The Third Tree

Why were there two trees in Eden but three crosses at the crucifixion of Christ? The answer is found in the offices of priest, king, and prophet.

Although the three offices are often listed as “prophet, priest, and king,” the biblical order places the prophet last.¹ The most obvious example of the biblical order is the three fundamental stages in the history of Israel as a nation—the eras epitomized in Moses, David, and Elijah.

The placement of the prophet at the beginning is an understandable error, since there were prophets in every era who served to establish it. After all, the priest who submits to the Word must first hear the Word. But what we see in Scripture is that God would set a man apart and, to prepare him as a mediator or a legal representative, put that individual through this threefold process. Thus, we see the process of the three offices in the three forty-year spans in the life of Moses: he was instructed from childhood in the court of Pharaoh until he was ready to rule as a prince; he was then instructed in the wilderness to rule not as a tyrant but as a shepherd; he was then called by God to speak to Pharaoh and serve as an avenger-redeemer for the people of God, ruling over the nations. Moses’ service as a prophet overlapped with the establishment of the priesthood of Israel. God trains and establishes a “head” who will faithfully “image” God to the “body” (Hebrews 2:10; Colossians 2:10)

Likewise, it was Samuel the prophet who established the era of Israel’s kings. So, the king is greater than the priest, but the prophet is greater than the king. David understood that Nathan came to him as the legal representative of an authority that was higher than David. The slaughter of the prophets of God by Jezebel, and the slaughter of the apostles by the Jewish rulers, were like murdering an ambassador or a policeman. While the crime might buy some time, it would inevitably bring a greater judgment.

“Hear another parable. There was a master of a house who planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a winepress in it and built a tower and leased it to tenants, and went into another country. When the season for fruit drew near, he sent his servants to the tenants to get his fruit. And the tenants took his servants and beat one, killed another, and stoned another. Again he sent other servants, more than the first. And they did the same to them. Finally he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But when the tenants saw the son, they said to themselves, This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and have his inheritance.’ And they took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him. When therefore the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?” They said to him, “He will put those wretches to a miserable death and let out the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the fruits in their seasons.” (Matthew 21:33-41)

If a rebellious son would not heed his parents (priesthood), he would have to deal with the elders at the gates of the city (kingdom), who would pronounce a sentence of death (prophecy) (Deuteronomy 21:18-21). Of course, this directive, like that in Eden, was given with the understanding that there was always a way of escape—repentance, faith, and atoning sacrifice. God only acts when the man or culture in question have “filled up” their sins. In His mercy, He waits until holiness and unholiness have reached “perfection,” that is, maturity. Those sanctimonious upstarts who condemn God for intervening are the same infantile minds who condemn Him for not intervening. God is not only not a totalitarian, He is also patient with us. Leaving judgment to the end is an opportunity to repent or to double down in our rebellion (Romans 2:4). Since Pharaoh continually refused to heed Moses, Pharaoh would deal not with Moses but with Yahweh himself. And how many chances did Yahweh give Pharaoh? More than any human would. How many chances did Saul receive before the kingdom was taken away from him? Paul quotes Isaiah in order to remind his audience that God could not cut Israel off like Sodom and Gomorrah because the curses of the Law were to serve as a pruning that the nation might bear the promised fruit (Isaiah 1:9; Romans 9:29).

But those who hardened their hearts like Pharaoh—unlike the Jews who believed on the Day of Pentecost—would suffer a far greater judgment because they had “filled up” their sins, allowing them to “pile up to heaven” (Matthew 23:32; Revelation 18:5). This is exactly what happened to the nations of Canaan who had been preached to by Abraham but then resisted his children (Genesis 15:16). Jerusalem was given 40 years, and repeated opportunities, to repent. Instead, the rulers saw the success of every rebellion as a vindication of their authority and even of divine sanction for their tyranny. The Jews were indeed cunning fighters, but their victory against Gessius Florus brought about a retaliation—the city was besieged and eventually destroyed. From their own recorded history, they should have realized that when God was not only sending prophets to them, but also the Prophet predicted by Moses, the door of mercy would soon be closed. With the rope of escape that God had extended to them they hanged themselves.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and decorate the monuments of the righteous, saying, ‘If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ Thus you witness against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers. You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell? Therefore I send you prophets and wise men and scribes, some of whom you will kill and crucify, and some you will flog in your synagogues and persecute from town to town, so that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on [the Land], from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah the son of Barachiah, whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar. Truly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.” (Matthew 23:29-36)

For slaying the first-century prophets, this civic “Jezebel” would be thrown down and eaten by scavengers. Blasphemy against the Spirit is unforgivable not because it is the worst sin but because it is the last sin. It is the final stage of rebellion, reached only after all other avenues of reconciliation have been exhausted.² A king who rejects the authority of God’s prophet, often installing prophets who will tell him what he wishes to hear, has usurped the authority of God.

