride will never get a management position. Yet, as His true bride, we ascend by faith every week to join in the worship, praise and prayer that truly governs the world. Knees bowed to Jesus are royal knees.

The glass ceiling that shatters the nations is the crystal city, the New Covenant firmament, the New Jerusalem.

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See also Totus Diabolus, The Ten Toes, Armageddon’s Big Sista, Jesus’ Long Day. How to be Really Evil, There Can Only Be One, Postmillennial Suffering, Three Babylons, Communion of Saints, Better Angels.

We receive baptism, but is membership of the visible New Covenant body entirely objective? The Old Covenant church, “the Body of Moses,” was Adamic. The Tabernacle was a Babelic tower, a ladder to heaven, laid out prostrate on the ground. The New Covenant Body, the Body of Jesus, is Evian. As a Temple filled with the Spirit of God, it stands upright and walks on the Crystal Sea.

I’m a Calvinist, but baptism is about the willing response of the New Covenant bride, initiated by the witness of the Old Covenant Adam. To try to divvy it up into subjective/objective is to miss the point of relationship. It takes two to tango.

Baptism was pictured for us by the animals gathering and submitting to Adam to be named, the animals gathering and submitting to Noah to be sheltered, the Gentiles submitting to the government of Mordecai and Esther (predicted by Isaiah with the Noahic symbols of holy branch, wolf and lamb [1]), and fulfilled in the Gentiles (beasts) miraculously listening to Paul once the Jews (Adams) reject the gospel. Yes, baptism is received, but it is an authority conferred.

Perhaps this is the difference between a mark and a seal. A mark is a cutting of the law into a dead tablet. The marks on repentant Israelites in Ezekiel’s vision and the mark of the beast in Revelation are like this: external tattoos on skin. But a seal is a sign of completion, and mission. It is the king’s authority on a “living” epistle, one that contains the Law inside and is ready to ride out into the world. [2]

When Jesus opens the New Covenant seals, the gospel horsemen ride out into the Land: Word, Division, Increase/Decrease, then Judgment. The horses were the legal witness of the Apostolic church.

In these two, mark and seal, we may have the difference between circumcision and baptism, Word and Spirit, external law and internal law.

If so, this means that “sealing” babies is like sealing empty envelopes. As far as New Covenant virility goes, it’s the equivalent of shooting blanks. [3]

[1] See The Wolf and the Lamb.
[2] See The Secret.
[3] See New Covenant Virility.

Nothing could save the circumcision.
How do you save death itself?

To recap, the basic structure we have been contemplating is this:

F A T H E R  > < S O N  +  B R I D E
and
F A T H E R  > B R I D E <  S O N

The Tabernacle was a three storey building laid out upon the ground. Upright, it was the true Babel (I guess Christ was the first truly upright Tabernacle then, in His resurrection. The Old Covenant was a new body made from the dust, but still prostrate, awaiting the breathing in of the Spirit.) If we put this structure upright, we see the picture given to us in human relationships as holy architecture.

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[1] See Worship as Commerce and Unashamed Artisans.
[2] So the Trinity debunks hyperpreterism.

Infinite Room series links here.
INFROOM

Psalm 114 is one of those weird passages of Scripture that makes you wonder if the author was high on something. Without an understanding of the significance of the place of this song among these seven Psalms, the lyrics appear to be either the overly-clever, sophomoric crypticism of an ancient Bono or the fragmented derivatory prattlings of a madman.

But we are at the centre of the seven Psalms. Psalm 114 is Testing, and so contains references to Israel’s corporate death and resurrection in the wilderness. The nation of Israel was a new Creation. In the grave of Egypt, God formed a new house in Joseph. In the furnace of slavery, He filled a new house under Moses. But Israel’s failure to enter the Land meant the process would be carried out once again. Those who left Egypt would die in the wilderness, and a later generation enter the Land.

This central Psalm, the fourth, corresponds to the book of Numbers, the fourth book, and Pentecost, the fourth festival. It concerns death under the Law, and resurrection filled with Law.

But its construction is still cryptic. And like the words of the best poets, I believe there is method to the apparent madness. I believe the entire Psalm contains a symmetry, but that there are also two matrix cycles within it.

Praise the LORD!
…..When Israel went out of Egypt,
……….The house of Jacob
……….from a people of strange language [lip?],
……………Judah became His sanctuary,
……….Israel His dominion.
…..The sea saw and fled; Jordan turned back.
The mountains skipped like rams,
The little hills like lambs.

What ails you, O sea, that you fled?
…..O Jordan, that you turned back?
……….O mountains, that you skipped like rams?
……….O little hills, like lambs?
……………Tremble, O earth, at the presence of the Lord,
……….At the presence of the God of Jacob,
…..Who turned the rock into a pool of water,
The flint into a fountain of waters.

