20. Inside the Ark
Audio Only20. Inside the Ark - for Notes
20. Inside the Ark - PP
The writer of Hebrews states that three things were placed into the Ark, the tables of the covenant, Aaron’s rod that budded, and a bowl of manna. Each one of these three things represents a critical reality of our lives and what is happening inside of us as we rest utterly inside of Jesus.
To live inside of the Ark is to live inside of Jesus and He inside of you, that is, John 14:20.
The number of times the gospel states that you ARE inside of Christ and that Christ IS inside of you are astonishing. Writing out every one of those verses is worth doing.
Abide in Me. Abide, remain, and live inside of Me just as I abide, remain, and live inside of you… Apart from Me, you are not capable of doing anything (John 15:4 & 6). Apart from Jesus you would not exist; you cannot ever be apart from Him. Believe it, absolutely.
The tablets of the covenant represent Christ Jesus as every Word God speaks, written all through the pathways of your heart with Spirit ink.
The bowl of manna, the hidden manna, represents Christ Jesus as every Word God speaks, now in your own mouth as you speak the same Word made personal as you.
Three Metaphors. And in between these two pictures or metaphors of Word in our lives, Word written as Jesus inside and Word spoken as us and going forth, is the picture of our transformation, Aaron’s rod that budded.
We will start with Word written upon our hearts. Christ lives in your hearts through faith (Ephesians 3:17). – Clearly you are a letter of Christ written with Spirit ink on the tablets of your hearts of flesh (2 Cor. 3:3 – reduced).
And I have made known to them Your name and will make it known, that the love with which You loved Me, might be inside of them, and I inside of them (John 17:26).
The Covenant. The Covenant itself is three lines from the gospel – Symmorphosed with the image of His Son – Transformed into the same image – We shall be like Him.
This word that is Christ, then, enters into you to dwell inside of your heart – through faith.
That means your confidence, by your simple choice, as you choose to KNOW every single time you say to any word God Himself speaks, “Let it be to me according to Your Word.” – Your confidence that the Spirit is writing those words as the Lord Jesus Himself all through your human heart.
Confidence. Confidence and knowing are two different things, working closely together. Let’s look at them separately, however.
Our confidence is that Jesus Himself is every Word God speaks, and that, since He lives inside our hearts, then everything He is can be found there in full completion. This confidence is always the bottom line.
We have become partakers of Christ IF INDEED the source of our substance and assurance we should hold firm until completion or perfection (Hebrews 3:14). To simplify – We are part of Christ IF we stand fully confident that we ARE part of Christ.
Knowing. Knowing, then, is built upon that confidence. Knowing is our personal awareness and acknowledgement of every good Word that is Jesus.
This is a receiving of every word in the Bible into our hearts, as we read them, and not into our heads; that is, we allow the words to pass through our minds and to rest in our hearts without having to know “what they mean.”
Even the words of the Old Testament are transformed into Christ as they come under the ruling verses of the Bible. Yet we must know what God actually says, and not what so many claim “the Bible says.”
Complexity of Word. What are these Words, then, written upon our hearts, making our hearts the very Covenant of God? Look at the complexity and variation of the natural creation. Every element and quality in nature is coming every moment out from the good Words that are Jesus.
Then, consider God’s thoughts concerning you, an infinite set of words existing in full inside of God’s own Being, Words that will become the unfolding of your own life as they come through Jesus to become you in each moment.
This set of Words is personal to you and to no other. Yet all of those Words fill you full now, for ALL of God is inside of you as you believe that He is.
The Words of the Gospel. Then there are the Words of the gospel, starting with the ruling verses of the Bible and all of their companions, and reaching out to include every Word in the Bible as God means it towards you.
Every one of these Words you share with other believers in Jesus, although they are each personal to you as well.
The ruling verses of the Bible are dynamic Words, living Words, Words that grow in their meaning and application. Knowing the intricate details of these specific Words will be the absolute joy of our exploration forever; nonetheless each is written fully in our hearts now in ALL that they are.
Personal Hidden Manna. Let’s look now at Word as hidden manna, your own personal speaking of Christ.
These begin as Words written upon your heart, but they become personal to you as you speak them out loud, calling yourself by every Word that is Christ.
To the one presently and actively overcoming, I will give him the manna having been hidden and I will give him a white stone {a vote of confidence or affirmation} and upon the stone a new name having been written, which no one has known except the one receiving it (Revelation 2:17). – The one who possesses this hidden manna WILL overcome.