The Power of the Prophet

Thus, the offices of priest, king, and prophet comprise a process of increasing authority and scope. The sign of prophethood is being regarded by God as a “friend,” that is, a confidant, a wise man, and even an advisor. Abraham bargained with God over the fate of the cities of the plain. Moses stopped God from destroying the nation after the sin with the golden calf. David was given a choice concerning the judgment of Israel after his Gentile-inspired census. In each case, God veiled His merciful nature in order that His prophet might become the mercy of God in his role as a mediator—God deliberately left a gap that the man might stand in it (Ezekiel 22:30). This pictures the advocacy of Jesus on our behalf before the throne of God in heaven (Hebrews 9:12; 1 John 2:1-2). In this way, God brings His representatives to a state of judicial maturity, men and women who are able to see beyond outward appearances to discern what is actually good and what is actually evil (Hebrews 5:14).

Not even the Son was excluded from this “school of the prophets,” being perfected (made mature) through suffering just like everyone else (Hebrews 2:10). It was during Jesus’ crucifixion that He stayed God’s hand from destroying the city and the sanctuary, delaying the prophecy of Daniel for one generation. This was the same merciful God who had temporarily delayed the death of Adam, deferred the execution of Cain, and postponed another global judgment through the splitting of humanity into Jew and Gentile. Since God works in fractals, even in the hour of his death, Jesus was working as a submissive priest, a ruling king, and an international prophet all in the one act of intercession. While Jesus is revealed in the Revelation as finally uniting all three offices in the one throne, each of the three always contained all three within it, a fractal structure that ought to remind us of the fact that “all of God does all that God does.” The Father never acts without the Son and the Spirit, the Son never acts without the Father and the Spirit, and the Spirit never acts without the Father and the Son.

This brings us to the correspondence of the offices with the thesis of the biblical covenant pattern. While the legal pattern is fivefold (like the Pentateuch), its historical outcome is sevenfold. The Ethics of the covenant “open” into the Triune Office. This means that the Forming (Days 1-3), Filling (Days 4-6), and Future (Day 7) pattern of the Creation Week is also contained within a human microcosm at the center: priesthood is a time of formation under guardians; kingdom is a time of physical strength and steward-rule under god; and prophecy is a time of offering wise advice to those in the priestly and kingly stages of life.

The Bible Matrix describes a delegation of authority from God to Man via a process of transformation: the priestly “flesh” becomes prophetic “smoke” in a refining kingly “fire.” The filling of the believers with the Spirit of God is the “Pentecostal” center of the pattern.

This process of transformation is most obvious in the journey of Israel from Egypt to Canaan. The steps are recapitulated in the ministry of Christ and the Firstfruits (Apostolic) Church, which is why the book of Revelation is structured after the same pattern. Christ ascends to heaven (priesthood), takes the throne and sends His Spirit (kingdom), and the Spirit-filled saints testify with the legal authority of the two great witnesses, Moses and Elijah, representing the Law and the Prophets. Their testimony against the harlot city leads to the execution of justice against her by the now permanently-transfigured son of David. Despite being outwardly weak, the power of the prophet is in his or her mouth, the power to bless and to curse (Matthew 18:18; Revelation 9:19). The prophet is the one with the real power, and the Church of Christ is a prophetic body. But that power comes from hearing the Word (priesthood) and obeying the Word (kingdom). Only those who hear and obey are qualified to speak on God’s behalf. That gives us the third office, and also the third “tree.”

