Week 25 Tabernacle

Names of the Tabernacle

Exodus 25:9          mishkan - dwelling

Leviticus 17:4        mishkan YHWH - dwelling of the Lord

Exodus 38:21 mishkan haedot tabernacle of the testimony - tablets of covenant, emphasizes covenant relationship

Exodus 28:43 ohel moed, dwelling of meeting or assembly.  who is meeting?  God is meeting with his people.  

Exodus 29:42-43 God will meet with his people

Q. What do they have in common?

-  All focus on the presence of God among His people.   

Exodus 25:8 mishdot, sanctuary, holy place

Exodus 38:24   quodesh, holy place

Exodus 34:26 house of YHWH

Q.  What do these have in common?

-  All focus on holiness of God, man cannot come into the presence of a holy God.  

-  The separateness of God is highlighted.

-  There is a tension between these names.  There is nearness and distance.  On one hand their is condescension and on the other there is a separateness highlighted by the walls, fences, and curtains.  Only the priests can enter the sanctuary and only the high priest can enter the holy of holies and then only on the Day of Atonement.  

Q.  Why does this contradiction exist?

-  God’s holiness and man’s sin.

-  Yet God still condescends and creates a system that through sacrifices and a mediator, the people can come into the presence of God.

Q. According to Exodus 19:6, Israel was supposed to be a kingdom of priests.  Why were the Levites set aside as priests?

-  During the golden calf episode, all of the Israelites rebelled except the Levites. 

-  The point is to communicate that the relationship between God and man is broken and requires a mediator.  

Point of tabernacle is God’s presence 

Q.  Why do you think God chose a tent to dwell in during the wilderness wanderings?

-  God identifies with his people in their situation.

-  Anticipation of incarnation

Hebrews 8:5-6

 -  These verses tell us the tabernacle is a copy of heavenly reality.  Work of tabernacle ultimately fulfilled in Christ.  

Hebrews 10:19-20

New and living way verse in Hebrews

This is why we can now approach boldly unlike the way for the Israelites.  The Israelites could approach God but it was guarded and indirect.  Christ breaks the tension that existed in the tabernacle between God’s desire to dwell with His people and God’s holiness.  

Q.  How is Christ prefigured in tabernacle?  Christ says that He is the temple in what way is that true?

- Priest - Christ intercedes for us and allows us to approach God

- Atonement - Points to the cross and the sacrifice of Christ that atones once and for all

for sin

- Presence of God - Christ is the incarnation of God.  

-  This is how Christ can claim that He is the temple.  

4.  Symbolism

-  Altar and laver  - go together, signify sacrifice and cleansing.  represent atonement 

and washing from sin.  cleansing is based upon atonement.  baptism is based 

upon sacrifice of Christ.  in order to enter into the place of God’s presence 

because sin creates a barrier and there must be atonement.

-  Bread of the presence - literally the bread of the face of God.  bread represents a

meal and fellowship.  eating a meal together was a sign of close fellowship

and a relationship with each other.  

you can see the relationship with the Lord’s supper because after one 

has been atoned and cleansed through baptism, they enter into fellowship

with Christ.  

there were 12 loaves of bread symbolizes the 12 tribes of Israel.  all of God’s 

people were included.  there is probably some significance to the fact that

after Jesus fed the 5000 there were 12 baskets left over.  Jesus is providing

His people fellowship with God.  

-  Menorah - made of solid goal with flames burning.  maybe it had some connection

with the pillar of fire and glory cloud that accompanied Israel.  Represented 

God’s presence.  Revelation talks about the 7 candlesticks for the 7 churches

and calls them the spirit of God, so this is a representation of the Holy Spirit. 

-  Incense  - placed right before the veil separating the holy place from the holy of

holies.  receives the worship of his people, but because of the atonement

and fellowship, God receives the worship of His people.  Our worship becomes

a pleasant smelling aroma.  Noah’s sacrifice.  

