40 Minutes In The Old Testament - Episode 107 (Exodus 35:1-40:38)

Episode Date: January 19, 2018

Chad and Daniel make a sprint to the end of Exodus and wrap the book up. There is much about the impact of receiving God's mercy and grace and why work is good. The story of Exodus is really the story of creation and God dwelling with His people. We hope you have enjoyed the journey.

welcome to 40 minutes in the old testament i'm daniel and marie price joined by chad bird Chad, are we going to try to mow all the way through the rest of Exodus, or are we going to give it a shot anyway? We are going to give it a shot, yeah. I've already shifted from first to second to third gear, so I'm already moving. So I think by the time we get talking, we're going to cover some territory this morning.

In fact, there's a couple chapters where we're just going to say, yeah, we already talked about that, and then jump to the next. So there's a good chance that in about 39 and a half more minutes that we'll be wrapping up. What you didn't prepare for, though, is the infamous Daniel Price bunny trail. Yeah. That's right. Maybe we can jump down a couple of very shallow bunny holes. We'll see.

If it doesn't happen, there's always next episode. That's right. That's the goal anyway. All right. Well, you know what? let's try to make it happen. So let's just jump right in. All right, let's do it. So last time we talked about a lot, actually about the face of Moses, his shining face that he had when he came down from Mount Sinai. And he spoke to the people with his veil off. And then when he was

done, he put it back down. And when he went in to talk to God, he lifted the veil up so that anytime he had either a face-to-face talk with God or a face-to-face talk with the people relaying the words of God to them, but then the veil was up. Otherwise, in his day-to-day activities, it was down. And we talked about that in connection with 2 Corinthians and how Paul makes use of that particular story. So that took us to the end of chapter 34. So that leaves us with chapters 35 through 40, which seems like, of course, a huge amount of material. But as we'll see in just a second, a lot of this is basically replaying what we've already heard in the previous chapters. So here's what happens in chapter 35. Chapter 35 is a pretty easy chapter to summarize.

So Moses gets everybody together, and he basically says, hey, here's what God told us to do. you're going to have a sabbath that's the way he starts out and then he goes on to say basically here are all the materials that we need to build god's tent and he starts to listen beginning with around verse uh five something like that uh you know we need we need precious metals like gold, silver, bronze. We need all kinds of material for tent making, like the blue, the purple, the scarlet material. We need some animal hides. We need oil. We need spices. We need precious stones. Anyway, he goes through this long list, basically a shopping list, if you will, of everything that they need, except, of course, there's no shopping that's

going to take place. This is all going to come from the people themselves. So when we get to verse 21, we have this description of how this worked. It said, everyone whose heart stirred him and everyone whose spirit moved him came and brought the Lord's contribution for the work of the tent of meeting for all its service and for the holy garments and then it goes on to kind of uh delineate to spell out more exactly who brought what which groups uh brought which kind of materials it talks about how excuse me how every man brought this and verse 25 that the skilled women were involved with with spinning some of this material it says that the rulers they brought the precious stones and then verse 29 kind of sums it all up it says the israelites

all the men and women whose heart moved them to bring material for all the work which the lord had commanded through moses to be done they brought a free will offering to the lord and then the chapter wraps up basically by saying who was in charge we've heard these names before Bezalel and Aholiab, they were the artisans. They were the ones that were skillful in putting together all of this stuff into the tabernacle. So basically chapter 35 tells us, here's what we need. And here's all the people who brought what was needed. And then these are the two people who are in charge of it. Now, one of the things I like about this chapter that really stands out to me is basically you've got Israel who are just on the flip side of near destruction.

I mean, this is, you got to keep this context in mind. These people are coming from the golden calf debacle. I mean, this is all fresh. It's not like, you know, a year has passed. This is just days after everything went down with that. So God has spared them. God has forgiven them. God has given them a fresh new start.

