«　WEEK 12　DAY 2　»

　　Psa. 68:1 Let God arise; let His enemies be scattered; and let those who hate Him flee before Him.

　　Num. 10:35 And when the Ark set out, Moses said, Rise up, O Jehovah, and let Your enemies be scattered; and let those who hate You flee before You.

　　Psalm 68:1 is a quotation of Moses' prayer in Numbers 10:35, uttered when the Ark of the Covenant set out from Mount Sinai.

　　After Moses brought the children of Israel to Mount Sinai, they stayed there for quite a long time....The main thing that happened at that time was not the decreeing of the law but God's charging Moses to build the tabernacle with the Ark, the incense altar, the lampstand, the table of the bread of the Presence, the laver, the altar, and all the utensils. (Life-study of the Psalms, pp. 316-317)

　　God wanted the children of Israel to build Him a tabernacle so that He could dwell among them and they could contact Him and even dwell with Him. However, because they were sinful, they needed an altar to take care of their sins. In addition, they needed the table of the bread of the Presence for spiritual food, the lampstand for spiritual light, and the incense altar for them to pray to the Lord.

　　The move of God in Christ is portrayed in Psalm 68:1-18....The first part of verse 1 says, "Let God arise," and God did rise up to move...through the tabernacle....This indicates that God moves in Christ and through Christ. Without Christ, God cannot move on the earth. In Christ the Triune God made a long "tour," a tour that lasted thirty-three and a half years and that ended with Christ's ascension to the third heaven.

　　Psalm 68 is about God's move within the tabernacle (typifying Christ) as His dwelling place with the Ark (typifying Christ) as the center. The tabernacle with the Ark traveled among the children of Israel for forty years until it arrived at Zion.

　　This move of God began after the rearing up of the tabernacle of the Ark, signifying Christ incarnated to be the dwelling place of God on the earth with Himself as the center for God's move in His economy (John 1:14a; Num. 9:15a). This means that God could move on earth only after He had established a way—the tabernacle with the Ark—in which He could be with His people and in which they could contact Him and be with Him. In the Old Testament we have the type, but in the New Testament we have Christ as the reality of the tabernacle of the Ark.

　　God's move...was from Sinai, signifying from the law (Psa. 68:8b, 17b), through the wilderness, signifying the earth (vv. 4b, 7b), to Mount Zion, God's dwelling place (v. 16), signifying God's dwelling place in the heavens (Eph. 4:8a)....Today we should triumph and exult in the move of God on earth, in His move from incarnation to ascension. (Life-study of the Psalms, pp. 317, 319-321)

　　God was moving on the earth in and through His dwelling place with Christ as the center. We must be clear concerning these three points: (1) God is moving on the earth, (2) God's move is in and with the tabernacle, and (3) God's move is with Christ as the center in the tabernacle. Psalm 68 was written with this background. It is an exact portrayal of the situation with God's move on the earth today. God is moving on this earth, He is moving in and through His church, and He is moving with Christ as the center of the church. (CWWL, 1969, vol. 3, "Christ and the Church Revealed and Typified in the Psalms," p. 88)

　　Athanasius, one of the early church fathers, said concerning Christ, "He was made man that we might be made God," and "The Word was made flesh...that we, partaking of His Spirit, might be deified." This is the principle of God's move on earth. God's move is in man and through man. God's move is to deify man, making man God in life and in nature but not, of course, in the Godhead. (Life-study of Job, p. 129)

　　Further Reading: CWWL, 1969, vol. 3, "Christ and the Church Revealed and Typified in the Psalms," ch. 10; Life-study of Job, msg. 24