Outline
B
Christ is the living stone, the foundation stone, the cornerstone, and the topstone of God's building; after being born of God, the believers in Christ are transformed into living precious stones for the building up of the church as the spiritual house of God—v. 4; 1 Cor. 3:11; Isa. 28:16; Acts 4:11; Zech. 4:7; John 1:12-13, 42; 1 Pet. 2:5-7; 1 Cor. 3:12; Matt. 16:18.
C
Christ as the stone has seven eyes, which signify the seven Spirits of God, the sevenfold intensified Spirit (Zech. 3:9; 4:10); the sevenfold intensified Spirit is also signified by the seven eyes of the Lamb (Rev. 5:6) and the seven lamps of fire burning before God's throne (4:5):
１
The lamps are for enlightening, searching, exposing, judging, and burning, and the eyes are for infusing; the seven eyes infuse all that the Lamb-stone is into our being to make us His golden lampstand—Zech. 4:2-6, 11-14.
２
The way for us to become living stones is to come to Him and be seen by Him; as the Lord enlightens and judges us, He looks at us and infuses Himself into us for our transformation into His image; we all need to be under the enlightening of the seven lamps, the beholding of the seven eyes, and the life imparting of the sevenfold intensified Spirit.
３
When Christ as the living stone of the grace of God is constituted into our being through our subjective experience of Him, He becomes our pillow for our rest to make us a pillar in God's building—Gen. 28:11-12, 17-19a; Zech. 4:7; Matt. 11:28-30; John 1:16-17, 51.
Morning Nourishment
Zech. 4:7 …He will bring forth the topstone with shouts of Grace, grace to it!3:9 For here is the stone that I have set before Joshua—upon one stone are seven eyes. I will engrave its engraving, declares Jehovah of hosts, and I will remove the iniquity of that land in one day.
Jesus Christ is a stone for God’s building…According to Acts 4:12, this stone is the One in whom we can be saved. Hence, He is the Stone-Savior. As the Stone-Savior, He is solid, strong, and reliable…This stone is the rock, the foundation stone, and the cornerstone. In Zechariah 4:7 we see that He is even the topstone. Christ is the material for God’s building. God’s building is entirely of Christ. (Life-study of Acts, p. 125)
The topstone with shouts of “Grace, grace to it!” signifies Christ, who is the grace as the stone, upon which are the seven eyes of Jehovah, the sevenfold intensified Spirit of God for the completion of the rebuilding of God’s temple (Zech. 3:9; 4:7-10; Rev. 5:6). To bring forth the topstone is to complete the building…For God’s building, Christ is a stone in three aspects. Christ is the foundation stone to uphold God’s building (Isa. 28:16; 1 Cor. 3:11), the cornerstone to join together the Gentile and Jewish members of His Body (Eph. 2:20; 1 Pet. 2:6), and the topstone to consummate God’s building. (Life-study of Zechariah, pp. 30-31)
Today’s Reading
Do you know what the Lord Jesus is today? He is the stone. He is the Lamb and the Lion in order to be the stone. Having removed the iniquity and having defeated all the enemies, He is now building…Now we can understand why, in His last visit to Jerusalem, the Lord Jesus indicated to the Jewish builders that they were rejecting not only the Lamb, the Redeemer, and the Lion, the Overcomer, but also the stone, the cornerstone. After His death and resurrection, the age became the age of the church, which is God’s building. For the building of the church, Christ is the rock. As He Himself told Peter, “You are a stone, and upon this rock I will build My church” (Matt. 16:18). After the crucifixion and the resurrection, the age became the age of the rock, the age of the stone. This is the age of building.It seems that throughout the centuries no one has ever realized that this age is not merely the age of redemption and of overcoming but mainly of the building. Christ today is the stone…Praise the Lord that He is now the Lion-Lamb-stone. His victory and His redemption both were for Him to be the stone. If He had not defeated the enemy and removed iniquity, there would have been no way for Him to accomplish God’s building work. Hallelujah, our Lord Jesus is now the Lion-Lamb-stone!
This stone has seven eyes. This is the crucial point. These seven eyes are the seven Spirits of God, and the seven Spirits of God are the seven burning, flaming lamps. What is the function of the eyes? Certainly, it is seeing. The seven eyes of Christ, however, are not for seeing things but for Him to see us, to look at us. Undoubtedly, the seven eyes of the building stone are for transfusing and infusing. Whenever He looks at us, we can understand if He is happy or unhappy…By looking at us, He transfuses all that He is into our being…The seven Spirits of God are for the imparting of life because, in the Bible, the Spirit is the Spirit of life. The seven lamps are for enlightening, searching, exposing, and judging in God’s move. This is for God’s administration. The transfusing by the eyes, the imparting of life by the Spirits of God, and the enlightening, searching, exposing, and judging by the seven lamps are all found in the book of Revelation. All of this is for the New Jerusalem. Before we came into the church, we never heard anything like this. But after we were in the church, we experienced something shining in us to search out every secret of our entire life. (Life-study of Revelation, pp. 375-376)
Further Reading: Life-study of Revelation, msgs. 22, 33, 68; CWWL, 1977, vol. 3, “The Ultimate Significance of the Golden Lampstand,” ch. 5; Life-study of Zechariah, msgs. 4—5