Episode Transcript
Hello, I'm Dr. Kylie Fisher. Welcome to Heavenly Harmonies.
In John 8, verse 12, Jesus says, I am the light of the world. He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life. Today we explore the topic of light as it relates to the sanctuary through the magnificent hymn Love Divine.
All loves Excelling Stay with me to discover heavenly harmonies that can keep you near to the heart of God. So in this season, we have been tracing the everlasting gospel in song, and we are using hymns to hide present truth in our hearts. And we've looked at the everlasting gospel from its beginning in eternity past, through centuries of dark persecution.
And Daniel, chapter 8, verses 11 and 12 tells us that during this time, during those 1260 years of persecution, God's sanctuary was to be cast down. And we saw that this refers to the work that Jesus is doing for us in heaven, which is a vital part of his plan of salvation, which is his plan to save us. And so the sanctuary in heaven is where Jesus has been working since he returned to heaven from his time here on earth.
So we know that from this verse in Daniel, these verses in Daniel, Daniel 8, 11 and 12, that Jesus work for us in the heavenly sanctuary during this time was to be attacked in some way. So various aspects of the false doctrines that actually attacked the work of Christ during this time have been highlighted. By contrast, in the hymn, the church has one foundation.
So you will hopefully recall, hopefully you've watched this programme. In looking at that hymn, we saw the characteristics of the true church. And so I think it's the second verse.
It speaks about having how the true church has one Lord, one faith, one birth, one holy name, she blessed partakes one holy food, and to one hope she presses with every grace endued. And so, you know, it says in that song that the true church acknowledges one Lord and she blesses one holy name. This obviously refers to our prayers to God and the fact that we pray only to God.
But during those years of persecution, sadly, this wonderful truth that we can come before the throne of God, this was replaced with the intercession of saints. It was made out that God and even Jesus Christ was so unfeeling that they could not be personally approached, but we could only approach them, you know, through the intercession of saints. And so it didn't have the idea that, you know, like, I mean, John 3:16, God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son.
You know, God is the one that provides the gift that reconciles us to him. But with this false doctrine, God is not portrayed as actually loving us, but that as these saints are interceding for us, you know, gives the idea that God needs to be, you know, we have to plead with God in order to awaken his love. But that's so much opposite to what is the real truth of this.
Yes. So this wonderful truth that we can pray directly to God, that was replaced with, you know, a range actually of false ideas. And, you know, when more thinking about prayer, a vital aspect of prayer is confession of sins, you know, in Jesus, in the prayer that he taught us to pray, he said, forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors, or forgive us our trespasses as we forgive our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.
That's the Old English, if you may be a bit more used to that. So that's a vital part of prayer. That's in the prayer that Jesus Christ himself taught us to pray rather than this.
During those centuries of persecution, over a thousand years of persecution, people were taught that they needed to confuse, confess their sins to priests and that they needed actually even to purchase God's favour, that they needed to pay money to be forgiven for their sins. They needed to make some long wearisome pilgrimage in an effort to atone for their sins. But it says in First John 1, verse 9, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
And so it's the blood that Jesus shed on the cross for us that is what brings us forgiveness of sin. It is not through some work that we do. God is the one that provided the gift to reconcile us to Himself.
So one holy name she blesses, partakes one holy food. And so the word of God, the Bible, during these terrible years of persecution, it was replaced with human tradition. And that's just so, so sad.
And so, yeah, so these false doctrines, they crept into the church. The church was taken away from or many people, I should say. There were those that remained faithful, but many people were taken away from their true foundation.
But with the Reformation, the Bible began to be restored to the people and its great truths were rediscovered, including, or began to be rediscovered, I should say, the great truths that related to the sanctuary. So these began to be rediscovered during this time. But the truths about the sanctuary stretch into our day.
There was new truth actually to be discovered in our day, and we know from previous programmes that Revelation, chapter 14, verses 6 to 12, the three angels messages, we cannot properly understand those messages if we do not understand the sanctuary truth. And so it's vital for us to see how these historical foundations were laid during the early Reformation and so that we can build on them when we come to looking at the truths that have been rediscovered in the time of the end, the time that especially relates to us, and we see these present truths, okay, so these truths that were related, that related to the sanctuary began to be rediscovered. And so we have established so far that in the first apartment of the earthly sanctuary, which is a copy of the absolutely massive, the colossal heavenly sanctuary, there were three pieces of furniture to the north, which I believe would be the right hand side of the priest as he entered.
