Ark Of The Testament
Uranda September 10, 1944
“And the temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of his testament.” What is seen in His Temple as it is opened to you? The Ark of His Testament. The Ark of the Testament has reference to what we may call the mysteries that are to be unfolded. In the Temple, at the time the Master was crucified, the veil separating the Holy Place from the Holy of Holies was rent in twain. In Solomon's Temple, and in the Tabernacle which preceded it, we have some of the most marvelous symbolism, the most marvelous revelation of truth and the principles of reality, and of the laws relating to the individual, to be found anywhere. If we were to take time to consider all of it, I think our whole session would be devoted to the Tabernacle and the Temple—the meaning of its various services and vessels in relationship to us, individually and collectively. We will not do that, but let us review a little for those who have not heard me speak upon this subject before.
During the wandering in the wilderness there were thirteen tribes of the Children of Israel. The Bible always lists only twelve at the time, but you will notice always one is omitted. There were thirteen, and the thirteenth was the tribe of the Levites. They encamped round about the Tabernacle in the center. There were four camps of three tribes each—four sections, each meeting at the central point. That makes twelve, but still the Levites were encamped in the center. We have the same thing with reference to Jesus and His twelve disciples, with Himself making the thirteenth. The Priesthood is supposed to represent the Divine in the earth, just as Jesus did represent the Divine in the earth. The four encampments relate to the firm foundation and all that that implies, which we do not have time to consider fully tonight. The Children of Israel were encamped round about the Tabernacle, and directly surrounding it was the Outer Court, into which people could move more or less at will. How many basic organic minerals are there in your body? There were twelve tribes—there are twelve basic organic minerals in the physical body. Then that Encampment represents your physical body. The Outer Court represents the human mind. The Holy Place represents the spiritual expression, and the Holy of Holies represents heaven within. The High Priest entered into the Holy of Holies once a year, indicating that that is the place of abode for the God Being. As to the expression “once a year,” that is as near as they could make it in symbolically expressing the fulness thereof.
In the Holy of Holies we find the Ark of His Covenant, or the Ark of His Testament, as it is called here. Who can describe the Ark as it was in the Tabernacle? It was carried on two rods; it was foursquare; it had the Mercy Seat over which the Cherubim faced each other; and then the Ark—you might today call it a chest of peculiar construction. Below the Mercy Seat there was a measure of Manna. The Manna, under normal circumstances, became putrid overnight. We have Aaron's Rod and the Tablets of Stone, or that which represented the Laws of God written upon the tablets of your heart. Aaron's Rod which budded symbolizes the individual contact with the Divine expression of Eternal Life through the endocrine system, or the Seven Seals. The Rod itself represents the spinal column and its connection with the nervous system and the Seven Seals or the seven glands; and Aaron's Rod which budded indicates that as the individual responds in attunement to the Lord and lets the Temple of God be opened in Heaven within, the manifestation of Eternal Life comes forth through that which, to outer appearances, is either dead or subject to death. The measure of Manna represents the Bread of Life, or the fruit of the Tree of Life. Why was the Law, commonly thought of as the Ten Commandments, written upon Tablets of Stone? Because man in the fallen state has a rather stony heart. The Tablets of Stone represent the stony nature of the heart of fallen man, rebelling against the way and the will of God, and as Moses broke the stones the first time, so does man constantly break the Laws of God, to his own detriment and self-destruction.
Upon the Ark of the Testament we have the Cherubim facing each other, indicating the positive and negative factors involved in the expression and manifestation of the God Being. And the Cherubim faced each other above the Mercy Seat. The Mercy Seat represents the Fourth Plane of vibration. The three outer planes to which we are naturally, in the outer sense, attuned—body, mind and spiritual expression—provide that which enables us to lead up to the Fourth Plane. And here, in the 1st chapter and the 12th and 13th verses of Revelation, we read: “And I turned to see the voice that spake with me. And being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks; And in the midst of the seven candlesticks one like unto the Son of man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps with a golden girdle.”
“In the midst of the seven”—the four is the connecting point, that point which provides the possibility of man's complete attunement in and with the Divine. It is the Mercy Seat, the connecting point between Heaven and earth. Therefore the Mercy Seat represents the Fourth Plane, and above it were the Cherubim, but below it was Aaron's Rod that budded, the Manna, and the Tablets of the Law. Now if these things had been kept above the Mercy Seat we could have properly felt that they were beyond our attainment, something impossible to us in our daily lives; but because they were under the Mercy Seat—and it is under the Mercy Seat that we are living, from an outer standpoint—so it is that as we let ourselves partake of that which comes through the Mercy Seat, from the Cherubim into the Ark of the Covenant, we begin to experience the release of Life from Aaron's Rod as it begins to bud forth, from the Manna (the Fruit of the Tree of Life or the Bread of Life from Heaven) and the true expression of the Law—the Law which becomes the controlling factor in the heart, symbolizing the emotional expression of the individual's activity.
It is in the emotional field that most people most frequently break the Law, because, getting bound up with various emotions, good, bad and indifferent, the individual ceases to recognize or to see the Law. Therefore the first point in which we must individually let the Law be effective in our lives is in the realm of our emotions, establishing tranquility of spirit, serenity of attitude, letting perfect love cast out all fear, and beginning to abide under the Mercy Seat so that we are no longer breaking the Law. Then, having begun to harmonize with the Law, not only from the standpoint of the emotions but from the standpoint of the function which naturally follows in body, mind and spirit, we begin to partake of the Bread of Life from Heaven, the Fruit of the Tree of Life, and then forthwith the manifestation of Divine Life from Heaven above begins to manifest through this physical form by means of the Seven Seals.
There are many details in connection with the Ark that our time will not permit us to go into tonight, but to the degree that we begin to realize what naturally follows from what has been said, we begin to find ourselves polarized as connecting links between Heaven and earth. And that is what? The Ark of the Testament. What is a testament? It is something that declares something, reveals something, provides a means by which someone else may know of something. Is that not so? Previously it was called the Ark of the Covenant. It is a Divine record, something that Divinely manifests as a sign, or evidence, of a promise. All right, the Ark of the Testament—it tells, doesn't it, what we as human beings are supposed to be. We have portrayed here the fact that when we begin to live in the Holy of Holies, that is, from the standpoint of proper attunement with God, we become, individually, the Ark of the Covenant and of the Testament.
© emissaries of divine light