And Moses says, hey, this is what we need. And so the people, in response that God has showered upon them, then turn around and contribute all of this for the making of God's house. And the funny thing about this is that it's not like Moses gave very specific instructions to individuals or to certain groups as to what they must do and said all of this was given as a free will offering. In fact, in chapter 36, it's called a free will offering. So all of this, the people contributed with a willing spirit, with a free heart, because they had seen the grace of God shown to them in the midst of their rebellion and sin and everything that happened with their idolatry. Which is a great example of how it's the love of God that prompts good works. It's the love of God that leads to our contributions. And it's not just kind of this naked obedience to some sort of mandate.

Instead, it's a response to what God has done for us. Yeah, it shows you that the motivation or the ability behind doing this was not the giving of the command itself, but in response to the grace of God. so god can give the command which he did and you go you get some law and you go down there and there's some golden calf stuff going on uh that's how that works uh in the midst of law giving there's idolatry but after forgiveness um you actually get uh you actually see a little bit of obedience yeah and that's how that works that's how that works yeah in fact uh chapter 36 The next chapter opens up with, I think it's kind of a humorous episode because the people respond to the love of God. They were going overboard.

36 starts out with seven verses which describe how the two artists, Bezalel and his friend, they're, you know, material from the people and they're they're putting it all together they're organizing work crews uh they're overseeing the construction of the tabernacle and people keep bringing more and more stuff really it they have they have to call moses and this is verse 5 of 36 and they tell moses basically hey you got to tell the people to stop people are bringing much more than enough for the construction work which the lord commanded us to to perform so not only did the people respond freely and willingly to the grace that was shown to them they responded so much to where you know eventually the guys are like hey we have way more than enough we could build like you know

five tabernacles with all the stuff that you're bringing us so thank you but the offering plate is spilling over we don't we don't need any more money thank you you can keep the rest i'm sure that happens all the time in churches yeah we're not gonna take an offering this sunday because you know we've we've like maxed out of how much money we can put in the bank we'll skip it this time around oh man that kind of over the top giving i think is a it is it's just it's such a beautiful expression of the the the thankfulness in response to the fact that god spared them that he forgave them that he promised he would still stick with them yeah somebody asked me once they're like sort of sort of uh not not not in the best um

not with the best intentions but uh do you believe in good works and i was like yeah man like in fact i even do some on like after i like hear the gospel sometimes i like stumble into one totally on accident unplanned like every once in a while dude like i'll just like end up doing something good like because like a totally on accident yeah it's it's funny the unreal accusations that are sometimes leveled against uh those who who preach the who preach the gospel as if good works uh aren't going to be the natural and uh unplanned outcome of the grace of god that's at work in your life yeah as if as if the bible wasn't crystal clear that like love and service of neighbor is the fruit of grace right yeah that's you know trees produce fruit christians

produce good works it's it's uh it just it's just what happens it's uh it's not as if it's some some great you have to conceive some great plan or scheme for pulling this off it just it's it's uh it's just the way the christian life works if you're a christian you're doing good works period yeah and if you want and if you want people to love and serve one another if you use the tree metaphor which is what the bible uses quite often uh the the reign of grace is much better at producing fruit than the acts of the law just that just is the case hey that that's a that's a good tweet it's very tweetable it's what the law is man it's a ministry of death it's it's there to cut you down

uh yeah i understand maybe some people maybe you might be like well the law will prune you back a little bit and that'll help maybe uh but ultimately that thing's gonna have to be watered that's that's gonna be uh forgiveness and grace that does that yeah there's a lot more water and sunshine than chainsaws yeah indeed all right continuing on all right continuing on so that puts us through 36 verse 7 and then beginning from this point through the rest of 36 to the rest of 37 and through most of 38 and 39 we have a description of what we've already heard beginning back in chapter 25 so it starts for instance in 36 verse 8 we're talking about the curtains of the tabernacle that were that were made and then it goes on to talk about the boards

which provided kind of the structure of the tent as well as the the walls that were surrounding the whole tabernacle court area then it moves to the veils like you know you got a veil before the the entrance of the court itself you got another veil before the the the tent uh the holy of holies the entrance into the tent and then of course you have the the most well-known veil between the holy place and the holy of holies and then it goes from there to describe the furnishings inside the holy place the ark the table of showbread the table of incense and the the golden lampstand the menorah you've got that all talked about in 37 38 goes on outside of the tent itself and moves to the courtyard to describe the altar and this wash basin made out of bronze that's between the