And that was the table of Shows bread. And so that was a special beautiful golden table with a golden crown around it. And there was special bread, unleavened bread was placed upon it.
And this represented the vital importance of the Bible as the sole foundation of faith and practise. And so this teaching was recovered in the early days of the Reformation by Wycliffe, Luther, Tyndale and many others. So the Bible particularly was represented by the bread.
So that was to the right of the priest. And then directly ahead of the priest, we found that there was a golden altar where incense was offered and this symbolised prayer. And we saw that In Revelation, chapter 8 it talks about this altar.
And again, a cornerstone of the early Reformation was true prayer, which the Reformers found to cover the soul and courage, the heart. Now today we move to the third piece of furniture, a golden candlestick with seven branches. Now, this is described in the book of Exodus.
So, yeah, look, we're not going to take time to look at that today, but, you know, you can look it up, Google it, the candlestick that's in the book of Exodus and you can read about that. And so there it says. So I'm just giving you quick summary.
So these. So there was seven branches on this candlestick. Many Jewish pictures have, I believe it's called a menorah.
And they've got this seven branched candlestick on their pictures. So maybe you can think of that as well. That's kind of a good mental image to have.
And so these seven branches with the seven lamps, they were to be kept burning continually, both day and night. Now, so the question is, what do these symbolise? And we're about to tie this also into our hymn for today. So we've already looked at, in our introductory verse, we read from John 8, verse 12, where Jesus was speaking and he said, I am the light of the world.
So the seven lamps, in one sense, they symbolise Jesus, but they also do symbolise other things as well. They certainly symbolise the work that Jesus is doing for us. But let's have a look at some other verses that speak about these.
So Psalm 119 and verse 105. Psalm 119, verse 105, says, Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path. So the lamps also represent the word of God.
And we found that the bread represents the word of God as well. So, you know, sometimes there's, you know, two symbols can have the same meaning. Sometimes one symbol in the Bible can have different meanings depending on the context in which it's used.
So we need to look at the context. So these lamps represent the word of God. And they represent the word of God, I believe, in a specific context.
Let's look at some other verses about this. Matthew, chapter 5 and verses 14 to 16. Matthew, chapter 5, verses 14 to 16.
Now, these are really famous verses. This is a really famous phrase which comes from Tyndale's Bible, of course, the way in which he put words together. He was a master of the pithy phrase.
And so he could put words into a way in English that made it really easy for us to remember. His phrases have entered the English language in general so that so many people who aren't even really Christians just, yeah, use his phrases. So ye are the light of the world.
The light of the world. That's the Tyndallion phrase. Ye are the light of the world.
A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick. And it giveth light unto all that are in the house.
Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father, which is in heaven. So here we see that Jesus says. That's Jesus speaking there.
He says, ye are the light of the world. And if we tie this to Bible prophecy, if we look in Revelation chapter one, we see we're not going to take the time now to read it, but we see there Jesus walking amongst seven candlesticks. And this actually represents God's church on earth.
Then also In Revelation chapter 4 and verse 5, it speaks about seven lamps of fire that are burning before the throne. So this is actually a different scene to what's in Revelation, chapter one. Revelation, chapter one, we see God's church on earth, but Revelation chapter four is actually a scene in heaven.
And in fact, it's in the heavenly sanctuary. So you can see just from these couple of examples that I've mentioned, that we really cannot understand revelation. We cannot understand the prophecies in Revelation if we do not understand the sanctuary.
Sanctuary truth is so, so important for us to understand. And that's why we're looking at it and we're looking at it in song. So let's put all these things together.
And so we see that the candlestick represents not only Jesus, but also God's people in the world. And so when the truths of the Bible are lived out in our lives, we bring glory to God in heaven. We show the truth about what God is like.
And that's so powerful because we are in a battle, a battle where works the Word of God is a weapon, as we've seen in Ephesians, chapter 6. Now, Lucifer deceived the heavenly angels by lies, by a deceptive use of words, and he's still doing the same thing today. When we live out the Word of God in our lives, we demonstrate conclusively that Lucifer's lies, his accusations against God are wrong.
And so we win powerful battles for God in the great controversy conflict. So that's so, so important for us to understand. Now let's see how these points are brought out in the hymn for today.
I'm sure you've been waiting with bated breath to start thinking about this and wondering when I've been going to get onto it. Well, here we are. We've arrived.