Trees of Righteousness

The two trees in the Garden represented the needs and the wants of humanity. Whatever glory he attained, Man would always be dependent upon God, so the Tree of Life in the Garden corresponded with all the things that are basic to life in the Land—life’s physical necessities. In contrast, the Tree of Wisdom corresponded to the glorious things of life, the good things that we do not actually need but for which we have God-given desires. A man can survive with bread and a log cabin, but a palace in a city filled with all the delights of high culture is far better. The key is that only those who remain humble before God and dependent upon Him can handle the “power tools” that come with earthly glory without becoming corrupted by them. God Himself must be, and remain, our first desire. This was the key to Solomon’s endorsement by God—priestly submission led to kingly authority and prophetic wisdom. The psalms and the proverbs of Israel’s kingdom era were the result of careful reading, memorization, and meditation upon the Word.

“And when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself in a book a copy of this law, approved by the Levitical priests. And it shall be with him, and he shall read in it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the LORD his God by keeping all the words of this law and these statutes, and doing them, that his heart may not be lifted up above his brothers, and that he may not turn aside from the commandment, either to the right hand or to the left, so that he may continue long in his kingdom, he and his children, in Israel.” (Deuteronomy 17:18-20)

Adam was promised the glory of kingdom but was first required to demonstrate self-government based upon the revealed Word. His priestly duty was to lead his wife to the Tree of Life. His kingly duty was to embody the Law of God in his rule over the lying serpent. His prophetic duty was to condemn the serpent and then testify—with his “redeemed” wife beside him—when God returned in judgment. Having humbled himself, he would have been exalted by God. Having conquered the serpent, he would have enjoyed the fruit of both trees—Life and Wisdom—and become a priest-king whose obedient faith was a source of light to the world.

What this also means is that the fruit of the two separate trees would have been combined, mixed, united, in his body, like bread and wine, and transformed into flesh and blood. At the Lord’s Table, He gives us His flesh and blood as bread and wine that we might testify on His behalf as “living epistles.”

The third tree is thus a mixture, a hybrid or engrafting, of the first two, but this is only possible if they are consumed in the correct order—submission to heaven (bread) brings lasting dominion on earth (wine). Adam himself, filled with Life and Wisdom, in his new role of speaking for God, would continually bring forth the fruits of righteousness (which are the result of truly hearing and digesting the Law). As the third tree, priesthood and kingdom would be combined in him as the source of prophecy.

The usurping of priesthood by kingdom through godless intermarriage led to the Great Flood. God’s remedy was to divide humanity into priestly and kingly lines, Jew and Gentile, as two separate genealogical trees. One was cultivated while the other remained wild. This divide was pictured in the halving of the sacrifices in Genesis 15, through which a prototype “pillar of fire and smoke” passed. The same idea is inherent in the blood (priesthood) and oil (kingdom) applied to only one side of the bodies of the Aaronic priests, who, as Trees of Life, were forbidden from seizing the fruits of kingdom and bound by the Law, like Adam, to receive them only as gifts.⁴ Reuniting these two “family trees” as a “hybrid” tree was the work of Christ on the cross. The result was the prophetic ministry of the Jew-Gentile Apostolic Church.

For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. (Ephesians 2:14-17)

Marriage as Priest-Kingdom

Although the intermarriage in Genesis 6 was godless, the intermarriage was always intended. That was the corporate extension of the marriage of the Man and the Woman in Genesis 2. Adam was created as a human “firstfruits” and lifted up as an offering into the Garden-Sanctuary. Although given dominion over the beasts as a priest, he was alone. For the man, Creation was complete but procreation was impossible. He had been formed and filled but had no future. Adam was like the Tree of Life. Life as a single person is priestly in nature. Some are indeed chosen to be eunuchs for God (Matthew 19:12). Similarly, the Levites “bore” the burden of the curse upon the land by possessing no land and thus no fruit, but that freed them to work for God (Numbers 18:20, 24). The virgins who served at the Tabernacle “bore” the curse upon the womb, and they thus served as “helpers” to the Levites (Judges 11:37-38). The work that these humble servants carried out in the “Garden” was necessary in the way that the humble work of farming, preparing food, and rearing children was necessary in the Land.

The Woman was not “created” but “constructed.” She was made from the man because she pictured the work of the man. He was “cut down” by God and “raised up” as a house, like the trees that were cut down and glorified with gold and silver as poles for the Tabernacle and Temple of God. Man was now “two trees.” When God builds a house, He does the work through Spirit-filled men (Exodus 31:1-11; Psalm 127:1).

What is the third tree, the “testimony,” in this case? One tree is priesthood, two trees are kingdom, and their marriage is a holy fire—the third tree. Even married couples are to become separate as two Edenic trees for priestly times of prayer but to be reunited as one flesh to avoid temptation (1 Corinthians 7:5).

