WORKING ON A BUILDING
WORKING ON A BUILDING
Sunday, January 31, 2021, the Year of Our Lord
Pastor Carolyn Sissom
Today I want to honor Deacons Tom and Diana Terlep and Deacon Tim Sherbeck for the work and sacrifice they are pouring into constructing the Eastgate Church Building. Also, the laborers who are volunteering their time and skills. When the church is complete, we will have a special service to honor all those men who for the love of God and their love and respect for Tom Terlep have sacrificed their time and strength for this labor of love.
The Deacon ministry is great in God’s eyes. If one accepts it gracefully and uses it well, God gives them a degree. Paul says they may “purchase to themselves a good degree” (1 Tim 3:13).
1 Chron. 28:20: David said to his son Solomon, “Be strong and of good courage, and do it; do not fear nor be dismayed, for the LORD God—my God—will be with you. He will not leave you nor forsake you, until you have finished all the work for the service of the house of the LORD.
No longer will we be moving from one desert oasis to another. Each move on the journey has been either directly or indirectly related to government controls. When the Lord sent me to Texas, He told me He wanted me to lead a corporate Body to His mountain. We become those vessels of the temple in whom He dwells and through whom He flows forth in blessing to others.
Exodus 15:17: You O’ Lord shall bring them in, and plant them in the mountain of your inheritance in the place, O’ Lord which you have made to dwell in, in the Sanctuary, O Lord, which your hands have established.
This is the realm of the Spirit where Father, Son and Holy Spirit have made their dwelling place in each one of us. We are the Temple. We are abiding in Him and He is abiding in us. My labor in the Lord has been to build the House of God in all to whom I am sent.
David selected the building site for Solomon’s Temple. It was Ornan’s threshing floor, where grace had been manifest. David gathered the strangers and set masons to build the house of God. He instructed Solomon to build, and ordered all the chiefs of Israel to help Solomon in the task.
Now set your heart and your soul to seek the LORD your God. Therefore, arise and build the sanctuary of the LORD God,
The officers of Solomon’s kingdom had served faithfully in the kingdom of Saul, but it only brought them to disillusionment and distress. Their real training was in company with David as they wandered about the hillsides of Judaea, unrecognized by the realm of Saul.
After the 2020 election, the prophets of God are going through a time of persecution and rejection. True prophetic ministry is birthed in persecution and rejection. We learn true discipleship as we take Christ’s yoke upon us and walk with Him in His rejection.
In 1 Chron. 27, each one of Solomon’s officers had one identifying qualification, “He suffered with David in his rejection.”
The prophetic warriors who stood with Donald J. Trump are now suffering with him in his rejection. It is okay! The Lord will raise out of their rejection the glory of God in their lives.
David’s mighty men were not opportunists striving for a place of leadership. They were following the leader who was anointed by God for God’s Kingdom purposes.
Man can never fail us if we follow Christ in love. Nothing is wasted that is done out of love for Him…foolish as it may seem in the eyes of men.
David understood that God’s spirit was moving His Kingdom into a new era. David went into considerable detail concerning the preparation for the Temple which is son, Solomon was to build. Preparation is a key word for this hour. Those who have the vision of what God is doing, and are pursuing it.
You have heard me say through this shaking of our nation, that we are coming into a new era, even a new age. I am not certain what it will look like, but this I know, it will be to the Glory of God. We know God’s plan will not fail. He is doing a secret work in the earth which will not be manifest until God’s appointed hour for His new order.
The truths of the Kingdom of God are called “mysteries,” which means they are “secrets.” These secrets are to be made known only to those who hearts have been prepared to receive them.
1 Chron. 28: 11-David gave his son Solomon the pattern of the porch, its houses, its treasuries, its upper chambers, its inner parlors, and the place of the mercy seat; and the pattern for all that he had by the Spirit, of the courts of the house of the LORD, of all the chambers all around, of the treasuries of the house of God, and of the treasuries for the dedicated things. Also, for the division of the priests and the Levites, for all the work of the service of the house of the LORD, and for all the articles of service in the house of the LORD. He gave gold by weight for things of gold, for all articles used in every kind of service; also silver for all articles of silver by weight, for all articles used in every kind of service. The weight for the lampstands of gold, and their lamps of gold, by weight for each lampstand and its lamps; for the lampstands of silver by weight, for the lampstand and its lamps, according to the use of each lampstand. And by weight he gave gold for the tables of the showbread, for each table, and silver for the tables of silver. Also, pure gold for the forks, the basins, the pitchers of pure gold, and the golden bowls—he gave gold by weight for every bowl; and for the silver bowls, silver by weight for every bowl; and refined gold by weight for the altar of incense, and for the construction of the chariot, that is, the gold cherubim that spread their wings and overshadowed the ark of the covenant of the LORD. “All this,” said David, “the LORD made me understand in writing, by His hand upon me, all the works of these plans.”
David’s offering was over three billion dollars. David stirred the leaders and the leaders stirred the people.
1 Ch. 29:9: The people rejoiced, because with perfect heart they offered willingly to the LORD: and David the king also rejoiced with great joy.
