Moreover, thou shalt make the
tabernacle with ten curtains of fine linen and blue and purple
and scarlet and cherubims of cunning work, shalt thou make
them. I want to talk about the tabernacle.
Moreover, thou shalt make the tabernacle. And we've done dealt
with the furniture that was going to be put in the tabernacle.
But the first page is the tabernacle. And a tabernacle has so many
types of our Lord Jesus Christ in it. And when you read about
those curtains, you don't see them unless you
go inside the tabernacle and look up. On the outside, it don't
look that way at all. The tabernacle is one of the
most instructive types in the Bible. give you three meanings and then
try to deal with them. The tabernacle, the first meaning
is this, is a type of visible illustration of that heavenly
place where God dwells. You know, when we talk about
the tabernacle, Hebrews 9 said this was a pattern. Therefore,
the things in heaven was made of a pattern. The pattern here
was a type of the things that was already in heaven. Whatever
happened down here was a type of whatever is going to be in
heaven. Everything in the tabernacle was sprinkled with blood. The
people were spread, the book was, the tabernacle itself was
sprinkled with blood. But this thing in heaven, that
tabernacle in heaven, that pattern of heavenly things, Christ himself,
not like the high priest Moses and sprinkled the people. Our
Lord Jesus Christ appeared in heaven itself in the presence
of God with his own blood. With his own blood. Not the blood
of bulls and goats, with his own blood. And so this pattern,
this down here is just a pattern of what was going to happen up
there. And that's God's dwelling place. And the second thing about
the tabernacle is, is the type of our Lord Jesus Christ. And
He's the meeting place between God and man. He's the meeting
place between God and man. And I tell you, that's the place
where God met man, is at the tabernacle. At the tabernacle. And the third meaning of the
tabernacle is this, a type of the Lord Jesus Christ in the
church. and the communion that we have
with Him because of the tabernacle. And like I said, the first of
these meanings is clearly stated, it was therefore necessary that
the pattern of things in heaven. And God told Moses, look at that
verse 40 of chapter 25. And look thou that maketh them
after the pattern which was shewed thee in the mount. God gave Moses
a pattern for every single thing in the tabernacle. And Christ,
he entered not into that place, the holy place, but just to figure
types of the true, but into heaven itself, into the presence of
God for us. And the tabernacle was a symbol
of God's dwelling. And there's a sanctuary. There was a sanctuary. That's
on the outside. Then there was a holy place.
Then there's a holiest of holies. Well, in this sanctuary, that's
where God met men. And that's where he dwelt. And
so God dwelt there. And it was just a type. It was
just a pattern. What we see here in type is really just a pattern
of the things that's in heaven. Now this is the place where God
met men. This is the place where God dwelt.
This is the place where God communed with His people. The Lord Jesus
Christ communed with His people. Then you imagine what it's going
to be like in glory. you know everything down here
without the shedding of blood nothing no remission of sins
everything sprinkled with blood well Christ appeared not in the
holy place but in the holiest of holies in the presence of
God for us in the presence of God for us
and so when we get there there's going to be a tabernacle and
I'll show you who that's going to be in a little while that's
going to be a dwelling place It is going to be just exactly
like God purposed and planned it. And that's after a pattern. And secondly, not only was it
God's dwelling place, but the tabernacle is the type of the
Lord Jesus Christ himself. Especially while he is here on
the earth during the days of his flesh. As the tabernacle
was God's dwelling place, so God was in Christ. God's dwelling
place there, God was in Christ. Reconciling the world unto Himself. The fullness of the Godhead dwelt
bodily in the Lord Jesus Christ. So God was in Christ while He
was on this earth. And I tell you this, the tabernacle
was not something which originated in the minds of Israel. They
didn't say, well, we need a place to worship God. Let's build us
a bunch of boards and let's get us some badger skins, let's make
us some boards, let's make us some tent, let's figure this
thing out how we want to do it. No, no, no, no. It didn't start
anywhere in man's mind. God got Moses on the mountain,
gave him a pattern, said this is the way I want it done. I
want everything to speak about my blessed son. And so when Christ came down
here, God was in the midst of that and no man ever entered
his mind that God would come down in the blessed person of
his son and dwell among us and that God himself would be in
Christ, saving us. Saving us. And I tell you what,
in fact, you know, God himself said as he prepared that heart,
that pattern, he said, God, our Lord Jesus Christ says thou hast
prepared him a body. What for? For God to dwell in. For God to save us. For God to
meet us. For God to commune with us. And here's the third thing about
this tabernacle. There God met His people. There where they met. You know
that Ark of the Covenant and that mercy seat that was on it.
That's where mercy sat. God said, this is my throne.
