40 Minutes In The Old Testament - Episode 92 (Exodus 25:10-22)

Episode Date: August 16, 2017

Get ready for the Ark of the Covenant! Chad Bird and Daniel Emery Price talk a lot about the construction of the Ark and what God is pointing to in it. They then discuss the theme of exile and return in the Bible and end with some thoughts on the Bread of the Presence. Check it out!

welcome to another episode of 40 minutes in the old testament i'm daniel emery price joined by chad bird chad how's it going it's good it's good i know people don't realize this but it's been a couple weeks since we've uh recorded i know well i was sick and then you were sick and there's a whole thing man i know i know not a good couple weeks but uh we're back on our feet again and uh exodus is still here waiting on us yeah man yeah you know um we we were figuring it out and you know we're going to be doing a live podcast from uh the here we still stand conference in san diego in october which by the way you should go to if you're listening to this uh go over to here we still stand.org see the lineup it includes me and chad we'll be there podcasting

talking the whole thing uh and if you want to go you can get 10 off by put uh typing in the code 4-0-O-T in the checkout box. Get 10% off. But we will be recording episode 100 of this podcast at the

conference. So that's... Centennial episode. How can you miss it? You gotta come out for that. Episode 100. Me and Chad will be there. We're going to be joined by Eric Sorensen who does 30 Minutes in the New Testament with me. We're going to do an episode, so you could be there for episode 100 live

and then listen to a bunch of other people who know a whole bunch of more stuff than me and Chad about a whole bunch of other things. It's going to be a great time, a bunch of food, a bunch of fellowship, a bunch of partying, and it's going to be good. October 19th through 21st, you should come. We'd love to hang out with you. Chad, where did we leave off? Do you even remember?

I think so. I think we're about at verse 10 of chapter 25 of Exodus, if I recall correctly. I didn't take any notes last time as to where we wrapped up, but I'm pretty sure that's it. We started this long section, I do know that, where we're talking about all of the instructions that God gave to Moses when he was on Mount Sinai for those 40 days about the construction of the tabernacle. And not just the tabernacle, but all of the various furnishings

that go inside and outside the tabernacle. And we introduced it. We talked about those first seven verses where they're gathering together all the materials they'll need. And then we spent a few minutes talking about verses eight and nine, which are sort of a preface, if you will,

to the rest of it, where God tells Moses he's to make everything according to the pattern that is shown to him on the mountain. So that's where we left off. So we'll pick up here at verse 10 today. Does that sound right to you? I believe that is correct. I was just actually looking at it, and that's exactly right. So congratulations.

Hey, I still have a little bit of memory left. All right, so verse 10 is the beginning of many sections in these next two or three chapters, where we have very specific instructions given about how the various articles of furniture, the overall construction of the tabernacle is to take place, what it's supposed to look like, the kind of materials that all of these various furnishings are to be made out of. So we begin, quite appropriately, we begin really at the very heart and center of the tabernacle itself, and that is with the Ark of the Covenant. So I'm sure you have in your mind a picture of what the tabernacle was like, But let me just kind of briefly remind you of that if it's maybe a little bit fuzzy or maybe you've never actually looked at this very closely. So you've really got what you might think of as three different spheres or circles, if you will, in the tabernacle itself.

And these are like concentric circles of holiness. so the the farther out the circle is the less holy it is and then as you get closer it gets holier and then when you get to the very center that's where you have the most holiest place so you you kind of you have to picture uh kind of like the ripples on a pond when you throw a rock in there these these ripples going out of these concentric circles going out where the the center is the holiest place and then on the periphery it's still holy but it's not as holy as the center So in the very center, you have what's called the Holy of Holies or the Most Holy Place. And this is God's inner sanctum, his special throne room.