Psalms 114 (NKJV)

Praise the LORD!
(Creation) Transcendance of God.

When Israel went out of Egypt,
(Division) The separationof Israel, to whom authority was delegated.

The house of Jacob
from a people of strange language [lip],
(Ascension) Tabernacle (tent) reference. Also a reference to the false Tabernacle of Babel. The people were no longer of one “lip.” [1]
Firstfruits is also a microcosm of Booths. Here we have the priesthood (proto-Jew) as princely Head and the (Gentile) Nations as Body; bread and wine, Land and Sea (Day 3). This is echoed and fulfilled at the end of the Psalm, veeeeeeery cleverly.

Judah became His sanctuary,
(Testing) Judah was the kingly tribe, the Lion. This central point often refers to thrones and rulers. Numbers named so because Israel is counted and arranged in military ‘constellations’ around the throne of God.

Israel His dominion.
(Maturity) Israel corresponds chiastically to Jacob, but is the “Body” of Jacob as “Head.” It refers to the tribes as armies, the warrior bride. The use of names also shows us that the Tabernacle was only a symbol. The true house was God’s people.

The sea saw and fled; Jordan turned back.
(Conquest) The waters parted as the veil at Atonement, to allow God’s new Man to pass through, protected inside a blood-covered box. As usual, the water also refers to the Laver.

The mountains skipped like rams,
The little hills like lambs.
(Glorification) This is the main “on-drugs” verse. I checked commentaries on this, all the best ones, and they had no idea whatsoever, other than this might refer to trees on mountains blowing in the wind, or sheep-covered hills. One thing you learn from James Jordan is to ask WHAT ARE RAMS AND LAMBS FOR? They are sacrificial animals. Same goes in Daniel 8.
A symbol similar to mountains and hills skipping away is used again in the Revelation, where the world’s existing High Places fled from the new mountain of God established at Christ’s ascension. The Jewish mountains and the Gentile islands disappeared. The pagan gods stopped talking (and they did!) Once the priesthood was centralised, there was only one High Place, the place of the High Priest, the Tabernacle. Just as rams and lambs are sacrificial, mountains and hills are Altars, like Sinai. The new Altar scatters the old ones.
What does this have to do with Glorification? One symbol that applies here is certainly the mountain of God. Instead of rivers of water, here it is rivers of old blood. But the Psalm is not done yet. The Psalmist has deconstructed the old temples (death). Now he raises up a new one (resurrection).

What ails you, O sea, that you fled?
Creation – Word (here it is a question) as light on the dark waters (the Ark)

O Jordan, that you turned back?
Division – the waters divided (the Veil)

O mountains, that you skipped like rams?
Ascension – 1 – the Land formed (Bronze Altar)

O little hills, like lambs?
Ascension – 2 – the grain and fruit – the Land filled
(Table of Showbread – firstfruits lamb)

Tremble, O Land, at the presence of the Lord,
Testing – Governing lights (Lampstand – fire from heaven)

At the presence of the God of Jacob,
Maturity – swarms (Incense Altar – tribes)

These last two, knowing they refer to Christ, should bring a tear to your eye.

Who turned the rock into a pool of water,
Conquest – Mediator (the Laver). The veil of flesh opened. [2]

The flint into a fountain of waters.
Glorification – Shekinah (New Eden)
The reference to flint is beyond brilliant. This final point is Tabernacles, a party thrown at the cost of Jews for the 70 Gentile nations. Seventy bulls were sacrificed.
Flint refers to the Circumcision, the new House of God. Israel was a nation under the knife. As Peter Leithart observed, the cutting off of Abram’s flesh with a knife averted God’s cutting off all flesh with another flood. [3]

Just as old Israel died in the wilderness and a new one inherited the promises, this verse also predicts a future Israel would be cut off and die for the life of the world as Covenant Head, and the miraculous waters of baptism would flow to the nations as Covenant Body. Forming and filling, blood and water, Jew and Gentile, in one tight, crystalline verse.

At that time the LORD said to Joshua, “Make flint knives for yourself, and circumcise the sons of Israel again the second time.” Joshua 5:2

“For the Lord GOD will help Me; Therefore I will not be disgraced; Therefore I have set My face like a flint, And I know that I will not be ashamed.” Isaiah 50:7

“Like adamant stone, harder than flint, I have made your forehead; do not be afraid of them, nor be dismayed at their looks, though they are a rebellious house.” Ezekiel 3:9

But just like the Circumcision that attempted to assassinate Paul, Israel would pervert her mission into elitism. Paul refers to the Circumcision as the mutilation, prophets of Baal who cut themselves as though this justified them before their god. They bloodied their private parts but neglected the one that mattered. Unlike the Jews who believed at Pentecost, they were not cut to the heart by the words of the Christ or His Apostles. In fact, they turned their hearts into murderous knives, as their fathers had done before them. And for this, God would again destroy the House and raise up a new one. How IRONIC is this verse?…