Although the Jews referred to the dowels of their scrolls as the Tree of Life, a scroll actually pictures the two trees in Eden with the third “office” passing to-and-fro between them as “character written into flesh.” Because Adam seized kingdom and rejected priesthood, he and his wife were expelled from the Garden. Marriage itself would suffer from the “kingdom before priesthood” flaw in Adam’s rule over his wife, the temptation to “lord it” over her while she remained dependent upon him for life’s necessities.

So, instead of a priest-kingdom ruled by a transfigured Adam and Eve, clothed in glory, bearing the testimony of God, there were two priestly “male” cherubim serving as guardians of the trees, like Levites guarding the Tabernacle, with the singular flaming sword, the tongue of prophecy, flashed to-and-fro between them. Of course, this image is reprised in the judgment of Aaron’s two sons who offered strange fire and were devoured by holy fire (Leviticus 10:1-2).

The image of the cherubim as heavenly “bouncers” at the gate of God is not only that of a man-sized two-pillar scroll but also of a face: the angels were two witnesses (eyes) and the sword was a flicking tongue. Since Adam had failed to trust God, and the Garden was not safe for the Woman, the face of God against Adam itself appeared as a giant serpent. The court of God contained a legal adversary instead of a legal advocate.

For mankind, this was the first sin, the original sin. However, for Adam, this was the last sin. Eve had been led astray but Adam’s sin was high-handed. The fact that he was disqualified from speaking for God is highlighted by the fact that not a single word from his mouth is recorded after this event. The ultimate “bookend” for this silence was the silence of Zechariah the priest who was struck dumb until the birth of a miraculous son. The final era of Israel was bookended by two prophetic “pillars,” both named John, and both were Levites. John the Baptist began the testimony of Jesus, with warnings to the Jews, as the friend of the bridegroom. John the Apostle ended the testimony of Jesus, with warnings to the Gentiles, and a description of the coming wedding feast. Between these two cherubim “trees,” the fiery tongues of Pentecost flash back and forth in the “leaves” of the New Testament codex.

Men as Trees Walking

So, Adam himself was to become the third tree, the Prophet, the first father, a source of food and shelter, a tree of righteousness. If found to be a faithful priest, he would receive the promised kingdom and carry the fruits of the Spirit, as a flaming sword, into the Land. Then God would open the Land and the womb (firstfruits and righteous sons instead of a murderer cursed with barrenness) and the nations (the harvest of righteousness, instead of the lawlessness of Genesis 6). The priestly ministry in the Garden would be replicated in the Land but in kingly terms, and the kingly ministry in the Land would be replicated in the World but in prophetic terms. This 3 x 3 construct, discussed above, gives us a “prophetic grid”—the three offices exercised horizontally in each domain, and also structuring the sequence of the vertical domains.

	Priesthood Forming “Ask”	Kingdom Filling “Seek”	Prophecy Future “Knock”
Priest GARDEN “Ask”	Tree of Life	Tree of Judicial Knowledge	Two Doorposts to Land…
King LAND “Seek”	Grain	Grapes	Firstfruits of World…
Prophet WORLD “Knock”	Bread	Wine	Feast with Heaven…

We mentioned that the offices were represented in the Tabernacle. The architecture represented the Garden, and the Garden, Land, and World, but it was also humaniform. The Table of Showbread and the Lampstand represent priesthood (left hand/life) and kingdom (right hand/glory) respectively, with the fragrant “bridal” Incense Altar between them as the place of mediation, eldership, legal testimony, and a blessed host of humble, abundant, righteous works as a response to the Word.

The “childhood” era of the Tabernacle led to the bridal “maturity” of the Temple. The three “internal” offices that were represented in the three items of furniture in the Holy Place were now also represented publicly in the two pillars, Jachin and Boaz, as symbols of the union of priesthood and kingdom.

The names of the pillars allude to the “forming and filling” process in Genesis 1, which ends with Day 7, “the future.” What was the third pillar? The pillar of cloud that filled the Temple upon its completion. This becomes more apparent when Ezekiel sees this prophetic pillar at the threshold of the Temple before its departure (Ezekiel 9:3). We see the same idea in the daubing of the doorposts of the households of Israel in Egypt before the nation was led by the pillar of God’s presence. It is also observed in the location of Solomon’s house which was built next to the Temple— he would pass to-and-fro from one to the other like the sun crossing the sky—or the flaming sword of Adam, the priest-king. The architecture is seen again in Revelation 10, where the mighty angel whose pillar-legs stand upon the Gentile Sea and the Jewish Land delivers the final prophecy against their conspiratorial union.

