Today's text from the ESV Study Bible: Exodus 25-27.
Crossway Publishers, the creators of the ESV Study Bible, have done a very nice job of creating illustrations of the tabernacle, and all its components. Click these links to view the illustrations:
- The Ark of the Covenant
- The Table for the Bread of the Presence
- The Tabernacle and its Court
- The Tabernacle Tent
- The Golden Lampstand
- The Bronze Alter
Something that also caught my attention from this reading, that I didn't catch the last time through, was that the tabernacle, as the place where God will dwell with his people, is a symbolic representation of the Garden of Eden including the Cherubim attending to its east entrance.
This from the ESV Study Bible notes:
"...there are two important keys to understanding the symbolism of the tabernacle. First, the tabernacle is seen as a tented palace for Israel's divine king. He is enthroned on the ark of the covenant in the innermost Holy of Holies (the Most Holy Place). His royalty is symbolized by the purple of the curtains and his divinity by the blue. The closer items are to the Holy of Holies, the more valuable are the metals (bronze→silver→gold) of which they are made. The other symbolic dimension is Eden. The tabernacle, like the garden of Eden, is where God dwells, and various details of the tabernacle suggest it is a mini-Eden. These parallels include the east-facing entrance guarded by cherubim, the gold, the tree of life (lampstand), and the tree of knowledge (the law). Thus God's dwelling in the tabernacle was a step toward the restoration of paradise, which is to be completed in the new heaven and earth (Revelation 21–22)."
One of the things I desire to better understand this year is to understand that I now have access to the holy of holies, and even more boggling to the mind is that fact that God in fact indwells, through the Holy Spirit, his people.
In light of this fact, and seeing the great attention given to this place, and the obvious attention to God's holiness, how should that change the way in which I live, and attend to his current holy of holies, that is, my body as a member of the body of Christ?
Have you given this much thought? If so, how has it changed the way in which you live?
