Exodus (Lesson 49)

Welcome to the Preaching the Cross Radio Podcast, featuring the radio ministry of Pastor James W.

Knox of the Bible Baptist Church of Delane, Florida.

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Now here's your host, Pastor James W.

Knox.

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We are studying the Bible book of Exodus, verse by verse, and we've made our way all the way up to the 26th chapter.

We're in the middle of a number of chapters which are discussing the pattern for the and instructions for the building of the tabernacle, that curtain-like structure, a tent-like structure, where God met with the children of Israel during Old Testament times.

And we've been looking at all of these details that seem on their surface to be a bit dull and tedious.

We're just being honest about it.

And yet we have seen that in so very many ways these things stand as just about everything in the Bible does, stand as types and shadows and pictures of our wonderful Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and draw our hearts and minds to his person and thus to his glory.

And we hope that'll be the case again on the program today.

In Exodus 26, the matter of the curtains, we'll just read that together and then have some more comments to make about these materials that are making up this tabernacle.

Verse 20, our chapter 26, verse 1 says, Moreover, thou shalt make the tabernacle with ten curtains of fine twined linen, and blue, and purple, and scarlet.

We talked about those colors last time.

With cherubims of cunning work shalt thou make them.

The length of one curtain shall be eight and twenty cubits, and the breadth of one curtain four cubits, and every one of the curtains shall have one measure.

The five curtains shall be coupled together one to another, and other five curtains shall be coupled one to another, and thou shalt make loops of blue upon the edge of the one curtain from the selvage in the coupling, and likewise shalt thou make in the uttermost edge of another curtain in the coupling of the second fifty loops.

Shalt thou make in the one curtain and fifty loops, shalt thou make in the edge of the curtain that is in the coupling of the second, that the loops may take hold one of another.

I wonder if there's another radio program being aired anywhere today that's reading these verses.

Just wondering, stay with us.

It's all the Bible, it's all God's word, and thou shalt make fifty tatches of gold.

Tatches, that's things which attach, and couple the curtains together with the tatches, and it shall be one tabernacle.

And thou shalt make curtains of goat's hair to be a covering upon the tabernacle.

Eleven curtains shalt thou make.

The length of one curtain shall be thirty cubits, and the breadth of one curtain four cubits, and the eleven curtains shall be all of one measure, and thou shalt couple five curtains by themselves, and six curtains by themselves, and shalt double the sixth curtain in the forefront of the tabernacle.

And thou shalt make fifty loops on the edge of the one curtain that is outmost in the coupling, and fifty loops in the edge of the curtain which couple with the second, and thou shalt make fifty tatches of brass, and put the tatches into the loops, and couple the tent together, that it may be one.

Come on, just a couple more verses, stay with us.

And the remnant that remaineth in the curtains of the tent, the half curtain that remaineth shall hang over the back side of the tabernacle, and a cubit on the one side, and a cubit on the other side, of that which remaineth in the length of the curtains of the tent, it shall hang over the sides of the tabernacle on this side, and on that side to cover it, and thou shalt make a covering for the tent of ram's skins dyed red, and a covering above of badger's skins.

Now, there are a number of lessons to be taken from these verses, whether we recognize it immediately or not.

First of all, there is the lesson to be learned about our spiritual appetite and apprehension.

Every one of us is lacking when it comes to spiritual understanding and spiritual desire.

I admit to you that I find the verses in my Bible about Jesus performing miracles far more stimulating than the verses we just read.

That speaks to my lack of perception.

I admit to you that the portions of God's word, oh, the Psalms and their beautiful praises to God, the Proverbs and the exquisite wisdom of God, Job and the trials of God's people, I admit to you that I get quite a bit more out of those parts of the Bible than I do the part we just read.

But I'm not proud of that.

There's something wrong with me.

There is something wrong with us.

Every word of God is pure, every word of God is precious.

God didn't waste any words.

There's no filler or fluff in the Bible.