Just as Moses was taken up into the mountain and given the pattern of the Tabernacle, so David was given the pattern of the new Temple by the Spirit---no doubt as he sat before the Lord in the tabernacle of David.
All over the earth Christian leaders are eagerly trying to rebuild the Church in a vain attempt to bring it back to the Tabernacle of David. God has something better in mind than the Tabernacle of David or even the early Church in the Book of Acts. God’s plan is a Church that has come to perfect fruit---“a glorious Church –not having spot or wrinkle.” Let us be content to do just what we know God wants us to do in this hour. I believe the Church was established by Jesus Christ to be the vehicle of the Kingdom of God. I believe the government of the Church is sealed in Heaven and that order will not change until Jesus comes again. I believe the Tabernacle of David is being built within each one of us in praise, worship and prayer.
David died at the age of 70 and Solomon was crowned King. In Solomon’s fourth year as King, he began the commission to build the Temple.
Solomon determined to build a house for the name of the LORD, and a house for his kingdom.
2 Chronicles 2:5-6: The temple which I build will be great, for our God is greater than all gods. But who is able to build Him a temple, since heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain Him? Who am I then, that I should build Him a temple?...
In 1 Kings, chapter 5, we have the story of King Hiram of Tyre who helped Solomon build the Temple. The word of God says King Hiram was ever a lover of David. When he found out Solomon was king, he sent his goodwill and friendship. Tyre is built on a rocky island just off the Phoenician coast. Solomon made a contract with the King to bring in cedars from Lebanon and to pay wages to his servants according to whatever Hiram would say.
Then King Hiram sent Solomon a skillful man whose name was also Hiram (Huram-abi). He became Solomon’s chief architect and engineer. King Solomon fetched Hiram out of Tyre.
The Bible speaks amazing things about him. He was a skillful man endowed with creativity. He is the son of a woman from the daughters of Dan, and his father is a man of Tyre. He is skilled in work with gold and silver, bronze and iron, stone and wood, purple, blue, and crimson yarn, and fine linen. He is experienced in every kind of engraving and can execute any design that is given him. He will work with your craftsmen and with those of my lord, your father, David (2 Ch. 2:13-14)
Hiram made the pillars and the Sea, two bronze pillars, ten movable stands of bronze, pots, shovels, sprinkling bowls. lavers, shovels and basins. All the bronze furnishings were outside the temple. In the inner court of the Lord’s temple all the furnishing and utinsils were of gold.
There was an immense investment of labor and resources into the building. I want to honor Tom Terlep as a man anointed by God to walk in the honor of Hiram. He was a man respected of kings, his men, and honored by God in the Holy Word. I have seen this same respect given to Tom Terlep. God will continue to bless him and Diana and their families for many generations.
So, Hiram finished the work he had undertaken for King Solomon in the house of God. (2 Ch. 4:11).
The word of the Lord came to Solomon while the House was being built:
1 Kings 6: 12-14: “Concerning this temple which you are building, if you walk in My statutes, execute My judgments, keep all My commandments, and walk in them, then I will perform My word with you, which I spoke to your father David.“And I will dwell among the children of Israel, and will not forsake My people Israel. So, Solomon built the temple and finished it.
1 Ki. 7:51: So, was ended all the work that king Solomon made for the house of the LORD. And Solomon brought in the things which David his father had dedicated; even the silver, and the gold, and the vessels, did he put among the treasures of the house of the LORD.
We will have a separate message on the moving of the Ark of Covenant and the glory of the Lord filling the Temple. We are blessed to carry the Presence of the Lord and the golden lampstand is in our midst. I have teachings on the website, Jesus in the Tabernacle on the Holy Place and Holy of Holies.
1 Ki. 8: 10-11: It came to pass, when the priests were come out of the holy place, that the cloud filled the house of the LORD. So, that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud: for the glory of the LORD had filled the house of the LORD.
Let us ever keep before us the awesome blessing of a building a church building for God and that the Lord chooses those who will build the Temple “not made with hands.”
Isaiah 66: 1-2: Thus, says the LORD, "Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. Where is the house you will build for me? Where will my resting place be? Has not my hand made all these things, and so they came into being?" declares the LORD. "These are the ones I look on with favor: those who are humble and contrite in spirit, and who tremble at my word.”
Solomon himself fully recognized that the temple he built was a place for God’s glorious and awesome Name.
1 Kings 5:5: Behold, I purpose to build a house unto the name of the LORD my God, as the LORD spoke unto David my father, saying, your son, whom I will set upon your throne in your room, he shall build a house unto my name.
We must remind God’s people over and over again that God’s Name has been called upon a people in the earth who have received Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. We are Christians. We are built together for a habitation of God through the Spirit (Eph. 2:22). This is the only habitation that is compatible with the heart of God anywhere in His universe. When God finds His place there, he is totally at rest, and desires no other temple.
The Lord Himself has brought together a building of God in the habitation of a people who have gathered under the house of Eastgate. Ezekiel was taken to the eastern gate, and saw the glory of God, and watched as His glory filled the house of God. Looking out the eastern gate tells us that a new day is dawning.
It is this “temple” which lives in us that God has planned to fill with the Glory of God until we shine with His Presence.
Carolyn Sissom, Pastor
Eastgate Ministries Church