Year 7, Day 75: Exodus 26

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I’ve often thought about the tabernacle and its construction.  It’s made out of wood, linen, and cording.  Remember that this was built in the wilderness.  This tabernacle and its implements essentially was outside in the elements 24 hours a day.  It knew the sun.  It knew the wind.  It knew the sandstorms.  It occasionally knew rain, certainly more when the people actually go into the Promised Land.  It knew the process of being torn down, moved, and set back up.  This is a building that took a great deal of beating.

In this light, I’ve often thought about how it lasted.  After all, we have homes and shingles and siding to protect our more delicate implements from the weather.  But the tabernacle did not.  It took the brunt of what mother nature has to offer.  How did it possibly survive?

To answer that thought, I actually think about the Mongols quite often.  Here are a group of people that even in the modern world still live in yurts.  They live in houses made up of wooden frames, animal skins, and fabric.  Their domiciles can be constructed and deconstructed quickly.  Yet, they last a good while, even in the harsh environment of Mongolia.  Certainly, they need repair from time to time – as I am sure that the Tabernacle needed periodic repair.  It’s not unreasonable to think of a building such as God describes in the passage as being realistic in a world with little shelter.

Where am I going with all of this?  I may surprise you.  Keep reading.

What I’m getting at in all of this is that there are some things in the tabernacle that are temporary.  The acacia frame and the fabric would wear out eventually.  On the other hand, there were some things that wouldn’t wear out.  These things are the altar and the more important implements of worship.  The tabernacle had elements that would wear out mixed with elements that wouldn’t.

There is a really neat parallel that we can make here with respect to Christ.  The tabernacle was the place where the sacrificial system came into its own.  The tabernacle was the place where the Hebrew people dealt with sin and its forgiveness.  The tabernacle was made of permanent and temporary parts.  There is a certain foreshadowing to Christ that we can see here.  Christ is the place where our sin is ultimately dealt with.  Yet, Christ had both temporary and permanent elements.  He came as a human being in flesh that would die, much like certain parts of the tabernacle would wear out.  Yet, Christ embodied the Spirit of God, which would certainly never wear out, much like the altar of the tabernacle.  Christ was a mixing of the immutable and the temporary.  We see this in the foreshadowing of the tabernacle.

Not only do we see this, but we live it out as well.  We are certainly human.  Our flesh does wear out.  We get tired; we get old.  But we also have the Spirit of God dwelling within us.  That will never wear out; neither will the work that God is doing within us.

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