And so let us admit, first of all, that we have a long, long way to go in our spiritual life until we reach the place when we can see the full wonder and beauty of everything that God has placed within His Word.

Secondly, the second lesson from these verses.

I find it fascinating that most of the problems in our lives puzzle us.

We suddenly wake up in the middle of a situation or a circumstance and wonder, how did this happen?

How did I get here?

What steps led me to this place?

And the reason we are so often confused is because we have failed to listen carefully and to heed carefully those portions of God's word which did not immediately stimulate our interest.

Have you ever noticed when giving instructions to children that it is a waste of time to give most children more than one bit of instruction at a time?

If you tell them to do three things, if they listened to you as you told them the first of the three things, they didn't hear the next two.

If they heard them, it was not with full attention, and you can almost be certain that if they set about to do what I asked them to do, or do what you instructed them to do, they they they will probably get the first one right and either leave the next two untouched or uh so mangle the job as to make it uh just as worthless as if they'd never done it.

People don't pay attention, they don't listen carefully.

How many times has someone been angered or upset because of what they thought they heard someone say because they didn't listen all the way through with care and attention?

Now, how many times in my life, how many times in your life, come on, brother, sister, be honest about it.

How many times in our lives have we gotten ourselves into some difficulty, brought upon ourselves some problem or trouble, because we just didn't think what God had to say was important enough to merit our undivided careful attention.

And so when we come to these latter chapters or the chapters in this second half of Exodus, there's a tendency on the part of every one of us to race through them as though they are not important.

And what we what we've done is we have said, because they are not interesting, they are not important.

And that's a fatal flaw in our thinking.

It's all God's word, and and we'll see when we get to the last chapter of Exodus how important these touches and the hanging of these curtains and these loops really are.

Though at this point they seem unimportant, insignificant.

It seems as though we could get away with ignoring these parts of the Bible, and that that would be a terrible mistake.

Now, another thing we notice about this material with regard to these curtains, there are fifty of them, fifty touches, and there are eleven curtains, there are five here and six there.

And yet, and yet, the Bible says of all these different materials, the fine twine linen, the dye and coloring, the goat skins, the loops, the tatches, the edges, the couplings.

The Bible says, listen now, verse six, it shall be one.

Verse eleven, that it may be one.

God is all about taking many different, diverse parts, and uniting them into a whole that will be in its entirety beautiful, functional, and something that brings honor and glory to Him.

He takes many members and makes one body, the church.

He takes many people and saves them all and makes them into a family.

This is the way of God.

God is not about individuality, God is about unity.

There is one Lord, that's Jesus Christ, and all the rest of us are to bow before Him, put our faith and trust in Him, allow Him to unite us together to bring Him pleasure.

And then one more thing we ought to notice these rams' skins are dyed red.

I suspect, I don't have a verse for it, but I suspect, I it looks to me as though this would be a wonderful way to remind the people of the ram caught in the thicket in Genesis chapter 23.

Genesis 23 · chapter mention

Do you remember that?

Abraham's on the mountain with Isaac.

Here's the wood, here's the fire, here's the knife.

But where, my father, is the sacrifice?

Abraham said to Isaac, God shall provide himself a lamb.

And it turned out that lamb was a full grown lamb that had grown to be a ram, caught in a thicket by its horns, and that animal was pulled out, offered in sacrifice in the stead of Isaac.

And what a picture that is of our Lord Jesus Christ offered in our place.

And so, and so that the ram's skins were dyed red.

Now, let's talk about some more of these materials.

The fine linen.

This is the second use of this word in Scripture.

The first time it was Genesis 41, 42, arrayed him in fine linen, referring to the clothing of Joseph.

It is used of Egyptian white linen of exceptional quality.

It represents the pure.

Now, not that's that's Joseph's clothes.

We're not using Egyptian fine linen on the tabernacle, no way.

But it represents the pure, spotless, righteous person of the Lord Jesus, particularly as seen in his humanity.

