Sermon Tone Analysis
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While on the mountain we call “Sinai”, the Lord spoke with Moses—instructing Him for forty days and forty nights.
It was on the mountain of God that God gave to Moses instructions for the tabernacle (the tent of meeting) the place where God’s people would worship and offer sacrifices to Him.
The instructions for the tabernacle itself, instructions for the contents of the tabernacle, instructions for the happenings inside the tabernacle make up chapters 25-31 of Exodus.
Exodus 35-40 detail the carrying-out of those instructions.
So the instructions for and execution of the tabernacle make up the majority of the last half of the book.
At first blush, the second half of Exodus is no where near as exciting or memorable as the first.
But let’s just look and see what we see...
If you have your Bible (and I hope you do) go ahead and open to Exodus 25.
And look with me as we take a really quick glance at these chapters:
Exodus 25-31, 35-40
13 full chapters of instructions and execution of the Lord commands.
That’s a lot of ink spilled and parchment used-up for what seems to be interior design and architecture and wardrobe.
But it’s more than that—it’s so much more than that.
This is a hint of Eden.
This is God Dwelling with His People
Do you have any idea how huge, how consequential, how miraculous, how gracious, how incredible, how merciful, how mind-blowing this is?
God dwelling with His people…whew!
This is His intention.
He’s not giving them instruction after instruction after instruction, detail after detail after detail for funsies.
He’s doing it for a purpose.
He’s instructing them and giving them these specific details because He, the Lord, Yahweh, the Creator of the Universe, the Almighty, the Eternal One is going to come and dwell among them.
This is, for the Israelite, the most incredible thing since sliced manna.
God is going to dwell with them in this place because He desires to.
This is God Dwelling with His People
In your own life, you know the value of being present or having those you love present.
“Absence makes the heart grow fonder” might be true, but presence is better by far.
My dad served in the United States Air Force and then in the Air National Guard for years—almost all my growing-up years (from 1974-1977 and then again from 1981-1999).
As such, he’d be gone one weekend a month and then for a few weeks every year; and on top of that throw-in a few 6-week trainings and a few deployments.
We got along okay while Dad was gone; my mom is SuperMom and was fully capable.
But, boy, did we miss Dad while he was away.
It just wasn’t the same.
And it always seemed like something catastrophic happened in his absence.
The toilet would break, the hot water heater would explode, the water line to the house would bust, the fridge would go out—something.
And it’s not that Dad could have done anything about it (Dad is many things, but handy isn’t one of them).
Dad couldn’t have prevented any of that stuff from happening, but his being there would have been a relief.
Dad’s presence would have made a world of difference.
You know what it is to be separated from family or loved ones.
They move across the country or are sent to the other side of the world.
They travel for their job and are home over the weekend (maybe).
You know what it is to be busy, to catch one another coming and going.
It feels like you hardly see one another because, well, you hardly see one another.
You miss them and long for them to be present, to have them around, to be near to them.
When a family is grieving the loss of a loved one, I often have people ask me: “What do I do?
What do I say?”
“There’s probably no need to say anything,” I suggest.
“If you say anything, say, ‘I’m so sorry, I love you, and I praying for you’ and leave it at that.”
And, I believe the most powerful thing you can do in those moments is simply to be there.
Be present.
Sit with them.
The Jewish people get this much right.
They call it ‘sitting shiva’.
They take a dish and then sit with the family.
It’s about being present.
Just be there.
There is something unbelievably powerful about presence.
Here in these chapters, we observe the awesome presence of God.
God graciously chose to dwell with His people.
He was deeply involved and invested in the lives of His people.
They don’t have to wonder where He is.
His presence brought reassurance and holy reverence.
God’s presence with Israel set them apart from all other nations; the Almighty God dwelt among them.
The Lord Yaweh, present with them.
>Why then are there so many specific instructions?
Couldn’t the Lord have simply said: “Hey, I’m gonna come crash on your couch for a while” or “Set aside a tent for me, would ya?”
So why all the specifics?
And, boy, does it get specific:
specific offerings to be given
specific and exacting directions
specific length, specific width, specific height
specific overlayment
specific decor
specific materials
specific numbers
specific colors
specific, well, everything
The Lord is incredibly specific, almost unbelievably specific.
For instance:
The Lord is the author of the first assembly instruction manual.
It all reads like that; the Lord has very specific instructions.
He wants them to build it and make it exactly like the pattern He has shown Moses.
Why so specific?
The specifics emphasize that Israel is to worship the Lord according to His Word.
The specifics teach Israel how to relate to the Holy Lord who is in their midst.
We—the Church—as His people today, must worship the Lord according to His Word (the Bible).
The Bible is our guide.
We worship accordingly.
We worship in spirit and in truth:
We devote ourselves to certain practices:
We conduct an orderly worship service:
We are to sing a variety of songs:
We worship Him because His Word tells us to; the lengthiest book in the Bible is a songbook.
We worship the Lord according to His Word because we, like the Israelites, are acutely aware of His presence with us.
We worship Him specifically and with great thoughtfulness.
We don’t approach this time flippantly or haphazardly.
It’s not an unplanned or un-thought-out event.
We worship according to His Word; we do Bible things in Bible ways (to the best of our understanding).
The tabernacle was where the Lord would meet with His people and the place where the priests would do their work.
Get the picture in your mind: God is with His people and the priests are making sacrifices and atonement for the people.
Ultimately, the tabernacle should cause us to ask:
How can a Holy God dwell among sinful people?
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