Help with the Tabernacle
Alright, with as on fire as I was yesterday, I will say that
this passage has me a little underwhelmed.
So, let’s see what we can drag out of this passage today.
Good old Warren Wiersbe comes through again! Wiersbe asks the question in his commentary
on this section: How does the command from God about including the images of
the cherubim within the tabernacle coverings mesh with the command against
making graven images found in Exodus 20?
God does tell us to not make images, yet here we have God telling the
Hebrews to make images with cherubim and other things on them.
Ultimately, I think this is a good question to ponder at
some depth. What this question really
brings us to think about is: what is more important – the action or the
motivation behind the action. Clearly
there is nothing wrong with the Hebrew people having images of cherubim as a
part of the tabernacle or else God wouldn’t have directed them to do it. So then the real issue with images as a part
of worship is the motivation behind them, not their presence. We are not to make graven images for the
point of worshipping them!
Graven Images
So what does that mean?
Is it okay to wear a cross (or some other holy image) as a reminder to
worship God even though it is a “graven image?”
Absolutely. Is it okay to treat
that cross in such a way as if I worship it – for example, thinking of it as a
lucky cross or thinking that my day will go better just because I am wearing
it? Absolutely not! The cross can certainly be worn as a reminder
for me to worship God as well as to help other people identify that I am a
Christian. But when it goes beyond that
and becomes something that has “power” in my life such as a lucky charm or a talisman,
then I have transgressed in sin.
To bring this back to the passage, suppose the Hebrew people
started worshipping the cherubim images woven into the tabernacle curtains. That clearly would be wrong. But the fault wouldn’t be in the fact that
there were images there, the fault would lie in the fact that the people
approached the images with an incorrect intention. Rather than the images reminding them to
worship God, they would have begun to worship the images themselves.
Now keep in mind the very fine theological hair that I am
splitting. One of the reasons many
followers of God do not have images is that it inherently prevents the worship
of them. I am certainly not condemning
that practice. If we are prone to
worshipping the wrong things, then it makes sense that we take those things
about which we are prone to getting into trouble and just get rid of them.
But just because we might choose to do so doesn’t mean we
should look down upon someone who can have an image and use it properly – such
as we see God instructing the Hebrew people here in Exodus regarding the
tabernacle. Again, for me it goes back
to the intent of the action being more important than the action. Another way of stating this theologically is
Joel 2:13 where Joel says “Rend your hearts, not your garments.”
The Dual Nature of the Tabernacle
To completely shift gears, here’s another interesting
thought to ponder about the tabernacle. Remember,
this tabernacle is something that would move through the lifespan of the
Hebrews. The tabernacle was made of
precious metals (gold, silver, etc) as well as wood. We know precious metals are largely permanent. Gold is gold and barring some nuclear
reaction it will always be gold. Wood,
on the other hand, is much more prone to deterioration over time. So here we have a single construct (the
tabernacle) made of both temporary and permanent parts. In some respects, sounds a bit like the dual
natures of Christ (human and divine).
The tabernacle can easily be seen as a symbolic representation of what
Jesus Christ literally is.
We must be a little careful about this, however. The tabernacle could always be split apart
into its permanent and temporary parts.
The gold and silver can be easily identified as can the wood. This is not so with Jesus Christ. We cannot – and should not – try to separate
Jesus’ humanity from his divinity.
Whereas the tabernacle was one thing made up of two elements, Jesus is
one thing representing the perfect fusion of two elements in order to create a
completely huge new singular element.
This is important, because people often try to speak of
Jesus as having two-natures so that they can separate them. This is just not the case and should be
avoided. So while we can see the
tabernacle as a symbol of Jesus Christ – we must also be aware of the limits
and pitfalls of such an analogy.
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