Notice or recall, either one, in Revelation 19, 8.

Fine linen is the attire of saints, and it's referred to as the righteousness of the saints.

In the tabernacle, however, it's not the saints but the Lord who is in view.

And the fine linen we'll see was used in making the veil and the door and the gate and the hangings of the court.

It was, therefore, a very prominent feature in the structure.

It was also in the ephod of the high priest and the garments of the priests.

And what about this goat's hair?

This hairy garment was the attire of prophets, according to Zechariah 13, verses 4 and 5.

Zechariah 13:4

When King Ahaziah lay dying and sent messengers to inquire the God of Ekron as to whether he would recover, they met the prophet Elijah.

And that was never a good thing if you weren't right with God.

And Elijah was bearing the message that the king would die.

On their return, the king inquired, What manner of man was he which came up to meet you?

And they responded, He was an hairy man, man clothed in hairy garment.

And the king knew it was Elijah the Tishbite.

2 Kings 1:7, his dress was enough to identify him.

2 Kings 1:7

John the Baptist also said he was clothed in a raiment of camel's hair and a leather girdle around his loins in Matthew 3.4.

The Lord Jesus was a prophet indeed.

He was the prophet like unto Moses, of whom Moses spoke in Deuteronomy 18.

Eleven curtains of woven's goat hair were made, and these formed one of the coverings of the tabernacle, speaking of Jesus Christ in his prophetic ministry, the fine linen speaking of the purity of his life, and the goat's hair speaking of the prophet's voice with which he did speak.

Then these ram skins dyed red.

Unlike the curtains of fine linen and goat's hair, there's no size recorded for these.

They formed a part of the covering of the tabernacle.

At the consecration of the priests, two rams were brought.

Both of them were slain, and one of them burnt upon the altar.

We'll see that when we get to chapter 29.

The blood of the other was placed upon the tip of the right ear, and the thumb of the right hand, and the great toe of the right foot of Aaron, and each of his sons.

The ram was called the ram of the consecration.

In chapter 29, verse 27, and the redness of the skins emphasized consecration to death.

Christ was obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.

So that one who is righteous and pure, that one who was the prophet like unto Moses, he died a bloody death to pay for man's sins.

We're going to read in just a little bit on down in the chapter about badger's skins.

Again, no size recorded for these.

The badger's skins formed the outside covering of the tabernacle and signified the Lord Jesus Christ as he is seen by the world.

Isaiah, as we have mentioned, writes that there was no beauty that we should desire him.

Jesus' beauty was not the kind that was attracted to the flesh.

The priests saw all the beauty of the tabernacle as they worked inside.

The high priest saw the beauty of the holiest of all on the inside.

But outside, outside, well, not much to look at.

Don't be deceived, don't be fooled by the outside.

Jesus didn't come to be looked at.

He didn't come so you could paint his picture.

He didn't come so you could make a statue of him.

He came to manifest the heart of God.

He came to declare the mind of God.

He came to fulfill the will of God.

It's the person of Jesus Christ you need to trust, not a portrait of Jesus Christ.

By the way, the commentators, the commentators, this is amazing.

Almost every one of them will tell you that badger skins is wrong.

Your Bible's wrong.

It shouldn't say badger skin because there weren't many badgers in the desert wilderness of Sinai.

Actually, these skins were those of the bottlenezed dolphin.

I couldn't make that up.

Let me see if I got this right.

I'm in a desert.

I'm in a wilderness.

I have already read in the book of Exodus that one of the problems faced by The children of Israel in the wilderness is they didn't have any water.

And men are going to tell me the Bible is wrong because there aren't a lot of badger skins in these desert places, not a lot of badgers.

So it must have been bottleneced dolphins.

You mean the kind that crawl in the sand?

You mean the kind that swim in the rocks?

What?

You know, when when you start attacking the Bible, it's like God just reaches in and pulls some of your brains out every time you do it.

I'd leave the Bible alone.

Then there's this shit'em wood.

