Reklamation Ministries
Seeing the Church and the World in Plain View
Which Throne Did Stephen See?
Because the sanctuary throne was not in existence in the days of the early Christian church, therefore the throne upon which Stephen saw Christ at the "right hand of God" (Acts 7:56) could not have been in the sanctuary, wherein is the "sea of glass," but rather in Paradise, whence flows the "river of water of life," and on either side of which is "the tree of life." (Revelation 22:1, 2). Very obviously, therefore, the throne which Stephen saw is "the throne of God and of the Lamb," the throne permanent and eternal. Round about this glory-seat are no beasts, no witnesses, no jury, and before it is "no candle," and no blood to be offered. In short, it stands, not in the sin-laden sanctuary, but in Paradise. It is the sovereign administrative throne, from which the Infinite eternally governs His immortal sinless beings!
To this throne, then, which is from everlasting to everlasting, Christ ascended and thereat sat down at the right hand of His Father until the time came when, in fulfillment of Daniel's prophecy and of John's revelation, sometime
after the little-horn power came into existence, both He and His Father moved to the sanctuary throne. 2 Upon the latter He does not sit as a king at the right hand of God; but rather before it does He stand both as a sacrificial lamb (Revelation 5:6), and as an intercessor (Daniel 7:13) pleading for sinful human beings. Hence,
His mediatorial work began first in the Holy, then the Most Holy.
Type Meets Anti-type
In the earthly sanctuary the high priest (typifying Christ) officiated first in the holy apartment throughout the year, then upon the Day of Atonement, the day of cleansing the sanctuary and judging the people, he officiated in the Most Holy for one day only. This twofold service signifies that in the heavenly sanctuary, the High Priest, Christ, must necessarily first officiate in the holy apartment up to the
anti-typical day of Atonement, then during that day, He must officiate in the Most Holy
apartment, the throne. Thus the earthly services too, repudiate the idea that Christ entered the Most Holy apartment of the heavenly
sanctuary immediately after His ascension.
From the foregoing facts, clear and distinct, the only tenable conclusion to be drawn is that Christ, immediately after His ascension, rather than entering within the veil in the sanctuary, sat down at the right hand of Father, in Paradise, and from there carried on His work in the holy apartment of the sanctuary. ". . . We have such a high priest, who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens; a minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man." (Heb.8:1,2).
What is the Judgment for the dead?
The Judgment as you know is in two separate and distinct sections, one following the other—