The complete man of God is thus the forming, the filling and the future, the prophet. He does not remain in the Garden like the other trees, rooted in the ground like the two dowels of the Torah, but instead walks out of it (on two pillar-like legs) into the Land to take dominion. In the Temple visions in Zechariah and the Revelation, this egress is represented in a more glorious form as spirit-horses rushing out into the world with the decrees of God. The ministry of the man was now the ministry of a host.

This 1-2-3 process of Ethical maturity also explains the imagery at the beginning and end of the era of Israel’s kings. Israel’s final judge, Samson, lost his eyes, cut down the “pillars of state,” and crushed the heads of the Philistines, all in the same chapter (Judges 16). Israel’s last king was judged by Nebuchadnezzar, and the loss of his eyes, although first mentioned in Jeremiah 39, is deliberately recounted in the same chapter that describes the dismantling of the two pillars of the Temple (Jeremiah 52). Having rejected God’s prophet, the Edenic pillars of priesthood and kingdom would be washed away in an invading “flood.”

The blind man whom Jesus healed could see “men as trees walking.” That was the inverse of Samson and Zedekiah losing their eyes and bringing an end to their respective Gardens. In the case of Samson, whose name ironically means “sunrise,” the loss of his physical sight led to an inspired prophetic insight. Although blinded, standing between the “two witnesses,” the “eyes” of the Temple of Dagon, he became the hidden “third eye” of the prophet, the one who ends the old order and begins the new.

The Wild Card

The phrase “you have established strength” in Psalm 2:8 might have been the inspiration for the names of the pillars of Solomon (Jachin means “he shall establish” and Boaz means “strength”). When the prophet stands as God’s Shekinah between the two offices of priest and king, and speaks from the “fire” within his bones (Jeremiah 20:9), he is always the “wild card” in God’s deck, the court jester who taunts and exposes the corrupt rulers with “Torah meme warfare,”⁵ the riddling provocateur with “hair as a woman” who sets fields aflame (Numbers 6:5; Acts 18:18; Revelation 9:8).

The prophetic role is bridal in nature and thus the language of the prophets is as difficult to understand as the mind of a woman. There is indeed a hidden logic, but unlike the sacrificial cut-things-up “boxed ingredients” Levitical thinking of males, it is the hidden, typo-logic of connections, associations, and emotional responses—a fragrant, intoxicating feast. Men, as “protologists,” do classification and categorization. Women, as “eschatologists,” do combination, implication, and appropriation. Men think like technicians. They are pioneers who begin things. Women are blessed with intuitions. They are nurturers who conclude things. Like the Law and the Prophets, Moses and Elijah, the two are complementary and indispensable, a double witness. Together, they are greater than the sum of their parts. The waters below and the waters above are kept apart, and yet united, by the fiery pillar of an ascension. Like everything else in God’s creation, they are linked but distinct.

Despite their eccentricities, the books of Moses seem down-to-earth when you get to the strange hybridizations in the Prophets. Likewise, Ecclesiastes seems to break all the childhood rules laid down in Proverbs. Those “Pharisaic” rules are necessary principles, but life is never that simple. Jesus ran roughshod over the supposedly hard-and-fast rules because the Spirit of the Law is love. The formed house must be as rigid as an altar but it is dead unless it is filled with the fire of the numinous. Things are not always what they appear to be, even when they come from God, who has a long history of giving stones and serpents to His children despite being a good Father. Samson perceived his affliction and physical blindness to be such a gift.⁶ So, priestly obedience and kingly legislative wisdom are not enough. This is why those who claim to be gods always find that their chariot wheels fall off just when victory is within their grasp. The prophetic is always “the unexpected,” the Samuel who turns up just after Saul offers a sacrifice in disobedience, or pops up again at the hand of the Witch of Endor. Leaders need the prophetic insight that can only come from God, the “blind eye” in the prayer closet that sees the unseen, senses things that are beyond calculation, and discerns the mind of God hidden behind the veil.