And it kind of depends on how you count. Some people might say there's one piece of furniture in there. Some people might say there's two. But if it's one, you picture it as the Ark of the Covenant, which we'll talk about in a minute. with the uh with the atonement cover over over the top of it so you can kind of picture that as one piece of furniture although you can also picture those as two different articles where you have the ark of the covenant itself which is nothing but a chest and then you've got this golden cover that that goes over the top of it the uh the atonement cover the caporet it's called

which we will talk about in this section as well. So depending on how you want to count that. But anyway, that's the only thing that's in the Holy of Holies. And that's the holiest place. And it's the holiest place for one reason and one reason only, because that is where the presence of God locates himself. He's on top of the Ark of the Covenant, on top of the Atomic Covenant, or the Mercy Seat, as we sometimes call it.

and because he is there that is the holiest place and that's as a kind of parentheses here that's important because that means that holiness holiness is not just kind of a theoretical concept holiness has to do with location and presence the divine presence so wherever god has specifically put himself that place is holy it's holy not because of any kind of innate quality of the surroundings or any any innate quality of the the material that might be there like the gold of the of the mercy seat no it's holy because that's where god is so holiness is determined by the presence of god that's extremely significant for our understanding of why we're holy and why places are holy and uh why there's spheres of holiness within the tabernacle so anyway you got the you

got the the innermost circle being the holy place where god is and then out from there you have the next circle and this is in the tabernacle construction that's the holy place uh this is still inside the tent of the tabernacle but it's a different room so you got the inner room the holy of holies and then you have the outer room and in the outer room you have three different articles of furniture which we'll get to in these chapters as well you've got a table for certain sacred bread called the bread of the presence and then directly in front of directly in front of the veil that separates the two rooms the holy place from the most holy place you've got a uh a little altar where incense is burned and where prayers are offered and then you've got a third article

of furniture in there you've got the uh the the lamp stand or the the candelabra as we as we sometimes call it the seven the seven candle uh candelabra so that's the that's the the next sphere of holiness and it's a holy place but it's not most holy place because it's adjacent to the most holy place so we've moved down little ways and as we have the as we have a different space now we have a different level of holiness and then we finally go out from there to what you usually call the courtyard and out here you've got a wash basin for the priest you've got the altar the the big altar where the sacrifices are made so these are the kind of the three different spheres of of the tabernacle three different spaces within the tabernacle itself

so you can't just think of the tabernacle means just tent that's all it's just a fancy word for tent but you can't think of just the tent because you got the whole area around it that's also part of the the broader tabernacle structure so if you can kind of get that in your in your head if you have a if you have a bible a study bible in particular there's usually a picture they depict the the tabernacle in some way you can check that out and kind of get it in your head i think that would be helpful as we're talking about all the stuff that goes in there that goes in the tabernacle itself and in the area around it that way you can kind of locate it in your own mind as to as to where it is so we're starting here then with this innermost circle with the holy

most holy place or the or the holy of holies and like i said earlier you got you got in there the ark of the covenant now i will say at the beginning when you hear ark i've had this asked several times in bible classes i've taught you know is the word ark here for ark of the covenant the same word like noah's ark and the answer is no it's it's it's not it's a different i don't know why they chose the same english word it really should be like the chest of the covenant or something like that but uh uh anyway it's that's the way we translate it but it's a completely different word from the ark of noah so you can't really make any kind of hebrew connections there between these two everyone knows the difference noah's ark is a big huge boat and ark of the

covenant is in raiders of the lost ark that's different yeah it is true that no matter how hard i try when i think ark of the covenant that's the only thing i see i know i know it's the uh the indiana jones method of biblical interpretation that's all i see i'm like i know exactly what that looks like don't i've seen the movie don't even bother explaining i know exactly what it looks like and i know what happens if you open it in fact i don't even know what we're talking about exodus because if you've seen the ten commandments you know everything that happens right charlton heston has already explained everything to us all all you need to to interpret the book of exodus is to see the ten commandments and raiders of the lost ark and

you're good to go yeah all we're doing here is just you know filling in the the blanks that's all you got the big story already in it from hollywood yeah so uh uh you you probably have an image of the Ark of the Covenant in your head from the Raiders of the Lost Ark? It's pretty small, actually. In Hebrew, they measure things by what are called cubits, which of course

is not the way that we measure things today, but a cubit was basically the distance from your elbow to the tip of your finger. Which I know is kind of a crazy way to measure things, because Dan

is very tall has very long arms and so a cubit for dan would not quite be the same as a cubit for most of us that's right but uh that's why he's so good at basketball but the uh the standard measurement that's usually ascribed to a cubit is 18 inches so the arc is two and a half cubits long it's one and a half cubits wide and it's one and a half cubits high so something like you know 45 inches by 27 by 27. I kind of picture a very tall cedar chest if you have a cedar chest.