Confessions of Faith. Let’s set out personal confessions of faith that are the twelve ruling ideas of our reality.
I am right now symmorphosed with Jesus, sharing the same form together as the revelation of Father.
Christ lives inside my heart because I am convinced that He does; I am filled with all the fullness of God.
I drink the Lord Jesus into Myself; rivers of living water flow out from me every moment, bring life to all.
I cast down all that speaks against God, against myself, and against my brothers and sisters in Christ.
Christ is my life; I have no other life.
Inside of Jesus. I possess everything that is God boldly; I walk with no consciousness of sins.
I walk in utter confidence that I am part of Christ in every step and in every moment; I stand upon FIRM.
I love you; I set forth my soul for you. I love my brothers and sisters in Christ with a pure heart fervently.
By seeing, by speaking and by being what I am, I am always setting creation free into the glory of my Salvation.
I live only inside of Jesus; Jesus lives entirely inside of all that is me. I put the Lord Jesus Christ upon myself; I know my Father with me as I know Jesus Sent into me.
The Form of God. I share the same Spirit of Christ with all who belong to Jesus; I share the same physical form that is Christ with all who belong to Jesus.
We together, as we love one another, are the form of God to all creation forever.
These Words cannot be ideas; they must become utterly personal to each one of us, our own knowing of Jesus personal as us. There is more in each of these Words than can ever be discovered. There is a meaning and a knowing of these Words that belongs to you and to no other.
Word in Heart and Mouth. Romans 10:8-10, then, cannot remain as an outer court word, wherein we first ask Jesus to be our Savior as we step through the Gate, though we first knew it there.
But what says it? “The word, that is, Christ, the Word God speaks, is near you here and now, inside of your mouth and inside of your heart”; that is, the word of faith, persuasion, and confidence which we proclaim. That, if you speak the same word in your mouth, that is the Lord Jesus, and hold confident faith and persuasion inside your heart that God raised Him out from the dead, you will be saved. For the heart persuades into just innocence; and the mouth speaks the same word, speaking Christ into salvation.
What Is Happening to Us? We have learned that “saved” means “together with God.” And so it is clear that this Word that is Jesus is found in two parts of us, first inside the heart, written there as Covenant, and second in our mouth, now our own personal Word.
As we rest utterly, here, inside the Ark of the Covenant, inside of Jesus, under the piercing presence of the Energeia of God, filled with Jesus as Word written all through our hearts and knowing Jesus as Word spoken personal as us – what is happening to us?
This is the wonder of Aaron’s Rod – lying ALL NIGHT LONG inside the presence of God-Fire.
Aaron’s Rod. The story of Aaron’s rod is found in Numbers 17, an event that took place immediately after the single greatest portrayal of “Christian rebellion” in the Bible. The question was – whom has God chosen?
Thirteen sticks spent all night long inside the Holy of Holies in the Presence of God, one stick for each of the princes of Israel as well as Aaron’s stick.
HOWEVER – we are not applying this metaphor inside the Old Testament context, but rather here, inside of Jesus, as a picture of you and me resting in perfect peace utterly inside of all the fulness of God.
Transformed. Our outer form appears “dead,” just as Aaron’s rod did.
Yet life, the very life of God springs forth from as in all that we are, just as it sprang forth from Aaron’s rod. How does this happen?
We all, then, having been unveiled in face, are reflecting the glory of the Lord [to one another] as a mirror and are being transformed into the same image from glory into glory, just exactly as from the Spirit of the Lord (2 Corinthians 3:18). Here inside of Jesus, as we rest utterly under the Energeia of God, everything of our transformation is in its place.
The Energia of God. The Spirit of God, then, hovering over the “face of our waters” takes the DNA Word written upon our hearts and the RNA Word spoken in our mouths, and designs us entirely by that Word.
This is the Energeia of God energeoing inside of us; this is Salvation.
What, then, do we become in our transformation? We become humans, as we are, for real, loving one another with pure hearts fervently. We become the revelation of Father; we become what God looks like.
Transformation by Fire. There is no super-Christ. When God comes through, He always places Himself beneath. There’s just us folks, delighting in one another as God made us, knowing and enjoying one another.
This transformation is kindness and gentleness, weeping and laughing together, encouraging each other, regarding one another as the Lord Jesus Himself, giving all favor to each other and to all. The Church which IS His Body, the fullness of Jesus who fills all inside of all (Ephesians 1:23).
This is our transformation by Fire – inside the Ark.