Tabernacle: God's Traveling Salvation Show

The Word for today:
Exodus 25

mark this: Exodus 25:8-9
Then have them make a sanctuary for me, and I will dwell among them. Make this tabernacle and all its furnishings exactly like the pattern I will show you.


Many of you know my disdain for the traditional Old Testament/New Testament division of the Bible. The Holy Spirit never drew that line. Those un-inspired titles have done more harm to biblical understanding than anything else I can think of.

If we must subdivide, here's the basic structure of the Bible:
Show (pictures of Jesus to come) -- from Genesis to Malachi
Jesus (Immanuel, God-with-us) -- from Matthew to John
Tell    (what Jesus means to us) -- from Acts to Revelation

The so-called Old Testament introduces the children of Israel to their Messiah in picture language (so the kids can understand.)

The Law of Moses, for example, is a picture of Jesus' life:
"Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them."  (Matthew 5:17)

The sacrificial system (the heart of the Mosaic Law) is a picture of Jesus' sacrificial death:
"Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!"  (John 1:29)

The tabernacle is a picture of the gospel, the Good News of our ongoing salvation. The best, most literal translation of John 1:14 is "The Word became flesh and tabernacled among us." (Amplified Bible)

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When I was a kid, I made a diorama in a shoebox. If you looked through the little "door" cut out of one end, it appeared as if you were entering an Indian village. That's what they were teaching in the fourth grade.

And to think that someone might have helped me make a diorama of the tabernacle, and thereby introduced me to Jesus the way God introduced him to Israel. But someone didn't.

If you don't know how the gospel unfolds and salvation proceeds over the course of our lives, then I'm inviting you to come along as we mentally reconstruct the tabernacle and learn what all the furnishings mean.

It wouldn't hurt any of us, even the most biblically advanced, to get a real shoebox and some construction paper, crayons, scissors, and glue. The tabernacle is a superlative gospel review. In fact, there is no better picture of the person and work of Jesus Christ.

The tabernacle is God's Traveling Salvation Show, so while you're looking for a shoebox, look around for a fourth grader. The show is always more fun if you take someone along.

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