It's kind of like that, but it's taller than that. It's about the same length. It's not some massive huge piece of furniture. It's pretty small. It's overlaid with gold. It's got these

four rings in it that they put these poles into in order that the ark could be carried because you know as you know this isn't the ark i mean the the tabernacle is not a permanent structure they moved they didn't like move every day they'd have to take down the tabernacle and move every day but when uh when they moved they had to take everything down and they had to carry everything that went with them and so you would have priests that carry the ark of the covenant and that's what these poles facilitated were uh was for uh the transportation of the ark and he had these rings in there that the poles would would go through

so you've got uh you got the ark of the covenant or the chest of the covenant and the reason it's called the the ark of the covenant is because it becomes the receptacle for the tablets of stone which uh god will put the ten commandments on and those so those stones are placed inside the the ark of the covenant now later on there's a couple of other items that are added as well there's a dark manna and there's also uh later on we have a story of aaron's staff or his rod which sprout even though it's a dead piece of wood it sprouts these these blossoms and so aaron's rod is placed inside the ark of the covenant as well that's that's later on but right now it's called the ark of the covenant because these these tablets of stone which are the the icons of the

covenant if you will they are emblematic of this this pact that yahweh has made with israel they are placed inside there and then that is placed in god's throne room so you you basically are putting if you want to think of it in secular terms this would be like keeping the uh the treaty that's been signed between a king and somebody else, like in the king's own bedchamber, something like that. So you have this pack that's kept in this very special place, God's special room, inside the Ark of the Covenant. Then, over the top of that, you have what we usually think of as the mercy seat.

That's the standard translation of that. But it's kaporet in Hebrew, which is from the verb kapar, which is usually translated as cover or atone. So a lot of times you'll see it, you'll hear it referenced as the atonement, the atonement cover or the place of atonement or also even something like the place of propitiation. But this isn't just like a flat gold plate. it's it's the plate that has attached to it two two angels a cherubim to be exact there's one on each end and they face each other and there's a space between them and their wings are stretched out toward toward the center and of course between the wings there's nothing but empty space but at least that you can see but this empty space is actually the throne of Yahweh

so it's it's a very of course different kind of throne it's not an actual seat but the space between the wings of the cherubim on top of the mercy seat that is where Yahweh is enthroned not symbolically enthroned it's not like you gotta pretend he's there he's that's that's where he has placed himself that's his that's his throne that's the place from which he reigns you have this language all over the psalms about god dwelling between the cherubim or enthroned upon and thrown upon the cherubim tape that ark of the covenant with the mercy seat on top of it and the cherubim that all together functions as the throne of the throne of yahweh inside the the holy of holies yeah can we just talk about i don't know this might seem really obvious but i

don't want to uh miss it uh in case it's not but uh i do think it's pretty awesome that you do have the first thing in there and where the ark gets its name is uh you know the ten commandments will go into into the ark but that mercy is sort of placed the mercy seat is placed over the top of the law uh and that's and that's where god dwells um they didn't make it to where like there was some um emblem of mercy that they stuck in there and then they put the law on top and that's where god dwelled no they they put the covenant in there and then the mercy seat is over the top that and god sort of dwells over that and the law while being holy and right and and good still is the standard that we are judged by.

It's still the thing that we end up comparing ourselves to and coming up short and finding ourselves lacking. And I'm reminded of what James says when he says that the mercy triumphs over judgment, right? And you have God sort of displaying this from early, early on as he sort of places his mercy over top uh of where the where the law is and you were saying like the place of propitiation even um that this that that god knows that this is his law that man is not going to be able to keep it

and he places mercy on top of it and places himself on top of it um as the dispenser of that mercy is pretty uh pretty it's a striking image that i don't know if everyone thinks about it when they hear that um it seems it seems fairly obvious right there but uh don't want to assume no i and i think uh that is a perfect illustration of the whole purpose of of the tabernacle it's uh in one way or another every single aspect of the tabernacle is a it is a prototype of the work of christ and it's certainly the certainly the mercy seat is in fact i'm i'm looking here in uh in paul's letter to the romans chapter three and uh he says uh in verse verse 23 he says as this verse that probably most of us know by heart that all have sinned and fall short of

