Tabernacle

April 8, 2024

The Old and the New

Hebrews 9.1-14

The old and the new. The copies and shadows vs. the Substance. Paul said it before, but may we never get tired of hearing it…we have such a High Priest.

All that the OT anticipated…all that the sacrifices looked forward to…the pictures and the symbols. All of it. Is now fulfilled in Jesus. What the blood of bulls and goats could never fully accomplish, Jesus did. They covered sin for a time. He took it away for all time. They worked for the cleansing of the flesh. He provided the way for the cleansing of the conscience. Theirs was external. His internal. There’s was a knockoff. He’s the real thing.

Jesus entered into the greater and more perfect tabernacle, the holy place, not of this creation, once for all, offering His own blood, obtaining eternal salvation, cleansing the conscience of those who believe from dead works to serve the living God. Jesus is greater…

If you haven’t trusted in Jesus yet, please make today the day. It’s as simple as recognizing that you are a sinner in need of a Savior. Believing that Jesus is the Savior that God promised. He lived a perfect life. He died a sacrificial death on your behalf and was raised the third day conquering both sin and death, so that by faith in Jesus you can have forgiveness of sins, eternal life and a clean conscience.

pro rege

This post is based on a sermon from our Hebrews series. Download the podcast at: Central Christian Church Main Service, or follow us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, X or Threads: @ccclancaster. You can also download our Central Christian app in the iTunes App Store.

February 26, 2014

Thoughts About What We’re Reading…

Is the Tabernacle Boring?

Here in our reading, in Exodus 25, God declares His desire to dwell in the midst of His people and gives them instructions on how to build His sanctuary – the Tabernacle.

The dwelling of God in the midst of His people is a significant biblical theme.

Way back in the garden of Eden, we are told God walked through the garden in the “cool of the day”. Creation was the sanctuary in which God dwelt with Adam and Eve.

The tabernacle, like the garden of Eden, here in Exodus is where God dwells, and various details of the tabernacle suggest it is a mini-Eden. These parallels include the east-facing entrance guarded by cherubim, the tree of life (lampstand), and the tree of knowledge (the law).

The tabernacle is a tented, mobile palace, so to speak, for Israel’s divine King.

Solomon in 1 Kings 6 builds the Temple as a more permanent structure for God’s dwelling.  But when the people forsake God He forsakes the Temple and it is destroyed by the Babylonians.

Although rebuilt by King Herod, the Temple system in the days of Jesus was far from glorifying God. We read about this in the Gospels as Jesus speaks out against the Temple system and its leaders.

All seems lost… until…

We read in John 1:14 that with the coming of Jesus, God had come to dwell – to “tabernacle” among us.

We learn later in John that Jesus’ own body was the temple that would be destroyed and raised.

Thus, Jesus is the resurrected temple, He is the foundation and cornerstone of a new temple – us, the New Testament people of God.  We serve as the dwelling place for God through the Holy Spirit.

This same biblical theme is carried even further in Revelation 21-22, the new earth, the new Jerusalem.  God will be the temple, and we, His people, will have our dwelling in Him.

Thus God’s dwelling in the tabernacle was a step toward the restoration of paradise, (think Eden but better) which is to be completed in the new heaven and earth.

How cool is that?  Maybe reading about the Tabernacle is not so boring after all!

Until next time…keep reading…
Jim