IV: Tabernacle, Priesthood and Feasts

Twelve Foundations

one priestly people built together

Root
Exod 28:17-21 · yesod (H3247)
Old Testament chain
  1. Exod 28:17-21
  2. 1 Kgs 5:17
  3. Isa 28:16
  4. Isa 54:11-12
  5. Rev 21:14, 19-20
New Testament
Rev 21:11, 18, 21; Rev 21:14; Rev 21:19-20; Eph 2:19-22

The breastplate bore twelve stones engraved with the names of Israel's tribes (Exod 28:17-21). Solomon laid the temple's foundation with costly hewn stones (1 Kgs 5:17), Isaiah heard Yahuah promise a tried cornerstone in Zion (Isa 28:16), and to the afflicted city, "I will lay thy stones with fair colours, and lay thy foundations with sapphires" (Isa 54:11). In Revelation 21:14, 19-20 the twelve foundations bear the apostles' names and are garnished with twelve stones echoing the breastplate, joining the tribal gates in one building: the entire city is a priestly people, and every street is sanctuary. Dispensational teaching that divides Israel and the assembly into two peoples cannot survive a single city where tribes and apostles form one structure.

From The Courtroom of Heaven, pp. 355–359, 365