-  Mercy Seat -  A better translation would be the “atonement cover” it was on top of the 

Ark and had two golden cherubim on top of it.  Romans 3:25, propitiation is the 

Greek word for atonement.  So in the Greek translation this would read 

propitiation cover.  In Genesis 3 the cherubim guarded the way to the tree of life.  

The tabernacle seems to make 3 points:

Presence 

Separation

Atonement

If we think the point of the tabernacle was for God to communicate something bigger to the Israelites using the symbolism of the tabernacle, then what was God trying to communicate?

Use N.T. Wright’s world view scheme.  We can construct a worldview of a culture by examining that culture’s  praxis and symbol  and determine how that culture would answer the basic questions of human existence:

    1. Who are we?  We are God’s people

    2. Where are we?  We are in God presence

3.  What is wrong? We are sinful and God is holy

4.  What is the solution? Atonement

We said the 3 big themes of the tabernacle were presence, separation, and atonement.  We can really say that presence is the main them with separation and the need for atonement a consequence of God’s presence.  

- The passage we read is about the glory of God entering into the tabernacle.  Its God’s presence that gives the tabernacle its significance.  

-  Later we see the same scene repeated at the dedication of Solomon’s temple.  

There was nothing in the ark except the two tablets of stone that Moses put there at Horeb, where YHWH made a covenant with the people of Israel, when they came out of the land of Egypt.  And when the priests came out of the Holy Place, a cloud filled the house of YHWH, so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of YHWH filled the house of YHWH.

1 Kings 8:9-11

Q.  Does anyone have an answer to the wheels in Ezekiel 1

-  Ezekiel 9-11 pictures the glory of YHWH leaving the temple in various stages and finally departing at the Mount of Olives.  

-  However, even though the presence of YHWH leaves the temple and Jerusalem is about be utterly destroyed by the Babylonians, Ezekiel says something really interesting.

Therefore says, “Thus says YHWH God: Though I will remove them far off among the nations, and though I will scatter them among the countries, yet I will be a sanctuary to them for a while in the countries where they have gone.”

-  God’s presence has left the temple but not His people.  After this verse, Ezekiel writes about a new spirit and a new heart God will give His people.  

-  A new temple is built 66 years later, but here is the reaction to it:

But many of the priests and Levites and heads of fathers’ houses, old men who had seen the first house, wept with a loud voice when they saw the foundation of this house being laid, though many shout aloud for joy.

Ezra 3:12

Q.  Why did the people weep?

-  The glory of the Lord did not return.  We have no scene like we do in Exodus 40 or 1 Kings 8.  

-  Haggai, who was the prophet who instigates rebuilding of the temple, says this

Who is left among you who saw this house in its former glory?  How do you see it now?  Is it not as nothing in your eyes?  …

According to the covenant the I made with you when you came out of Egypt.  My Spirit remains in your midst.  Fear not.  For thus says YHWH of hosts: Yet once more, in a little while, I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land.  And I will shake all the nations, so that the treasures of all nations will come in, and I will fill this house with glory says YHWH of hosts.”

Haggai 2:3-7

Zechariah and Malachi will also talk about the glory of YHWH returning to the temple.  

John 1:14 tell us that the glory of YHWH does return when the word became flesh and tabernacled among us and we have seen the glory, glory as of the only son of the Father.  

Luke has Jesus coming to the Mount Olives during the triumphal entry.  Jesus then goes to the temple and announces judgment  on it.  He prays in the garden at the base of the Mount of Olives and finally enters Jerusalem only to be arrested, tried and crucified.  Later it will be from the Mount of Olives where General Titus and the Roman Xth legion will set up camp and eventually destroy Jerusalem.  To this day Titus’ Arch commemorates this battle and you can clearly see a Roman soldier carrying the Menorah.

Jesus has replaced the Temple because He is the glory of YHWH and fulfills everything the tabernacle and temple were meant to represent - God’s presence.  Jesus through the atonement solves the problem of God’s desire to be with His people but the separateness as a result of their sin.   

Acts 2:2-4