tabernacle and the altar, and then the court itself, how it's made. And then at the end of 38, there's this summation of a lot of the metal that was contributed to make the tabernacle, the gold and the silver and the bronze. We have very detailed descriptions of exactly how much was offered by the people to make this in you know measurements like shekels and talents and things of that nature so that's through the end of 38 39 is talking about the uh divestments of the priest at least half of 39 is talking about the vestments of the of the priests which again we've we've already covered what they're made out of the precious stones that are in the breastplate of Aaron. And then it finishes it out with the description of that golden plate

that went across the forehead of Aaron that had the words holy to Yahweh inscribed on it. And so that's the way this whole section goes. It's not the exact same order as we saw earlier with the instructions given to Moses, when Moses was first told about the tabernacle, God started with the most important parts, like the Ark of the Covenant. When it's described in these chapters, it's kind of a more practical approach. So you've got the tent itself made, and then you talk about what goes inside the tent. But more or less, it's a description of exactly what they were able to accomplish with the material that was given to them so uh i think in what like five minutes i've covered three chapters that is a record i just like to just like to note that that is the first

time that has ever occurred after a hundred and however many episodes of 40 minutes in the old testament that's pretty good that's only because let's pause for a minute while i pat myself on the back yeah well we'll see what happens years and years and years from now uh when we get through like first and second kings and then we like and then we're like hitting first and second chronicles that'll probably be pretty quick like and we just covered all this yeah go back and listen to episodes uh 1554 and 1555 we talked about that there yeah so so we are now if you're if you're keeping track of this we are now almost at the end of 39 and keep in mind there's only 40 chapters in the book. So here's what happens in the last chapter and a half.

One of the main things that we're going to see is that Moses is going to use language that sounds very familiar to us. It's sometimes an allusion, sometimes almost a direct quote from some of the very first episodes of 40 minutes in the old testament way back in genesis 1 and 2 i've mentioned this more than once but i'm going to kind of bring some of it together as we talk about this last chapter and a half of how the whole description of the tabernacle is patterned after the creation account very not only in the language that's used but also the structure of the the retelling of how the tabernacle was was made so i'll get to that in just a minute but here's let me kind of quickly summarize what what happens in this last last chapter and a half

so beginning with verse 32 of chapter 39 it says that all the work of the tabernacle of the tent of meeting was completed. And it says that the Israelites did everything just as the Lord had commanded Moses. That becomes also a refrain that we hear throughout these chapters, that everything was made exactly as God had commanded Moses, so that the people were not just kind of coming up with something on their own. They weren't being creative. They weren't interjecting their own ideas or opinions into this. This was all made according to the instructions that God had given to Moses. And of course that makes sense because this is God's house. You know, if, if, uh, if my wife and I are going to build a home and we meet with the architect

and say, we're going to build a four bedroom home and it's, uh, you know, gonna have, uh, this size kitchen and this size family room and maybe a study and all of this. So we meet with the architect. We we plan out with him in great detail what we want it to look like. And the patterns drawn up, the blueprints, everything like that. Well, that's what once the construction begins. Of course, that is exactly what we want to happen. We don't want the architect to come in and say, you know what, I'm going to make this a three bedroom home and it won't be a study. and it's going to be a really small kitchen, but a huge, huge family room. No, it's not up to him. It's up to those who will inhabit the house. It's up to me and my wife. Well, it's kind of like that

here with God. He gives the blueprint. He is the architect. He spells out in detail what he wants his home to look like, to be like, how many rooms, dimensions, decorations, everything. and it's up to the people to build it exactly as god had commanded because every single aspect of god's home is important important not not just because it's it's his but important because in one way or another every aspect of his home tells us something about him and it tells us something about how he interacts with his people, because ultimately God's home is really not so much for him as it is for his visitors, for his guests, for his family, because this is going to be a home where he meets his people. It's a very social, the tabernacle is a very social home,

