The verses we read in Deuteronomy 15 say that the firstborn ox should not be put to work and the firstborn sheep should not be shorn; instead, they should be eaten (vv. 19-20). What does this mean according to typology? When many Christians and non-Christians talk about Christ, they expect that Christ will either till the ground or be shorn. No one thinks of eating Christ. To ask Christ to till the ground means to ask Him to labor on your behalf, to do things for you. Did you know that every day you want the Lord Jesus to till the ground for you? You do not have a way to deal with your wife, so you pray, “Lord, You know the kind of wife You have given me; I am helpless. Please deal with her.” This is to ask the Lord Jesus to till the ground for you. Some sisters may pray, “Lord, You know how stubborn my husband is. Lord, You have to deal with him; otherwise, I will not be able to bear it any longer.” When you ask the Lord to do things for you in this way, you are asking Him to till the ground as an ox.
What is the meaning of shearing the sheep of the wool? Wool is used to make clothing. You may want Christ to be your outward adornment; you try to imitate Christ outwardly. It is rare to find Christians who have escaped these two things. Those Christians who do not love the Lord simply ignore Him. However, Christians who love the Lord want Him either to till the ground or to be shorn.
The Bible does not tell us to till the ground but to eat. Do not ask Christ to do anything for you; rather, eat Christ into you. Do not pray and ask Christ to change your wife; instead, eat Christ into you and live by Him! Your wife may not change a bit; yet to you, to live is Christ. Do not ask the Lord to give your husband a beating; the Lord will never answer this kind of prayer. The Lord will say, “I will use My staff as a whip to beat you instead.” You have to eat the Lord. When you eat the Lord, any mistreatment from your husband will be sweet to you. Hallelujah! You do not need the Lord to till the ground; neither do you need to shear Him. You simply need to eat Him.
It seems that the Lord is saying, “I am the bread of life. He who eats Me shall live because of Me. Do not expect Me to do anything for you or expect Me to be your outward adornment. You have to understand that I come to give you life and to give it more abundantly. I want to enter into you to be your life and your everything. As long as I live in you, you should not care about the outward circumstances. It is good if your wife has changed; it is even better if she has not changed. It is good to have a submissive wife; it is even better to have an unsubmissive wife. A warm and tender husband is lovely, of course; however, a rough and tough husband is even lovelier.”
Therefore, what matters today is to have life within us, not to implore Christ to do anything for us. As long as Christ enters into us to be our life and our supply, we can do the things that others cannot do, we can endure the sufferings that others cannot endure, and we can bear the burdens that others cannot bear. Do not till the ground or shear the sheep. Instead, eat the Lord! Do not expect Him to be your Prophet or your King. He came to be the bread of life to you. Therefore, eat Him!
Brothers and sisters, what does the Bible speak about? Eating! For what reason did Jesus come? He came for us to eat Him. Whenever fundamental Christianity speaks about the Feast of Passover, the blood of the lamb is invariably regarded with utmost importance. I am not suggesting that the blood is not important. Man sinned, and he needs the blood. In the Garden of Eden, however, there was the tree of life; there was no blood. It was when man sinned that the blood was needed, but the lamb has not only blood but also flesh. The blood deals with our sins due to our fall, and the flesh supplies us with the life from the tree of life. Hence, it is not only the blood; it is the blood with the flesh.
When you read Exodus 12, you can see these two things—the blood and the flesh. The blood was sprinkled outside the house, so the house was under the blood. What were the children of Israel doing under the covering of the blood? They were eating. Many in Christianity speak clearly about the blood, but the focus of the Passover lamb is not on the blood but on the flesh. The blood is for the flesh; the sprinkling of the blood is for man to eat the flesh. The blood is for redemption, and redemption is to bring man back to the enjoyment of Christ as life.
(Eating the Lord, Chapter 1, by Witness Lee)