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Transcript
00:00Priorities In Exodus chapters 36-40 we find three additional
00:06tabernacle lists, making four in total.
00:10We have already read the list of specification, setting out what is to be provided.
00:15Next come the list of manufacture, detailing how each item is to be made, the list of construction,
00:22describing how to put it all together, and the list of erection, where it is finally
00:26built.
00:28How very important the tabernacle is, then, to command such space and repeated detail.
00:34This is underlined by another statistic.
00:37Exodus 35 verse 1 states the principle governing the whole enterprise, which the Lord has commanded
00:43you to do.
00:45This insistence on divine authorization and detailed design comes twenty-three times including,
00:50in chapter 39, seven times of individual articles, and in chapter 40.
00:57Seven times in the course of erection.
01:00We should understand this as a mandate to study every detail of the tabernacle, everything
01:04is where and what it is by divine direction.
01:08The Lord planned, directed, and oversaw it all.
01:12There is truth in every symbol, and there is a central truth in the whole the tabernacle
01:16achieves the purpose the Lord had in mind when he set about redeeming his people from
01:20Egypt.
01:22That I may dwell among them.
01:25Israel is a tent-dwelling people.
01:26The Lord will live in his tent alongside them.
01:30We see this worked out in Numbers 2 in how Israel is to set up camp.
01:35Think of the camp like a great cross, with the Judah tribes stretching out in a line
01:39east, the Reuben tribes to the south, the Ephraim tribes on the west, and the Dan tribes
01:44northwards.
01:46But at the exact center of the crossing is the Lord's tent, the tabernacle.
01:51The Lord is in the middle of his people.
01:54Everything else is an adjunct to that great reality the sacrifices, the mercy seat, the
01:59work of the priests and Levites.
02:02All else is in the interest of enabling and securing the presence of the Holy One among
02:06sinners.
02:08This is the problem Haggai faces when his people turn from building the Lord's house.
02:13Do they not want the Lord at the center of their lives?
02:16Moses' people do look at their response on the great gift day.
02:21And should we not go all out to avoid and banish whatever offends his presence, and
02:25to cultivate everything that he desires and that delights him?
02:29Reflection We are given another priority in Exodus 35
02:33verse 1 to 3, which is the last of seven times the Sabbath law is referred to.
02:39The Lord is serious about the apartness of his holy day.