very social house, because God is always inviting people in and they're doing this or they're doing that in order that God might have this kind of ongoing interaction with his family, with the Israelites. So that's one of the key themes that you see in this closing part of Exodus, is that they made everything just the way God told them to make it. So part of that is spelled out in the in the last part of 39 and it wraps up the closing verse of chapter 39 is this moses saw all the work and behold they had done it just as the lord had commanded this they had done so moses blessed them we're going to come back to that verse in a minute but uh to kind of keep that language in mind but that's the way the chapter ends then chapter 40 the final chapter

takes us through the kind of the setting up of everything. And this happens, the opening verse or the opening, the second verse tells us this all happens on the first day of the first month. So this is the beginning of the year. This is not January 1st, but the beginning of the year for the Israelites, first day, first month, everything is going to be set up.

And so they do, and it goes on in the next few verses describe how everything is uh is erected they put the ark in there they set up the veil the tent everything like that and then they take anointing oil beginning with verse nine and this anointing oil is put over basically everything it goes on the tabernacle it goes on the furnishings it goes on the the altar and then after everything has been anointed then they get aaron and his sons who are going to be the priest and they they anoint them they wash them they put on their holy their holy garments their vestments and then they they anoint aaron and then they anoint his his sons so that they will serve as the as the priests there so everything is set up on the first

day on the first month and then verse 17 through 33 goes through once more we have this we have this repetition, that they did everything just as the Lord had commanded Moses. In fact, seven times we have the exact same phrase, that they did this just as the Lord had commanded Moses, and then they did that just as the Lord had commanded Moses. So that takes us through verse 33. And then at the end, the closing section, 34 through 38, describes what happens after everything is set up after everything is anointed after sacrifices are offered then god comes into his home then the cloud of god covers the tent the glory of the lord fills the tent and that becomes his abode in israel so that's kind of a a really quick overview of what

what's coming up in this last chapter and a half now what i want what i want to do is back up just little bit and uh and kind of summarize as much as i can how this particular structure is is patterned after what happens genesis 1 and 2 and then and why it is because that's the that's the big question why why would so much of the tabernacle language be taking us back to Genesis 1, 1 and 2. And there's two or three things that I want to focus on. One is that you see over and over this pattern of seven. So I don't remember if we talked about this when we covered Genesis 1 or not,

but you've got patterns of seven all over the first chapter of Genesis. To begin with, the very first verse of the Bible, The opening words are seven in number. There's seven words in Genesis 1, verse 7, Hebrew words in Genesis 1, verse 1. And then, of course, you've got seven times God says that what he had done is good or very good. So seven words in the opening verse, seven times God says it's good or very good. and of course then you have seven days in in the week which culminates on the sabbath day so all that is genesis one got four different aspects of the sevenness of the creation account well

that's exactly what you see in the tabernacle creation account as as well so to begin with the instructions on how to build the tabernacle begins on the seventh day and then these instructions which take us from chapter 35 through 31 are comprised of seven speeches that god gives to moses about how to make this and the seventh speech culminates in a discussion of the sabbath so you have the you have the same kind of pattern going on here you got sevens all over genesis one you have sevens all over the last few chapters of last few chapters of Genesis. So that's one of the ways that you can see what happens in creation is being replicated in the making of the tabernacle. But then you've also got, you've got these echoes

of scriptural verses between these two. Just let me give you a couple of illustrations. So Genesis 1 verse 31 says, God saw everything that he had made and behold, it was very good. now genesis 39 i mean exodus 39 which we just read a few minutes ago said that moses saw all the work and behold they had done it this saw everything that he had made and saw all the work and behold all of that is almost verbatim uh in the hebrew then genesis 2 back to genesis 2 back to creation it says thus the heavens and the earth were finished Then back to Exodus 39, it says all the work of the tabernacle of the tent of meeting was finished. And then jumping back to Genesis 2, it said God blessed the seventh day.