the glory of god but then he goes on so everybody's sin everybody's fallen short of the glory of god being justified as a gift by his grace through the redemption which is in christ jesus so he goes from uh you know universal depravity everybody's sin nobody you know nobody is nobody gets out from underneath this they've all sinned but they're justified as a gift by god's grace through the redeeming work of christ jesus and then he goes on this is verse 25 whom so he's talking about christ whom god displayed publicly as a propitiation in his blood so when uh when paul uses that particular word there what he's talking about is the the greek word that's used there is the word for the propitiation cover for the mercy seat for the the atonement cover

so this is this is paul talking about our sinfulness talking about the justification we have in christ and then pointing to christ as the mercy seat so he is the one who covers the law he's the one whose blood atones for our sins he's the one who has provided the redemption that we need and that only and that only he can give and this ties in beautifully with the one of the uh the functions of the mercy seat itself and that is it wasn't just there they just hold up the cherubim but once a year in the fall on the day called yom kippur which is the day of atonement the priest the high priest would enter into the holy of holies and he would sprinkle blood on the mercy seat and sprinkle blood on this on this seat of atonement

on this this covering literally that was over the uh over the ark of the covenant as a way in which all of israel's sins were were atoned for and so you have this bloody base this bloody cover that is god's throne being the source from which we have redemption and forgiveness and cleansing for Israel. And this, Paul says, is what Christ is. Because Christ, as the book of Hebrews will tell us, has entered into the Holy of Holies in heaven itself. There he has provided redemption for all of us. So you have kind of this combination of images. You have Christ as the priest entering into the Holy of Holies, but when he goes into the Holy of Holies, he becomes the atonement cover so he is the one who is sprinkled with his own blood so that we might have redemption

and and forgiveness of sins in him yeah it's it's striking that paul you know says that you can uh approach that boldly because that wasn't something that they did before that's for certain uh there wasn't there wasn't just like yeah anyone just walk right up in here you know uh that's not that's not how that worked uh but because of what was coming and what all of this stuff points to which is ultimately christ that in christ we we approach god with with confidence with boldness that we can walk we walk right in um we can go and talk to him and and go to where he at where he is i mean uh i mean we'll get there and the bread of the presence and stuff but i mean And when you think about the way, so that you do it in a boldness doesn't necessitate irreverence by any means, but it does denote confidence.

And so every baptized believer in Christ approaches where God is with confidence that Christ has made that way. So if you are at church and you go to approach God's table where God is residing under the forms of bread and wine, you don't have to tremble and shake or anything like that. You can walk right up because of what Christ has done. He has made that possible for you to walk up as someone who is endowed with his righteousness, and you have nothing to worry about. Yeah, I think it's difficult for us as people that, of course, never experienced the life of an average Israelite to appreciate just the amazing newness that Hebrews talks about when it discusses coming into God's presence with boldness. Because, of course, none of us grew up with a temple or a tabernacle, and just seeing the priest work around it, that's something that's not part of our psyche. But for the earliest Christians, when they would have read something like the book of Hebrews, where he talks about going into the Holy of Holies with boldness and confidence, I mean, that would have turned everything upside down for them. I mean, it's really just an amazing, an amazing new way that's been open for them that before was just inconceivable.

I mean, no one ever dreamed of this. And yet, not only is it now possible, he says, but you can do it with boldness and confidence, enter into that holy of holies. I mean, it wasn't even like any priest could go in there. Only the high priest, and only once a year did he go inside the Holy of Holies. Yeah, you better do it right. And you've got to do it right, exactly. Yeah, it's not in the Bible, but in rabbinic literature, there's stories of them tying a rope to the leg of the high priest

in case something went wrong inside there, so they drag him out because nobody wanted to go in to get him. So, yeah, you've got to do it right. You've got to do it only once a year on the right day. You've got to make sure you have blood with you. you got to just be the high priest but now because of because of christ every believer because they are in christ have that boldness and confidence to walk right into the presence of the father because uh the fear is gone there's no fear of being destroyed there's no fear of not