So love divine all loves excelling Joy of heaven to earth Come down Fix in us thy humble dwelling all thy faithful mercy's crown Jesus, Thou art all compassion Pure unbounded love thou art Visit us with Thy salvation Enter every trembling heart Breathe, O breathe thy loving spirit into every troubled breast Let us all in Thee inherit Let us find the promised rest Take away our bent to sinning Alpha and omega B End of faith as its beginning Set our hearts at liberty Come Almighty to deliver Let us all Thy grace receive Suddenly return and never, nevermore Thy temples leave thee we would be always blessing Serve thee as thy hosts above Pray and praise thee without ceasing Glory in thy perfect love Finish then thy new creation Pure and spotless Let us be Let us see Thy great salvation Perfectly restored in Thee Changed from glory into glory Till in heaven we take our place Till we cast our crowns before thee Lost in wonder, love and praise Won't it be just a wonderful day when we can say goodbye to this old world and just be praising Jesus forevermore? But our song starts here. If we want to join the Heavenly Chorus, we need to learn that song right now. So we see in this hymn vital truths that relate to the sanctuary and the meaning of the seven candlesticks.
And these truths also did come to be understood by the Wesley brothers. So that hymn's written by Charles Wesley. He was the hymn writer.
John Wesley was the more of the preacher. So. And they were thus passed on to literally thousands of people.
So let's just look at the themes in this hymn before we listen to the Tabernacle Choir sing it. So I want to bring out three key themes, and we'll see how they relate to this truth about the sanctuary and the truth about the candlesticks. So the first key theme is the love of God.
And it's just all through this song, you know, it starts out with love divine all loves excelling Jesus Thou art all compassion Pure unbounded love Thou art thee we would be always blessing Serve thee as thy hosts above. And so the age angels actually serve God out of love. You know, we've spoken about how God is a God of love.
Yeah, like 1 John 4, verse 8. 1 John 4, verse 16. God is love.
And God longs for a love response from us. And love cannot be commanded, it cannot be forced. It's only awakened by love.
And so it's as we behold the love of God that we are drawn to him. And, you know, God also is three persons. And so when we speak about God, this includes the Holy Spirit.
And that brings us to point 2, because the work of the Holy Spirit is dwelt on in this song. Now, that's so significant to the sanctuary and to these candlesticks, because the lamps in the sanctuary were to be kept burning continually, they were to use the children of Israel, which use olive oil to keep these lamps burning continually. That's in Exodus, chapter 27, verse 20.
Now, oil represents the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives. If you've got questions about this, you can look up about the anointing of King David and see how from his anointing, when he was anointed with oil, the Holy Spirit came on him. That's in 1 Samuel 16:13.
And in Zechariah, chapter 4 and verses 2 to 6, we see a depiction of the sanctuary and how that there is these candlesticks, and they're actually connected with golden pipes to two olive trees that are just continually bringing oil into the lamps. And so just as the oil in the lamps is unseen, so the agency of the Holy Spirit is often undiscerned. And when speaking to Nicodemus, Jesus compared the Holy Spirit to wind moving through the trees.
And so we can't see the wind, but we can see its effects as it flooders the leaves of plants and does other things as well. Which brings us to point 3, which is the results of the Holy Spirit in our lives and that's brought out in this song. Finish then.
Thy new creation, pure and spotless, let us be so like the wind, the Holy Spirit moves silently in our lives, but we see the effects of his works in the actions that we do. So, friends, I want you to notice the progression here. It starts with the love of God.
Jesus sends us the Holy Spirit to apply the results of his sacrifice. And then the Holy Spirit Spirit affects the change in our lives. And so that order just is perfectly represented in this symbol of this golden candlestick.
And so we are changed from glory into glory. It's by beholding Christ that we become like Him. So let's now listen to our hymn for today.
Love divine all loves excelling us I humbled all thy faithful mercies Crown Jesus with us Sal sa Let wa Friend, would you like to walk with Jesus, the light of the world? Why not accept him now as we pray? Dear God, thank you so much. For Jesus we know and we believe that he is the light of the world. May we always walk in his light, the light of his truth.
I pray in Jesus name. Amen. So thank you so much for joining me today on Heavenly Harmonies.
I would love for you to join me again next time for more historic foundations of present truth. But until then, may your soul be filled with heavenly harmonies that will keep you near to the heart of God.