And then in Exodus 39, after the tabernacle was made, it said God blessed them, the Israelites. So you've got you've got all of these parallels that go on between Genesis and Exodus, between the making of the making of the heavens and the earth and in the making of the tabernacle. Well, the question is why? Everything that I've read in the commentaries and a very, very scholarly literature basically agrees that what Moses does in his description of the tabernacle is meant to take us back to Genesis. wanted to. Well, why is that? Well, the simple answer is this, because in the midst of a fallen world where everything is not as it should be, in the midst of sin and brokenness and pollution and guilt and shame and everything else, in a world that lost the original Eden, that lost paradise, that lost this pure and perfect relationship with God, in the midst of a world

like that, along comes the tabernacle that is like a new Eden for the Israelites. So they are able to come to the tabernacle, to come to God, into a place that is very much like a new creation, because it's here in the tabernacle where God dwells, where he has his blood and sacrifices and the giving of holiness and purity. It's there that God is constantly reconstituting his people, recreating them, making them to be the way that he wants them to be, basically restoring them to the created humans that he wants them to be. no longer filled with pollution and sin but but purified and forgiven uh those who are at at one

with with the god who who loves them who created them and who now has has restored them so that's why long description but that's why i think that's so important because the tabernacle then becomes the place of an ongoing eden where god dwells among his his people and at the same time then it becomes the preview of what god is going to do in the in the true new creation that we have in christ because all of this all of this is is designed is purposely designed to point toward its fulfillment in in in the word becoming flesh in the incarnation in the new tabernacle in the new temple in christ who makes us all new creations in himself so you have this you have this journey from creation to the tabernacle to the incarnation and every step along the way is

god working to make us or remake us into the people that he that he wants us to be and the tabernacle is one more illustration of that desire yeah i've been talking way too long no no it's good that's good the uh i think it's interesting that just like in eden as well he he sets people in it to tend to it. Eden is not sort of this thing where man is just kind of roaming around

wondering what he's going to do. He's just worshipping God all day long. That's not how it works. Man is set in the garden to tend it. That's what he's doing. That's why it's a garden.

Even in Eden, gardens need tending. which tells you that having something to do is a good thing that work even in the work was part of the original plan it's difficult

and broken now it doesn't work for us thorns and thistles now but then it was a very good thing tending the garden was a blessing not part of the curse and so in the tabernacle as it

mirrors Eden it's not as though God says build this place and then just you know leave it there I'll chill out in there and then you know you guys can come be in my presence every once in a while but puts people in there to tend

to what God has created and I think that that also tells us something about the ultimate new creation that there will be some of that going on too that we'll have things to do and they'll be good things

uh they're not not not burdensome things not uh not not things that we don't desire to do but that work it's what it's one of the things that i i think that sometimes our depictions of eden uh or even heaven uh are like what like what do you do you know it sounds kind of boring you know am i really just gonna be like on my face for like ever uh because i mean i'm sure god's pretty glorious but that sounds like eventually you know eventually it's gonna get pretty old uh and and the answer to that is no i think you have lots to do i think that they're like i think i'm really looking forward to work being uh redeemed uh so that we're able to do the things that we are that we are meant to do uh in ways that actually work yeah absolutely that's

I think that's probably one of the main misconceptions that people have of what the afterlife is going to be like. That either we're just laying around on clouds or on our face worshiping God. This is a new creation. It's a new heavens and a new earth. And we're going to be there not as souls, but as people who are perfected in body, resurrected bodies. and so we're gonna be doing things with our bodies we're gonna be playing we're gonna be working we're gonna be eating and drinking and doing all those things that are part of being a creature uh part of having flesh and blood resurrected and glorified flesh and blood but

flesh and blood never nonetheless yeah well it's yeah it's part of being made in the image of god i mean god is not a god who doesn't do god does yeah he's he's constantly working he's a so we who are his image uh mirror that yeah but work work is part of uh purposeful work work with uh a reason behind it a good reason is part of what it means to be made in the image of god god by virtue of making us did something uh and and then we are created and we do things It's part of the reason why, kind of going back to even talking about doing good works. What is good works? It's good work.