He dwelt between them cherubims. And He says, there will I commune
with thee, there I'll meet with you. And the thing about it is,
God was holy, and He could only be approached through a sacrifice.
And our Lord Jesus Christ was that sacrifice by which He was
approached by. And I tell you what, in this
tabernacle was the place where God met with men. And that was
the manifest that God manifested Himself to Israel in order to
bring them into communion with Himself. Let me show you something. Look in Revelation 21 with me.
Revelation 21. I'm going to show you. Man's fellowship with God was
through sacrifices and offerings and men coming. And all the tabernacle
of God was there for men. For men. For God to meet with
men. But look here in Revelations
21 and verse 3. And I heard a great voice out
of heaven saying, Behold! The tabernacle of God is with
men. And look what else it says about
it. You know this is where we're going to commune with him at.
Meet with him at. The tabernacle of God is with
men and he, he, the tabernacle, our Lord, you will dwell with
them and they shall be his people and God himself shall be with
them and be their God. That's where God go meets at.
That tabernacle. I'll be their God. They're going
to be my people. I'm going to dwell with them.
They're going to dwell with me. That's what it says about the
tabernacle. But the key to the tabernacle
is like the key to all the scriptures. The key to all the scriptures is the Lord Jesus Christ himself. In the whole volume of the book
it is written of me. I delight to do thy will, O God,
I delight to do thy will. And everything about this tabernacle
that we've seen so far talks about the person and work of
our Lord Jesus Christ. And proof of this is mentioned
in this, and you know and you don't have to turn to it, but
this is what we know. John 1.14 says this, the word was made
flesh and that word dwelt among us means tabernacled among us.
God himself came down in his blessed Son and tabernacled among
us. He is talking about the Old Testament
tabernacle. God's tabernacle. God had a place
here. God came down in His blessed
Son. He was manifest in the flesh.
And when you read in the margin, it says dwell with Him. He tabernacled
among us. He was God's tabernacle. The
place where God made man. And I tell you what, and that
all look back to this right here. Let me give you several things
about this tabernacle and our Lord Jesus Christ. First, the
tabernacle was temporary. It was temporary. is temporary. The tabernacle
was just a tent. You look at that thing, it's
just a tent. When you talk about the vow of court, what we're
talking about, we're talking about that tabernacle. That 45 foot
long, 15 foot wide. That tabernacle. When you looked
at that thing, it was just a tent. It was just a tent. His badger
skin stretched over it. And it was temporary structure.
A temporary convenience. Something that could be moved
from place to place during the journeys as the children of Israel.
That's why they had the staves in them. So they could carry
everything. They could take it all apart and move it. They had
men. But that's all they done was
carry this stuff and move it from one place to another and
set it back up again. Well, our Lord Jesus Christ,
when he was on this earth, he was here for just a brief time.
He wasn't here very long at all. He dwelled in his body just a
very short time while he was on this earth. 33 years. And to tell you something
about our Lord Jesus Christ, he never stayed in one place.
He went from here, He went from Galilee, to Nazareth, to Capernaum,
to Judea. He went everywhere, got on the
sea. Our Lord Jesus Christ like this
tabernacle. I mean, He didn't stay in one
place. He moved where the need was the greatest. You know, He come among sinners.
He went where the need was. And I tell you what, and there
was times that you know he would get up and they'd be ready to
get him and he'd just go away. And one time when he went into
Samaria and he caused those hogs to go into all those, those hogs
to go into that, into that water and drown them
all. They said, Oh, listen, depart
out of our coast. Leave us. He just barely going through
there. He was just, the scripture said He was going through Nain,
just passing through Jericho when He met the widow Nain. He was on a journey when He stopped
at the water at the well. Our Lord Jesus Christ moved about. Bless His holy name. And He was
always, always active in the ministry. Always active. Here's the second thing about
the tabernacle, talking about our Lord Jesus Christ. The tabernacle
was for use only in the wilderness. Only in the wilderness. When
they got in Canaan, they didn't use the tabernacle anymore. They
say it might have been 40 years. I don't know, 35, 36 years, what
it might have been. And I tell you what, during the
time of their pilgrimage, they were still in the wilderness,
you know, and they built that tabernacle, a place to meet with
God and God to meet with them. And the wilderness, the wilderness
was where our blessed Lord Jesus Christ came into. What man, if
you have a 99 sheep, if he loses one, what does he do? He goes
into the wilderness to find that one sheep. And I tell you what,
you look at the eternal word, when he tabernacled among men,
I just, he was, he come into the wilderness of sin and corruption
and darkness and death. Come among men. And oh my, and
to show you how what a wilderness it was, he was born and laid
in a manger. What a wilderness. Then raised in Nazareth and raised
to be a working man. One time he said to us, birds
have nest and the foxes have holes, but the son of man has
nowhere to lay his head. That's a wilderness for you.