“Yes, they made their hearts like flint, refusing to hear the law and the words which the LORD of hosts had sent by His Spirit through the former prophets. Thus great wrath came from the LORD of hosts.” Zechariah 7:12

The family of true Flintstones, the Jews who were cut to the heart, fulfilled the words of Christ:

“He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.” John 7:38

In a sense, their Words became knives also, as they shared the gospel. The living Word of God is always a sharp knife. John saw the witness of the church as soldiers made out of Tabernacle:

And thus I saw the horses in the vision: those who sat on them had breastplates of fiery red, hyacinth blue, and sulfur yellow; and the heads of the horses [were] like the heads of lions; and out of their mouths came fire, smoke, and brimstone. By these three [plagues] a third of mankind was killed — by the fire and the smoke and the brimstone which came out of their mouths. Revelation 9:17-18 [4]

Finally, both cycles of the Psalm combined together show a basic symmetry. Forming and filling make a New Creation.

___________________________
[1] See Confused Lip.
[2] See Walking on Water.
[3] Peter J. Leithart, Cutting Off Flesh.
[4] See Totus Christus for my exposition of these details!

or The Sick Fix of Quick Bricks

God had repeated His promises of land and people to Isaac, but it was to Jacob that God revealed He was going to build the true Babelic tower in the Promised Land. With his head on a rough stone, Jacob saw angels ascending and descending on a stairway to heaven, a ziggurat, a constructed holy mountain, between God and man. As with Eve, the Lord would build it out of flesh and blood—Jacob’s offspring—a living Tabernacle made of precious stones mined from the Land.

Unworked stones, like Jacob’s headrest, were a requirement of the Law for building an altar. Jacob’s head was on the Altar at the doorway to the Garden at the foot of the mountain. God’s men are unworked stones (Daniel 2:34-35), set apart (circumcised) in the wilderness and sacrificed—killed and cut up by God—and resurrected as beautiful, chiselled stones for a living Temple. [1]

The true sons of God are willing to endure the refinement process. Unlike the sons of Joktan, they are content to dwell in tents (Tabernacles) until the raw materials are pure, until nature is transformed into godly culture by God’s hand. Nimrod and Pharaoh made quick bricks, but the sound of a chisel was not heard near the site of Solomon’s Temple.

“Enoch and Babylon are the first cities, but Jerusalem is the last. Jubal is the first musician, but David the “last”. The wicked get there first and do much of the work, laying up an inheritance for the just. Because they are not concerned with morality, the wicked can employ slave labour to build their cultures early, while a righteous culture takes longer to build.”

James B. Jordan, Was Job an Edomite King?, Biblical Horizons, No. 131, www.biblicalhorizons.com

This desire for quick fixes is our problem today. We are not content to dwell in tents and wait for God’s timing. We take out an overdraft on the future for immediate glory. Our worship has become “Herodian.” A church compromised with the state erects a hastily-built tower that cannot last. Instead of the bride, it is a one night stand. [2]

_______________________________
[1] See Unashamed Artisans.
[2] See Totus Diabolus.

I saw in my dream, that the Interpreter took Christian by the hand again, and led him into a very dark room, where there sat a man in an iron cage. Now the man seemed very sad. He sat with his eyes looking down to the ground, and his hands folded together, and he sighed as if his heart would break.

Then said Christian, “Who is this?”

“Talk with him and see,” said the Interpreter.

“What used you to be?” asked Christian.

“I was once a flourishing professor, both in my own eyes, and also in the eyes of others,” answered the man. “I was on my way, as I thought, to the Celestial City and I was confident that I would get there.”

“But what did you do to bring yourself to this condition?” Christian asked.

“I failed to keep watch,” the man replied. “I followed the pleasures of this world, which promised me all manner of delights. But they proved to be an empty bubble. And now I am shut up in this iron cage—a man of despair who can’t get out.”

No further explanations were given. No one said who put him there. But the Interpreter whispered to Christian:

“Bear well in mind what you have seen.” [1]

.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .

Another thought related to the ideas in Behind Closed Doors.

The whole aim of the construction process, whether in sex, foetal development, education, business, art, music, family or state government, is the ultimate revelation of a mature glory. We are given the opportunity to create, and that involves certain God-given freedoms. If the freedoms are abused, what we construct for ourselves is a cage. Lust is a cage. A dysfunctional family or state is a cage. Enforced egalitarian socio-economics is a cage. Undisciplined children are a cage.

Jesus laid down His life for this world, and the freedoms of western culture have been a direct outcome. In its final stages, we have rebelliously inverted each of these freedoms (including the economic ones) and turned both our Christian protection (including our God-given wealth) and Christian mandate into a cage. Ancient Israel did the same. Why does this inversion process seem such a logical path for fallen human nature?

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