That's what it is. That's what good works are. They're work that is good. And part of the new creation, even that we have now, of being new creatures, baptized into Christ and a new creation is born. part of that new creation that redeemed creation it does just it does because it's what it's part of what it was what what it's made for it's part of what is um it's innate in it uh it's part of what it means to be like god is to do and so the question is never i wonder if i wonder if uh what god created will do well if he created it he creates things to do uh he creates everything

that he's created uh will will work for for good and uh and so that you don't have to wonder if uh well i mean i've been baptized into christ and now i'm a new creation i i wonder if i'll just sit around and not do anything no you no it's not that's not how that works uh they're they're adam uh adam did uh like god did uh that's that's how it goes yeah so we uh we can look forward to we can look forward to uh to the resurrection with uh knowing that on our on our best days in this life but a faint image of the goodness that we're going to enjoy there and part of that goodness will be activity labor blessed blessed and enjoyable labor yeah i think i think that's why you feel um i mean sometimes it's very elusive because the world is broken

but everyone knows what that feeling is like when you do and this doesn't have to do with even necessarily doing what most people would consider good things. I'm not talking about feeding the hungry or something like that, which obviously are good things. But even when you do something that would seem somewhat mundane, when you finish something that you set out to do, when you feel like you've done a good job, there is what I would consider a holy sense of accomplishment that's not wrong.

uh there there is a sense of completion to something that is good and right uh and and that that feeling is fairly elusive to us i think i don't think we i don't think we experience that as much as we're meant to because uh we fail at doing things well so often but uh every once in a while you you do something that is halfway decent and you complete it and and you do feel good about it you're like i i set out to do this thing uh i it would maybe it was difficult maybe it was hard and the harder it was the more sense of accomplishment you have afterwards and you say that's that's good i don't know if you say writing books difficult process and but when you finish it there is this sense of oh i did something i i made something i created something

i think that just all gets amped up in the new creation that like that you'll have things to do That sense of accomplishment, that sense of fulfilling something, doing something, completing something is something that I think that we'll experience a whole lot. And I think that's a good thing. Yeah, it is. Absolutely. It gives a foretaste of what is to come. We're sneaking up on our time allotment here. Let me wrap up with a description of what takes place at the very end. so uh verse 34 says then the cloud covered the tent of meeting and the glory of the lord filled the tabernacle we've seen this exact same thing happen on mount sinai

the cloud comes down and the glory of the lord is there so just like the the tabernacle is a place of new creation so it's also going to be a a portable sinai uh this place of revelation this place where the word of god where the word of god is given the the glory that fills it is so intense that moses can't even can't even enter the tabernacle and it says throughout their journeys when the cloud came up from the tabernacle the israelites would would take off they would they would follow where god led them and then when it was was on the tabernacle that's that's where they stayed. It was a cloud by day and a fire in it by night. And so the tabernacle became the abode of God, his house, his place, sort of almost you could think of it as his body, if you will,

in a metaphorical sort of way. This is where they knew he had located himself, just like he would eventually, in reality, become flesh, become a body and tabernacle among us in in christ and ultimately that's what all of exodus is is pointing us toward is the the messiah fulfilling everything that is sketched out for us here so he is the he is the color of which this is the black and white prototype so that's uh that's the end of exodus hope uh hope everybody's enjoyed it dude that is that is it and i'll tell you what i think that leviticus is going to be quite the adventure it will yeah yeah hang on to your hang on to your hats because uh leviticus might be more than you uh than you uh than you initially bargained for yeah yeah uh it'll be it'll be

interesting for me and you to get out of narrative for a little while and uh one time i did a bible study on leviticus it turned out that it was a really a bible study on leviticus and hebrews so i'm guessing that i'm guessing that dairy i don't know but uh we'll see but i'm guessing that as we journey through leviticus that we will be in the new testament more than average yeah yeah yeah we're gonna be we're gonna be working that bible back and forth uh flipping between these to quite quite a bit uh i mean i i hope everyone's uh gonna enjoy it as much as i'm as i am i'm looking forward to that it is it is indeed one of the most uh uh christ saturated books of the old testament and i'll hopefully i'll be able to demonstrate that as we as we work right through

it all right well chad thanks for hanging out thanks for working your way through two books you bet it's been fun looking forward to more yeah over the course of the last couple years guys. Hope you join us for Leviticus. That'll be next week. So until then, we'll see you later.