being holy enough there's no fear of maybe not doing something exactly the right way because the way has been opened by by him he's done all the work for us he's paid the price for us and he has invited us in so that we might uh be right in the presence of our of our father yeah i mean that that that is also hard for us to wrap our mind around you know what a stumbling block that would be to to the jews uh when you got some people being like oh yeah like uh yeah anyone can just enter the presence of god and uh yeah i mean you'd be a gentile uncircumcised and enter the presence of i mean that's just i mean that's a massive stumbling block for them i mean the the idea that not just a priest but like anybody and by anybody yeah i mean like any

buddy uh jew gentile circumcised uncircumcised has access to the very presence of god is just it's a dramatic shift from everything that they had going on yeah it would have been a jaw-dropping literally a jaw-dropping moment for for any jew to hear hear something like this probably their their first reaction would have just been this incredulous there's i know absolutely no way it's impossible so it would have taken a while for that to sink in because it was so radically contrary to everything that they had experienced so far.

But that's what we have in Christ, because he's the mercy seat, the bloody mercy seat who has opened up for us the way into the most holy place. So that's the holy of holies,

and that's what you find inside there. Now, this particular section wraps up with God saying, there, this is verse 22, there I will meet with you. That is talking about on top of the ark. There I will meet with you. And from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim, which are upon the ark of the testimony, I will speak to you about all that I will give you in commandment for the sons of Israel. So the ark is the place where God meets with moses and the ark is the place from which god speaks speaks to him so this is his meeting

place his speaking place his throne the uh the the the place from which uh in which god is going to dwell in the midst of his people and i will i will say this i think i mentioned it before but uh just to to affirm it once more keep in mind that all of this will be taking place in the very center of the israelite camp that's another thing that i that i think is uh there's really indicative of the the willingness of god to always be where his people are that he doesn't say i want you to make a tabernacle on the highest mountain that you can find so that it's basically impossible for almost everybody to get there instead god comes down where his people are he says hey i want you to make a tent i'm going to be in the tent and i want the tent my tent

to be exactly in the center of the israelite camp so just like don says the word became flesh and and tabernacled among us well even in the old testament the word didn't become flesh but the word came down and tabernacled in the midst of the people of israel he wasn't outside the camp He wasn't on a mountaintop. Rather, he was right in the heart of the Israelite camp. So even in the Old Testament, we have this this clear indication of God's willingness to always be where his people are. Later in the book of Ezekiel, for instance, we'll see God even going into exile with his people. Kind of an ironic thing, because God sends them into exile because of their sin. But at the same time, God says, I will go with you into exile as well.

So the mercy and the grace and really what you might call the humility, the lowliness of God is evidenced in his willingness to live right in the midst of his people. Well, he is a God who exiles himself, condemns himself, passes judgment on himself for the sake of others, right? So even this speaks to ultimately what this is going to be all about, you know. Yeah. When you think about God in exile, exiling himself or going with his people into exile because of their sin, I mean, you can't help but think about, I mean, I can't help but think about it anyway. you know christ in his in his cry to to the father you know my god my god why have you forsaken me sort of being cast out uh being um taking on the sin of the world and then bearing the punishment uh and exile from god uh you know temporarily of course but uh that's that's what all of that all

of that stuff is pointing to is that like yeah ultimately like i i go you sin and then i go to where your sin, I go with you in your sin, and in the cross you have him taking the sin and going alone and not exiling his people, but instead of bearing the judgment on himself and himself alone. Yeah, yeah, exactly. I think that we can do ourselves a lot of good by thinking about the crucifixion in terms of exile more than we do.

I mean, I know it's there, but the exiled nature of the cross really opens up a much broader and more Old Testament understanding of what's going on there. The exiled and willing exile of God himself so that he might bear our sins away from us and bring us back to the Father. Yeah, I had a prof once who basically said that if you take the whole Bible leading up to, especially the Old Testament, but even leading up, even the cross itself, the whole thing is about exile and return over and over and over again. Yeah, I mean, if you look at the parable of the prodigal son, the parable of the prodigal son is about exile and return. Right, I mean, that's what Christianity is, right? Yeah. That's what the cross is. I mean, the cross and the resurrection are exile and return.

