Rev. Don Campbell
Exodus 25-27
THOUGHT FOR TODAY, FEBRUARY 7, 2019:
GOD DWELLS NOT IN TEMPLES MADE WITH HANDS [Ex 25-27]
Very detailed instructions are given in today’s reading for the construction of the tabernacle and all its furnishings. An inspired writer sums these three chapters up in a few words: “Now even the first covenant had regulations for worship and an earthly place of holiness. For a tent was prepared, the first section, in which were the lampstand and the table and the bread of the Presence. It is called the Holy Place. Behind the second curtain was a second section called the Most Holy Place, having the golden altar of incense and the ark of the covenant covered on all sides with gold, in which was a golden urn holding the manna, and Aaron’s staff that budded, and the tablets of the covenant. Above it were the cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat. Of these things we cannot now speak in detail” (Heb 9:1-5). These things were a shadow of the good things to come, instead of the true form of the realities (Heb 10:1).
When God said, “And let them make me a sanctuary, that I may dwell in their midst” (Ex 25:8), he was not telling them that they could put him in a box. If there were ever any doubt about this, it is dispelled by the word of the Lord through Isaiah: Thus says the Lord: ‘Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool; what is the house that you would build for me, and what is the place of my rest? All these things my hand has made, and so all these things came to be, declares the Lord. But this is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word” (Isa 66:1-2). God was telling them that there was a place where they could come and priests would act on their behalf to offer sacrifices to him: “These preparations having thus been made, the priests go regularly into the first section, performing their ritual duties, but into the second only the high priest goes, and he but once a year, and not without taking blood, which he offers for himself and for the unintentional sins of the people. By this the Holy Spirit indicates that the way into the holy places is not yet opened as long as the first section is still standing (which is symbolic for the present age). According to this arrangement, gifts and sacrifices are offered that cannot perfect the conscience of the worshiper, but deal only with food and drink and various washings, regulations for the body imposed until the time of reformation” (Heb 9:6-10).
Today, God’s mercy is not bound to a place nor dispensed through a priesthood. Jesus, our high priest, entered into the true holy place, which is heaven itself and offered his own blood as a once-for-all sacrifice for our sins, permitting our own entrance into the holy place: “Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from a evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water” (Heb 10:19-22).
“For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, ‘I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people” (2 Cor 5:16-17).
CONNECTIONS – Isaiah 66:1-2, Hebrews 4:16 and 10:19-2, Matt 23:13-14
1. How would you reconcile Isaiah 66:1-2 which says that those who are accepted by God are the humble and contrite who tremble at God’s word and Hebrews 4:16 and 10:19-22 that we are to come with confidence (“boldly,” KJV) into God’s presence?
2. J. B. Phillips, in his book “Your God Is Too Small” wrote of the “God-in-a-Box” error, which can best be described as the attempt of professing Christians to put God in their own denominational box and control all access to him. Is this what some in Jesus’ day were doing? (Matt 23:13-14).
