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And I looked, and behold, in the midst of the throne and of the four living creatures, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as though it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God sent out into all the Land. (Revelation 5:6)

The Bible is the story of the historic battle between the serpent-king and the servant king. Both sit on bloody thrones. Herod slaughters the innocents, and is then slaughtered by God. The innocent Christ is slaughtered, then sends His followers into the world as seven Spirits (Lampstand/Pentecost), but also as lambs among wolves.

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Furnishing the New House

Zechariah’s night visions move God’s furniture around. As we saw, the instructions for the Tabernacle furniture align it with the Creation Week. And the Creation Week corresponds with the seven Feasts. Zechariah’s visions follow the Creation and Feast patterns, but the Tabernacle furniture has been shifted around all over the place.

Now, you will probably ask how eight visions can align with seven days or seven feasts. The answer is that it takes the two visions in chapter 5 to reflect the Day of Atonement. Thus:

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“If Satan was defeated at the cross, why was there so much Satanic activity before the destruction of the Temple?”

(*Satan was thrown out of the heavenly Temple but moved into the earthly one – seven worse demons – a false Lampstand. Judaism’s seven eyes were darkened. [Matt. 6:23])

We don’t know how many wise men travelled from the east, but perhaps we can make a guess via God’s deliberate typology.

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In the two trees, Life and Wisdom, bread and wine, priest and king, flesh and blood, Land and Sea, earth and heaven, the Lord presented Adam with a divided world.

The only way it could be united was through obedience. If he obeyed the Father’s will, he would eat the bread, then drink the wine, and the divided world would be united first in his own body. By obedience, Adam became a Tree of Life (Table), then a Tree of Wisdom (Lampstand) uniting earth with heaven. Dominion begins with bread and wine.

The golden Lampstand, with seven flames, pictured the sun, moon and five planets (those visible to the naked eye) that govern the firmament*—the seven “eagle-eyes” of God. In Ezekiel 1, this corresponded to the face of the Eagle that always faced north, watching over the people of God, the Table of Showbread (the face of the Man).

The Lampstand was also a stylised almond tree. In Hebrew, the word translated “almond” is also the word for “watcher, overseer.” An almond tree is a shepherdwho grows out of the earth and reaches heaven—a Tree of Life.

The serpent usurped Adam’s authority in the garden, and he became the legal judge (satan) of mankind, standing full of eyes before the ark/throne – seven stars at God’s right hand. As the ancients, including Solomon, sculpted wild beasts to guard their thrones, so this angelic tutor became a beast “crouching at the door.” Man had to pass him to reign with God. We see him before God’s throne in Job. He roamed to and fro on the Land like a raven and returned to accuse God’s people. The angel of light—the shepherd “Lampstand”—had become a wolf.

*The governing lights were created on Day 4. The speech concerning the Lampstand is the fourth speech regarding the Tabernacle construction.

Belshazzar curses the day he let the Chaldeans talk him into signing up with Facebreadbook.

“In the same hour the fingers of a man’s hand appeared and wrote opposite the lampstand on the plaster of the wall of the king’s palace; and the king saw the part of the hand that wrote.” Daniel 5:5

“The fact that the Watcher Lampstand oversees the Facebread in the Temple means that Israel undergoes a continual inspection of jealousy. God watches all the time. In Daniel 5, the Lampstand “arrives” and sees Belshazzar’s face, “facebread” because it is at his great “bread”, and his face is undone as his “splendours change”. It is precisely as Belshazzar is drinking the wine that the judgment appears, as in the case of the woman in Numbers 5. As a priestly agent is involved in bringing judgment in Numbers 5, so Daniel is involved in bringing judgment in Daniel 5. As the woman’s loins are undone, so are Belshazzar’s. The woman’s judgment is barrenness; in the case of Belshazzar the king, the judgment is the same: no future.”1

Notice the “Holy Place” configuration. The Lampstand, the Table, and the graven Word (Ark). Daniel is the Incense Altar, the accepted elder. Why do pictures of this event never include the Lampstand? It is crucial.

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1 James B. Jordan, The Handwriting on the Wall, p. 289.
See also Jesus at Belshazzar’s Feast: An Explanatory Disquisition on an Aspect of the Story of the Woman Taken in Adultery for an interesting read.

“…repent, and do the works you did at first. If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent.” (Revelation 2:5)

The Lampstand was the seven eyes of God, the flaming tongues of the Law given at Pentecost. Either we are judges or we are judged. An eye for an eye. Adam failed to judge rightly and Satan became the accuser, thieving Adam’s throne at the right hand of God.

Christ promises a future inspection. As prime mover, He sets things in motion then returns to measure Adam’s work on the next Lord’s day. Then we receive plunder, or He plunders us “like a thief.” If, like Adam/Solomon, we steal from Jesus, He will steal from us like Satan/Nebuchadnezzar (Matthew 13:12).

The warnings to the seven churches prefigure the greater judgments that follow in Revelation – upon the eighth church, Judaism. Jesus did come and remove the Lampstand. He came as Titus.

…”and the light of a lamp will shine in you no more…”

The golden Lampstand, with seven flames, corresponds to the sun, moon and five planets (those visible to the naked eye) that govern the firmament. These are the seven “eagle-eyes” of God. The Lampstand was a stylised almond tree. In Hebrew, the word translated “almond” is also the word for “watcher, overseer.” An almond tree is a shepherd who grows out of the earth and reaches heaven–a Tree of Life.

Stephen defended himself with a speech recounting the history of Israel, culminating in their murder of prophets before the exile.

“You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you. Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who announced beforehand the coming of the Righteous One, whom you have now betrayed and murdered, you who received the law as delivered by angels and did not keep it.” (Acts 7:51-53)

They would be exiled, like their fathers, but into outer darkness grinding their teeth in agony (Matthew 8:12). They were already grinding their teeth, but against Stephen. He saw the heavenly veil opened and Jesus standing at the right hand of God, the Watcher Tree, the Lampstand, measuring the first martyr of the New Covenant Table of Showbread. Like Jesus, Stephen was ejected from the city and executed. Like Jesus, he asked the Lord to receive his spirit, and prayed for forgiveness for his murderers. He was “one like the Son of Man.”
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The book of Daniel begins with the captured vessels from Solomon’s Temple being carried off to Babylon. We assume the ark, with its solid gold lid, was melted down. The golden lampstand, however, shows up at Belshazzar’s feast just before the fall of Babylon to Persia. Cyrus decrees that the Jews can return and rebuild the Temple. They carry the vessels, minus the Ark, across the Great River Euphrates.

Zechariah later sees a flying scroll with the dimensions of the Tabernacle (10 x 20 cubits). These are also the dimensions of the Ark plus cherubim in Solomon’s Temple. The Ark had been offered as an ascension and created a new heaven – unrolled a new scroll. The Restoration Covenant cost the Ark its “life.”

Now to Acts. The human Ark, Jesus, had ascended to heaven and left the “seven churches”, the New Covenant Lampstands with tongues of fire, to rule and conquer Babylon (Jerusalem). The church did so, and we see the firstfruits church army, the “kings from the sunrising” crossing the Great River in Revelation 16, entering a new earth like Joshua over Jordan.