Blog In Audio:
Greetings,
My week has been busy filled with many practical duties at home and assisting my daughter and her family in a move. It was good to partner with many of my local church family in doing the practical duties of life. I also enjoyed a great time over our holiday weekend here in America.
In the description of the throne room in Revelation chapter 4, there is a sea of glass like crystal. The Old Testament prophet Ezekiel had an experience that saw the throne room from the vantage point of earth (Ezek. 1). There was yet to be an open heaven and access to God by all, as was now revealed to John in the New Covenant experience of Revelation. Ezekiel saw this crystal sea as a cloud above his head, but John saw a sea of glass like crystal beneath his feat.
Revelation 4:6 Before the throne there was a sea of glass, like crystal. And in the midst of the throne, and around the throne, were four living creatures full of eyes in front and in back.
What is that crystal sea? In Solomon’s temple, they called the lavers that wash the blood and filth of the sacrifice off the priest before he went into the holy place, seas (1 Kings 7:23). The term sea was indication of a mirror. They called the lavers mirrors. That’s what the laver was. It was a mirror, or a sea. It is a testimony that it is God’s word that cleanses us and changes us to become what we could not be without Him. When we look into the Word of God, we see the change that comes to our hearts from within. In Christ there is a crystal sea beneath the feet of those in Christ, something you can see yourself in.
Revelation chapter 5 reveals that no one could step onto that sea because in Ezekiel’s day, it was a cloud above man’s head. But now we live in the day of a Revelation of Jesus Christ. This was the day that John had this revelation, and that day is also now. Anyone can have a revelation of Jesus Christ today. What used to be a cloud is a sea, and there are blessings that come if you could go in past this sea into this reality of the holy and holy of holies. In the Old Covenant, no one could go onto the sea until the Lamb, Jesus, the Word, stepped onto the sea.
If you stepped onto that sea, it would make you translucent. So no one could step onto the Word of God because the Word of God would make them translucent, and it would show every flaw within them. Only a man with a pure testimony of the Word of God could open the door to the New Covenant testimony of intimacy with God in Christ. Then the Man, Jesus, the Lamb of God, who had no flaws, stepped onto the sea, and it made Him translucent, and there was nothing in Him that could stop Him from opening the seal. The opening of that seal was the opening of the New Covenant for all who believe. We are brought near to God through the sacrifice of the once for all Lamb of God. Jesus Christ is the righteousness of all mankind and in Christ we are given a place of personal, intimate relationship with God as farmers, husbands, wives, truck drivers, teachers, nurses, doctors, and everyday people in an everyday world.
So before this throne, there’s a sea of glass-like crystal. We can stand on the expressions of God in Christ, and we can become expressions of His name. In Christ we can be changed in our character, nature, and way as sons and daughters of God. The Word became flesh and moved into the neighborhood so that all flesh in any and every neighborhood could become expressions of God’s word. When God speaks to our hearts, we are changed, and we become expressions of God’s word to our world.
2 Corinthians 3:16 Nevertheless when one turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. 17 Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. 18 But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.
Every member of the Church can be transformed by Christ’s living word and thus become a testimony of flesh made into the word of God. Members of Christ’s Body have been given the ability to know the word of God in their hearts and in their minds (Jer. 31:33; Heb. 8:10; 10:16). We have eyes in front and back, for each of us has a personal relationship with God in Christ. We know God with our hearts and that knowing of Him becomes a testimony of His grace working in and through us to our world. A revelation of Jesus Christ in our lives transforms us to become who we are meant to be as expressions of God’s word as His sons and daughters in our world. Grace comes to us all at a revelation of Jesus in our lives (1 Pet. 1:13). Every part of our being is made alive in Christ. We know God and need not be taught from an external source (Jer. 31:34; Jn. 14:26; 16:13; Heb. 8:11; 1 Jn. 2:27). Being transformed from within is a testimony of being sons and daughters of God in the New Covenant of life in Christ.
Blessings,
Ted J. Hanson
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House of Bread Ministry
3210 Meridian St.
Bellingham, WA 98225-1728