The third pillar is always greater than the sum of its parts, a fruitful “multiplication” flowing from a godly marriage of the two pillars of the church and the state. As it was with the indwelling of the Tabernacle, Temple, and house of the saints on the Day of Pentecost, the union of priestly humility (the hearers of the Law) and kingly government (the doers of the Law) create an environment for the Spirit, an invitation for the holy city to descend from heaven. The secularization of the West is the reason why our culture has become not only economically but also creatively bankrupt. Inspiration flows from discipline, in marriage as well as in the arts. The Spirit of God was our muse, and we have quenched Him. Trained in Gospel, we have sung brilliant songs, but now our Gospel is nothing but lip service, a liturgical lip-sync.

In cultural terms, prophecy expresses itself in the arts. Literature, painting, architecture, sculpture, music, and drama—along with fine dining—are the first things to suffer when the necessities of life and the security of lawful government are taken away. Basic food and shelter once again become the priorities when there is no budget for glory. The Western Church no longer submits to the Word, and thus has not only lost the kingly wisdom that comes from that submission, but has also lost the ability to capture the imagination of the culture. This is also why modern teaching and preaching is so uninspired, and why charismatic “prophecy” is so lacking in discernment. On the one hand, scientistic academics eschew “the wild card,” and on the other, those who desire the “untamed” work of the Spirit have no altar to receive Him on and end up entertaining “strange fire.” In both cases, the glory has left the building. Doing what is right in our own eyes has rendered us poor, blind, and naked.

The Architecture of the Cross

Nailed to the top of Jesus’ cross was a “flying scroll,” one that decreed Him to be the “king of the Jews,” that is, a priest king. ⁷ The scroll, located between the two “dowels” of the lying thieves on either side would later become a flaming sword in the mouth of Jesus.

Again I lifted my eyes and saw, and behold, a flying scroll! And he said to me, “What do you see?” I answered, “I see a flying scroll. Its length is twenty cubits, and its width ten cubits.” Then he said to me, “This is the curse that goes out over the face of the whole land. For everyone who steals shall be cleaned out according to what is on one side, and everyone who swears falsely shall be cleaned out according to what is on the other side. I will send it out, declares the LORD of hosts, and it shall enter the house of the thief, and the house of him who swears falsely by my name. And it shall remain in his house and consume it, both timber and stones.” (Zechariah 5:1-4)

The scroll in Zechariah 5 has the same dimensions as the Tabernacle of Moses. The Tabernacle was a cross laid out upon the ground. The crucifixion of Christ was the Adamic family tree felled, worked, and raised up as the prophetic foundation for a new house. The scroll corresponded to the Word hidden in the Most Holy Place, that which had condemned the original lying thief, Adam. The Table and the Lampstand were Adam’s two sons, priesthood and kingdom set at odds against each other through the enmity of the Law of the Gospel. Here, flogged, spat upon, pierced, and ridiculed, in the darkness of the pillar of God’s courtroom,⁸ was God Himself “tabernacled” in human flesh, the prophetic Word incarnate (John 1:14), the Word robbed of all image and visage (Isaiah 50:6; 53:2), a veil of flesh torn between the cherubim to open the door to the Sanctuary of God as a new and living way (John 10:9; Hebrews 10:20), the Samsonite “sun shining in full strength” between the bloodied posts (Revelation 1:16).

For those with eyes to see, the scroll was open, the Word proclaimed, and the mystery finally revealed. The mind of God was now the mind of Christ, and to the saints (priesthood) by the Spirit (kingdom), He is an open book (prophecy). For those who walk in the Spirit, the unexpected is never unexpected.

“So likewise ye, when ye shall see all these things, know that it is near, even at the doors.” (Matthew 24:33, KJV)

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1. For more discussion on the three offices and their order, see James B. Jordan, From Bread to Wine: Creation, Worship, and Christian Maturity, chapter 2.
2. For more discussion, see The Last Sin.
3. Michael Bull, “Everlasting Arms,” Schema Vol. 1.
4. For more discussion, see Cutting Off Canaan and The Forbidden Feast.
5. See Apocalyptic Meme Warfare.
6. See The Unknown Gifts.
7. For more discussion of the theology of scrolls in the Bible, see “Closed Books and Open Doors” in Michael Bull, The End of Israel: Jesus, Paul & AD70, 192-209.
8. See Darkness Under His Feet.