This tree was found in the wilderness and flourished in conditions that were hostile.

Mature trees of this variety, while retaining a full head of foliage and beautifying the desert plain with fragrant yellow flowers, bear the appearance of having survived adverse and hostile growing conditions.

This wood was used in the construction of the ark, as we read, in the staves, the golden altar and its staves, the table of showbread and its staves, the brazen altar and its staves, the boards and their bars, the pillars for the door, the veil, the gate, and the pillars which form the outer court.

This wood was chosen because it was incorruptible.

It didn't rot like other woods rotted.

And how this represents the incorruptible, sinless humanity and person of the Lord Jesus.

Later we read about the light.

Let's go ahead while we're dealing with these materials.

Oil for the light.

This was made by the people and used in the lampstand, we read about that, candlestick, which stood in the holy place.

This oil was replenished morning and evening, for the light had always to be burning.

It was never to go out.

This oil, therefore, was not used in the construction of the tabernacle, but in its daily functioning.

The spices used for the anointing of the tabernacle before it began to function, and for the anointing of the priests, consisted of a mixture of myrrh and cinnamon, sweet calamus, cassia, olive oil, and these blended spices and the sweet aroma, the pleasant aroma they would give off, of course, signifies the Lord Jesus Christ.

We're going to read in just a little while about the sweet incense.

This was used in the holy place morning and evening, at the time when the lampstand was being replenished and cleaned.

It was placed in a censer with coals from the brazen altar, which was then put on the golden altar of incense.

In this way the holy place was always filled with sweet incense.

It was also brought in a golden censer into the holiest of all.

When the high priest entered on the day of atonement, this incense consisted of a mixture of stacti, oncha, galbanum, and frankincense.

As with anointing oil, the sweet incense signifies the sweet and pleasant fragrance of the life of the Lord Jesus.

Twelve precious stones would be carried on the breastplate of the high priest, each stone representing one of the twelve tribes of Israel, and they were carried not on his foot to be walked on, not on a crown of his head so they could rule over him, but on the breastplate of the high priest, showing nearness to his heart, and how the Lord Jesus Christ takes those of us that were dead in trespasses and sins and makes us lively stones, carries us next to his heart.

Praise the Lord.

Now, just to read forward in chapter twenty six, verse fifteen, we got a few minutes remaining.

And thou shalt make boards for the tabernacle of Shittimwood standing up.

Ten cubits shall be the length of the board, and a cubit and a half shall be the breadth of one board.

Two tenons shall there be in one board set in order, one against another, thus shalt thou make all for all the boards of the tabernacle, and thou shalt make the boards for the tabernacle, twenty boards on the south side southward, and thou shalt make forty sockets of silver under the twenty boards, two sockets under one board, and uh for his two tenons, and two sockets under another board for his two tenons, and for the second side of the tabernacle on the north side there shall be twenty boards, and their forty sockets of silver, two sockets under one board, two sockets under another board, and so forth.

Taken from nature and fit for God's house, a picture of salvation.

These silver sockets were made out of ransom money.

We'll read about it in Exodus 30.

So we are held in his building by the redemption of Jesus Christ.

Look at it, these boards living out there in the wilderness, they are brought in, they are formed and fashioned, they are placed in the service of God, they are put in the place where God is worshipped, and they are held there by these silver sockets because what keeps one in God's family, what keeps one in God's house, what keeps one in God's service, it is the redemption that is ours in Jesus Christ.

You see, all the Bible, all the Bible is about our Savior.

Oh, it might be telling how he saved us, it might be telling how we should worship and adore him, it might be showing some picture of his goodness, some picture of his strength, some picture of his rejection, but whatever, whatever the case may be, this holy Bible points to our holy Savior and fills our hearts with joy and gladness as we consider this name that is above every name, this one that is above all others, our precious Lord Jesus Christ.

Do you know him?

Have you trusted him?

I hope so.

He's the only way to heaven.

He's the only hope you have of eternal life.

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