The Tabernacle

Have you ever noticed how our homes reflect our personalities? I know this is true of my own home. Connie and I tend to be practical people who like a home that provides just the space we need for our lifestyle. We have enough room and no more. If we wanted, we could get a larger house, but that would just mean more floors to sweep, more space to heat and cool, and a few more feet to walk to get where you want to go. And we would be paying for those inconveniences. We love our home just the way it is.

Now my daughter and her husband are a whole different story. They are artistic in their tastes. My son-in-law is a great artist and has the house filled with his painting and pottery. There is practically nothing practical about their house. They have the world’s most complex coffeepot, with more buttons than the cockpit of an airplane. When I go to visit, I take my own coffeepot. It has an on and off switch. And you have to be a genius to figure out how to turn on and off the water in their bathroom sink. They like to be different, and they are good at it. You can tell a lot about their personalities by being in their home.

When God brought the children of Israel out of Egypt, he led them to Mount Sinai. While there, God instructed Moses to build Him a house called the Tabernacle and gave him the exact design.

The basic layout included a courtyard that was completely enclosed by curtains that surround the Tabernacle building. That building consisted of two rooms, the outer one called the holy place, and the inner one referred to as the holy of holies. When entering the courtyard, you first encounter a bronze altar where sacrifices are made. The next item is the laver, a very large bronze bowl filled with water.

Entering through the curtain into the outer room of the Tabernacle, you encounter a lampstand with seven lamps to your left and to your right is located a table on which is placed loaves of bread for the priests to eat. The inner room, the holy of holies, is separated from the holy place by a very thick curtain called the veil. Just outside the veil, in the holy place, is an altar where the priests burn incense.

On the other side of the veil, inside the holy of holies, we find an oblong gold box called the Ark of the Covenant that contains the tablets of the law that God gave to Moses. On top of the Ark of the Covenant is a gold cover, and on the cover are two gold cherubim facing each other with their wings spread out so that they touch one another. Scripture tells us that God resides above the cherubim.

As with our homes, the Tabernacle reflects God’s personality. That being the case, we might begin our investigation of the Tabernacle by seeking to identify which of the articles described above reflect God the Father. However, none of them do. The reason can be found in the Ten Commandments. God instructs Moses, “You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.” (Exodus 20:4 ESV) Here and elsewhere we find God insisting that He not be represented by an object, that doing so does not accurately portray Him.

How then does the Tabernacle reflect the nature of God? We find the answer in Isaiah’s vision of God recorded in Isaiah 6:1-3. Isaiah describes this event as follows:

“In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!”

Here we find God describing Himself by repeating the word “holy” three times. The term “holy” speaks of that which is separated from the mundane and unclean. When I was growing up, our house had a kitchen where we ate our regular meals.. However, like many other families, we also had a dining room that was set apart for special occasions such as Thanksgiving and Christmas dinner. For those occasions my mother brought out a special set of china and silverware. We might say that this room and these objects were holy, set apart from the mundane and reserved for these special occasions.

Though the Tabernacle does not include a specific piece of furniture representing God, it does represent Him by depicting three levels of holiness, reflecting the repetition of that term in Isaiah’s vision. The outer court is holy in that it is set aside for those offering sacrifices to the Lord. The holy place required an added level of holiness in that only the priests were allowed entrance into that space. The holy of holies depicted the third and ultimate expression of holiness, with entrance to that room being restricted to the high priest who was only permitted to enter once yearly. So we find God the Father depicted in His home, the Tabernacle, by these three progressing levels of holiness.

This configuration of God’s house, with Him residing in the most holy room, also conveys the challenge confronting us in having a relationship with God. How can we, as sinful people, gain access to God’s presence, as He resides in this most holy location? The answer to that question resides in the depiction of God the Son and God the Holy Spirit in the Tabernacle.

To discover the portrayal of God the Son, we need to once again enter of the Tabernacle compound. As noted earlier, we first encounter the bronze altar where sacrifices are made. This altar and its sacrifices anticipate the sacrifice for our sins made by the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross. By receiving Him, we are justified from all of our sins and ordained as His priests, qualifying us to enter into the holy place.

As already noted, in that outer room on the left-hand side we find a lampstand, symbolizing the pronouncement of Jesus that He is the light of the world. As such, He teaches us how to live holy lives, pleasing to God the Father. We also noted that a table for bread is located on the right side of the holy place, symbolizing the pronouncement of Jesus that He is the bread of life. As the lampstand reveals to us how to live before a holy God, the bread provides us with the spiritual energy needed to maintain that lifestyle.

Upon the death of Christ on the cross, Scripture tells us that the veil was ripped in two from top to bottom, giving us access into the holy of holies. However, try as we might, even as believers we cannot measure up to God’s standard of holiness, raising the question of how we can enter into His presence. The answer resides on that covering over the Ark of the Covenant. As we noted, that Ark contained the law, and God the Father resides above that Ark. However, during his annual entrance into the holy of holies, the high priest sprinkles blook on the covering of the Ark, conveying that the blood of Christ comes between the law below the covering and the presence of God above the covering, providing forgiveness for our sins and access into God’s presence.

We also find in the Tabernacle the portrayal of the ministry of the Holy Spirit that enables us to live in God’s presence. As noted earlier, after we encounter the bronze altar we come to the laver. Titus 3:5 reveals to us the ministry of the Holy Spirit symbolized by the laver when the apostle Paul writes, “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit.” This verse takes us back to the Garden of Eden where Adam and Eve suffered spiritual death because of their sin. It also takes us to the pronouncement of Christ to Nicodemus that he must be born again through the ministry of the Holy Spirit. The laver represents that regenerating ministry. When we are justified by the sacrifice of Christ, the Holy Spirit enters our life and performs in us that spiritual birth that enables us to enter the presence of God.

As we enter the holy place, immediately before us is the altar of incense. Revelation 8:3 teaches us that this altar represents the ministry of the Holy Spirit related to our prayers: “Then another angel, having a golden censer, came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all the saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne.” Why do we need the ministry of the Holy Spirit when we pray? The apostle Paul provides us with the answer in Romans 8:26: “Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.” Prayer entails our speaking to the Creator of the universe, and impeccably holy God. Even as believers, we lack the capacity to converse with Him appropriately. Because of that, the Holy Spirit reformats our prayers so that they are acceptable to God the Father. With the veil torn in half through the death of Christ, our prayers, cleaned up by the ministry of the Holy Spirit, enter God’s presence in the holy of holies.

We see, then, that just as our homes reflect who we are, the Tabernacle reflects who God is. It depicts the holiness of God, but it also conveys how the ministry of God the Son and God the Holy Spirit make a way to live in His presence. In other words, because of these wonderful provisions, His house can be our house also, and we can live there with Him.