Oh my, and when he come time to die, he didn't even have a
grave of his own. They had to put him in another
man's grave. That's wilderness. That's wilderness. and the tabernacle was a humble
unattractive had an outward appearance now we get into the inward part
of it but only outside You look at that thing, even on the outer
court, they put tents over everything. They covered everything up with
tents. And they put this tent, we'll get to all this stuff,
but they put this beautiful broadwood work over it. And then they put
badger skin over top, dyed badger skin over top of that. So it's
inside where all the beauty was, but on the outside, it was just
a tent. And when people walked by and
looked at it, They said, man alive, what in the world? There's
no beauty, if that's where God meets men, there's no beauty
about that. It's a tent, old badger skins,
bunch of boards with things stretched over them. There's no beauty
about it, huh? Oh my, wouldn't that people looked
at the tabernacle, there wasn't nothing about the carnal life.
They said, boy, that's a beautiful place. Bunch of boards put together,
staked out, killed a bunch of badgers and
dyed them and tanned them, stretched over it. Oh my. And when our Lord Jesus
Christ was manifest in the flesh, our Lord Jesus Christ was hid
beneath the veil of that flesh. He was in the body. He was in
flesh. And how many people looked at
Him and saw no beauty about Him. Saw no comeliness about Him.
Saw no glory about Him. Saw no preciousness about Him.
Oh my! No form. They beheld with the
unanointed eye. They saw no beauty that they
should desire. But boy, when God gave you sight
of Him, Huh? Oh, David said all night, I want
to see the King in His beauty. And I'm telling you, beloved,
and that's the way it was. When men looked at the Lord Jesus
Christ, they said, well, He's just a carpenter. He's Mary's
son, Joseph's son. There's nothing special about
Him. But to everyone, God gave eyes to see. They said, this
is truly, this, who is he? Who the son of man say I am?
Well, thou art the Christ. You're the son of the living
God. That's who you are. You don't look like the son of
God. You look like Jesus of Nazareth, but thou art the Christ, the
son of the living God. Well, I understand you was born
in Bethlehem. Thou art the Christ, the son
of God. Oh my, you look at him outwardly
and that's the way people see him today. There's lots of folks
that view Christ and see no beauty about him. All the beauty that
they see is in man's power, man's will, man's choice. This is the mean generation.
Got to have some attention, so the preachers and all the churches,
they do everything they can to get men's attention, so they
bring Jesus Christ down to their level. If I can't get you to come up
front, would you at least raise your hand? If you don't want
to raise your hand, will you just bow your head? Just do something. I heard a fellow say one time,
be a lady and be a gentleman for Jesus and stand up for Him.
I tell you what, I want to be somebody that bows down before
Him. Lays on my face before Him. He's
the one with the power. He's the one with the glory.
Let everybody view Him the way they want to. But I see Him in
His glory. See Him in His beauty. See Him
in His power. See Him in His majesty. See Him
on His throne. And one of these days, bless
His holy name, we'll see Him with these eyes and not another. Huh? And fourthly, this tabernacle
was God's dwelling place. God's dwelling place. There,
right in the midst of Israel's camp there, God took up His dwelling
place there. He took up His abode between
the cherubim upon the mercy seat. He made His throne. And in the
holy of holies, He manifested His glorious presence. And for
33 years, 33 years that word tabernacled among
men and God dwelt in one place at that time over in Israel and
I tell you what The type was fulfilled in our
Lord Jesus Christ. This is God's dwelling place.
This is God's abiding place in His blessed Son. And that's the
Shekinah glory. You see that cloud over there?
That's the Shekinah glory of God. He comes down in a great
cloud. And that cloud just glistened.
It just shined. And our Lord Jesus Christ, when
He went up on the Mount of Transfiguration, the scripture said His countenance
changed as glistening as white and bright as the sun. That's
God's Shekinah glory. God, and then the scripture said
a cloud came down. A cloud came down. He said, this
is my Son. This is my Son. hear what he's got to say. And the tabernacle was the place
where God met with man. In fact, it was called the tent
of meeting. If someone desired to draw near
to God Almighty, he had to come to the door of the tabernacle.
And Moses gave him the instructions about everything in that thing,
about all the furniture, and the mercy seat, and the ark,
and everything about it. And here's this lovely type,
our Lord Jesus Christ. There's no... The meeting place
between God and man is in one place. Our Lord Jesus said it
like this. He made it so plain. No man No
man. Moses ain't going to do it. Paul
ain't going to do it. Peter ain't going to do it. Matthew
ain't going to do it. John ain't going to do it. James
ain't going to do it. Nobody's coming to the Father
but by me. You want to speak to my Father,
you've got to go through me. Do you want to talk to the Father?