Yeah, it is. I mean, it is the theme. We saw it way back with Abraham and Sarah exiled to Egypt and they come home. We see it here in the book of Exodus, Isaiah. Well, basically, all of the major prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, as well as many of the other prophets and in the Psalms itself, When the salvation of the Messiah is discussed, inevitably the exile becomes an image that's used by them. So they will go to a faraway country, but God will bring them back. That's how the work of the Messiah is prophesied, as another exile.

And then, of course, on the Mount of Transfiguration in Luke's gospel, Moses and Elijah and Jesus are talking about his exodus, which he is about to accomplish in Jerusalem, his exile. So, yeah, I mean, I fully agree with your prof who said exile and return is what it's all about because there's not a book in the Bible that in some way doesn't connect with that theme. Yeah, one thing that's cool is even when you have Paul talk about the proclamation of the gospel in Romans, he uses this quote where he says, you know, how beautiful are the feet of those who preach good news, right? Talking about those who would go and proclaim the gospel. And it's a weird statement if you don't know where he's pulling it from. You're like, what does that mean? What do you mean beautiful feet on people who preach the gospel and proclaim liberation and deliverance? Well, he's pulling this from – this is what the people of Israel said of those who came and proclaimed to them that the Babylonian captivity was over, that the exile was done.

And so the gospel itself is that. I mean it's the proclamation that the captivity and exile are over. It's done. Yeah, that's a great point. Yeah. Here you have people suffering in the shadow of death, in captivity, in darkness. And then these people show up saying, hey, it's over. Right? Yeah. I mean, the exile is over. The punishment's over. The darkness is over. God has done everything necessary to bring you home in Christ. So yeah, I mean, that's basically what preachers do, right? Yeah, the people basically say, blessed are your feet for traveling here to tell us this good news. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, there's no, hey, they don't show up. Listen, I've got five things here, and if you'll do them, your exile will be over. I mean, it's all you've got to do, these five things. No. They show up, listen, it's done. It's finished. I mean, it's been completed.

The exile is over. Yeah, it's almost like, hey, why are you guys still here? this is done yeah what are you guys doing here there's like a party going on back in the holy land there's a feast as much meat eat meat as you can eat much wine as you can drink so come on let's party get out of get out of babylon and come home to israel yeah well let's see we got uh we got a couple minutes left uh so why don't i uh quickly summarize uh the show bread we can come back to it if you want to that's the next section you've got uh so we move into the next room which is usually called the holy place and uh on one side of of this room it's situated

the tabernacle is always set up in such a way that the the uh the entrance to the tabernacle faces east so on the north side of the holy place of this room you have what's called the table of show bread and it's it's nothing more than a golden table uh with rings on it and poles that you can so you can carry it for for transporting it from place to place but what's important about this table is that it has this special bread that's placed upon it uh it's changed out every sabbath day it's uh usually translated as showbread or bread of the presence literally it's bread of the face because when when hebrew talks about presence it uses a very literal image it uses face so like if i'm face to face with someone i'm in their presence so this is called the bread

of the presence literally the bread of the face because this bread is directly in the presence of God. And because of that, it is what's called most holy. That is to say, it's bread that not only is holy, but it actually communicates holiness to those who consume it. So you've got things that are holy, but they can't transfer holiness. And then you have things that are most holy that can transfer holiness. And it's bread is most holy. So every Sabbath, the priest would come into the the holy place and they would consume these 12 loaves of unleavened bread this bread of the presence and by doing that they would be filled with the holiness of god so the bread was infused if you will with this with the sanctity of yahweh and by consuming this bread

the priests were then filled with the holiness of of god himself uh we'll probably have to pick that up a little bit more next week because we're out of time but i want you to think about the bread of the presence in connection with the lord's supper and uh and the remarkable connection that we have there between this old testament bread of the presence which communicates holiness and then the bread of the lord's supper which communicates the holiness of christ to us trying to tell me that god decided to be present with bread in the old testament yeah this is actually the beginning of the real presence that uh that sometimes people talk about right yeah he's really present in this bread really giving his holiness to those who consume it there's no

symbolism involved here this is the real this is the real deal yeah well we will have to save that for next week because we're out of time and i definitely chad and i'm sure you do too have thoughts uh about that so hey guys thanks for joining us uh come hang out with us in san diego here we still stand out or go check it out we'd love to hang out with you hopefully we'll see you there chad we'll see you next week all right we'll see you then dan thanks