Voice of the Kingfisher speaks out …from a different perspective
by Elinor Montgomery
The Temple – Part 1
May 6, 2008
Most people will tell you that the first temple built for God was constructed circa 960 B.C. by King Solomon. What do you say? Would you agree with this statement? If so, you are in error.
The first temple ever built for God was built by God, Himself, and his name was called Adam. He was built from the dust of the earth into which the Lord God breathed the Spirit of life. And he became a living being, created in the image of God. He was created in the Spirit of God subject to His ruler-ship and to His truth.
If he had been grateful for his life, he would not have blasphemed the Holy Spirit, but rather he would have worshiped only in the Spirit of life, obeying the truth of his God.
But Adam failed miserably, and the glory of God departed from the temple, which was doomed to be destroyed and returned to dust. The Spirit of life gave way to the spirit of death. In disobedience to God’s commandment, the temple of Adam rejected the truth and God’s ruler-ship for the lie and Satan’s ruler-ship. Does this bear any resemblance to another temple of another time, when the rulers of the temple rejected the truth, so that not one stone was left standing upon another?
Adam lost the gift of life given to him when God breathed His Spirit into him, thus giving himself over to a culture of death. This was the first act of religious idolatry, when Adam, God’s created son, accepted the lie, which paved the way for the first belief system of satanic religion. The lie of the serpent did not deny the existence of God; it simply denied the validity of His truth. The coming ecumenical religious movement will honor God, but will be based on the denial of His truth, called Jesus and the Word.
The twist to God’s words came with the lie that God (yes, Satan believed in God) does not mean what He says. To paraphrase the words of the serpent, it stated that though God might say His beloved human being would die, a loving God would not surely mean what He says by allowing this to happen. The suggestion was that God is capable of telling little white lies, in order to force His will upon man’s will.
This was the first lie of Satan, paving the way for modern thought that the Bible is not truth, and that the holiness of God is tolerant of sin. It paved the way for the modern message of man’s goodness being the requirement for eternal life. It also paved the way for modern Christendom to explain away the truths of the Bible and to change the message of the cross of salvation for a social gospel matching the mores of society. Ultimately, the institutional church will take on the image of its father, the devil, as did the Pharisees of Judaism, with which it wants to have unity in a Judeo-Christian ‘value-pak’.
He was God’s created vessel and son who rejected God’s truth, the very same son who walked with God in perfect relationship in the Garden of creation. This is perhaps one of the most frightening messages for the church today. If one strays from one’s position in the Lord along the way to the kingdom, by moving away from obedience to the truth of His Word, one will surely be ripe, as was Adam, to accept the twisting of the Word. This leads in one direction only, which is to the broad road of destruction within the camp of religion.
Let us next look at the tower-building project of Babel, a city built by man, after the flood of Noah’s time. It was man’s first attempt at religious tower-building in his desire to reach heaven, by means of his own works. God destroyed their power in unity by scattering the people over the entire face of the earth, while dividing their once united tongue into many tongues. This was the second judgment upon the descendants of Noah who had escaped the first judgment of the flood upon man who had embraced wickedness in all its forms.
God then called forth a people unto Himself through Abraham, who was required by God to separate from his idol-worshiping family and follow Him in faith and obedience to His truth. He could hear the voice of God and therefore, could speak for Him relating to men what He had said to him. His oral tradition would become the written tradition of the prophets, the first writing of which was done by the finger of God writing on tablets of stone. This written tradition of God is what we know as the Holy Bible. There is no other holy book with the finger of God upon it.
The writing began in the wilderness, after a young nation, having matured in the land of Egypt during a period of enslavement under Egyptian religious leaders and their people, was separated and led out from Egypt in an exodus, masterminded by God. This nation was called Israel, the Hebrew children of God in the lineage of Abraham. They were called to be a burning torch of the light of God to the world, revealing His divine glory and power as the One and only true God.
God commanded His people to build a tabernacle in the wilderness, a meeting-place for God to meet with man. It was a copy and shadow of what is in heaven or the kingdom of God (see Hebrews 8:5). God initiated and planned for its construction by choosing and equipping His own builders and workers.
The vessels of the tabernacle were covered in gold (worship). The gold of this world was taken from the Egyptians by the Israelites before the Exodus, and was refined from its crude state in the wilderness to become a pure form of gold, fit for the Holy Place of God. It was to be given over to God for His purposes by means of a free-will-offering from His people.
What a picture of the money we earn in this world, which is the gold of Satan, being transformed and used for the purposes of God! It is what we call stewardship today. The gold, which we worship in this world, must be changed to become the pure worship of the Lord in spirit and in truth, but never in the things of this world.
And so, the tabernacle became the meeting place of God with man over which the power and glory of God were seen in the cloud by day and in the pillar of fire by night. This was done entirely according to God’s plan and for the sake of not only His people but for the enlightenment of all the gentile nations surrounding them.
They were only the priests who could enter into the tabernacle of meeting, where they made the sacrifices and atonement for God’s people. And only the high priest could go into the holiest place of all, the Holy of Holies, where the ark of the covenant rested. Animal sacrifices were made regularly by the priests for the sins of the people, for one sacrifice would never suffice for the ongoing sin of man.
Once Israel was in the Land, the tabernacle remained in Shiloh through the period of Judges and on into the time of King David’s reign, before which it was moved to Nob (see 1 Samuel 21:1-6).