You've got to talk through me. And if God talks to you, He's
going to talk to you through me. Oh, ain't you grateful that
you know that? I mean, we know the way to go
to meet with God. And here's the thing about it,
God come down so He could meet with us in the person of His
blessed Son. Oh my, God come to meet us? It says come and speak to me. Come and talk to me. Come and
enter my presence. I'm going to tell you how to
do it. See my son? You come to me by him and I'll
accept you. I'll receive you. One mediator between God and
man, the man Christ Jesus. He, as God and as man, he could
span that great gulf between man and God. He's God, he could
reach up and touch God and God would accept him. And as man,
he could reach down and touch man and do something for him
and make him meet in that one blessed place, his blessed son.
Span that great gulf. And let me tell you another thing
about the tabernacle. It was the center of Israel's
camp. It's right in the center. There's 12 tribes of Israel.
And there was three tribes on every side of that tabernacle. Three tribes over here, three
tribes over here, three tribes over there, and three tribes
up here in the front. North, South, East, and West.
Three tribes. And you know what's right in
the middle of all of Israel? The Tabernacle. And I tell you what. They moved
that Tabernacle. It's called the Tabernacle of
Testimony too. And all of Israel encamped round
about the Tabernacle. You can read that in so many
different places. But oh my. And Moses would go
out and he'd tell the people the words of the Lord and gather
the people together and they'd all stand around about the tabernacle. And God would speak to them.
It was the great gathering center. And you know where our gathering
center is now? We've had all of them gather
here tonight. Gathered around one name. Is that not right? We've gathered here about one
name. One person. He's the center. Our Lord Jesus
said wherever two or three are gathered together in my name,
what does he say? I'll be right in the middle of them. I'll be right in the middle
of them. So he's our gathering place. Here's the situation, if we don't
have the gospel, and if we don't have Christ, and we don't preach
Christ, and we don't know Christ, we absolutely have no reason
to meet. But if Christ is why we come, and we all gather around
Him, gather around His name, gather around His person, gather
around His word, gather around who He is, and what He did, and
why He did it, we gather around Him, And bless His holy name. He's the center. Is He not the
center of our thoughts? He's the center of our worship.
He's the center of this blessed book. And everybody gathers around
Him. And when we get to glory, you know who we're going to sing
about and who we're going to gather around? Ten thousand times ten thousand
thousands. And you know everybody that goes
to glory, they only want to go to glory for one reason. To go
be with Him. How many people said, I'm going
to go be with the Lord real soon. And that's what you talk about.
I want to go be with Christ. I'll get to see Christ. That's
what Job said. He said, I'll see Him for myself. I'll see Him for myself. And
we'll get to see him and he's the sinner. He's the sinner. Oh my. Our blessed Savior. Oh, what a precious promise.
Where two or three are gathered together, I'm right in the middle
of it. Here's another thing about the tabernacle. The tabernacle
was the place where sacrifices was made. Where sacrifice was
made. And down the court, when you first come in, there was
a brazen altar. raised an altar made out of brass
and had a grate on the bottom of it and had horns coming out
of it and it was made out of brass so when they come in there
with those sacrifices that brass wouldn't burn it would hold up
it would endure the fire would endure the flame and the fire
would consume that sacrifice oh my there was the blood shed
there the atonement was made And so our Lord Jesus Christ,
you talking about a type of the brazen altar. Oh my. When our Lord Jesus hung on that
cross, the fire of God fell on Him. The fire of His wrath fell
on Him. And that fire was in that, they
kept a fire continually in that brazen altar. Kept a fire. And that fire would consume that
sacrifice. But our Lord Jesus Christ, He's
like that brazen altar. He could endure. He could endure
the fire and the wrath and the justice of God. He could bear
it. He could bear it. And not only
that, but He was the sacrifice. Bound, bound by love, bound by
obedience, bound by the Word of God, bound by His promises
and bound by the covenant of grace. He was bound to that altar.
And instead of the fire consuming Him, He consumed the fire. And there's no more wrath, no
more justice. And our Lord Jesus Christ He
come out from that crucible where that fire was and that justice
was and he come out of there. Got up a third morning and there
he was. Oh my. And that sacrifice, all
of those sacrifices never put away sin. He has put away sin
once and for all. Once and for all. And let me
tell you this, the tabernacle was the place of worship. It
was the place of worship. That was the place that God set
in the middle of them to worship. And to worship. If a person decided
to worship God, he stood outside the door. He stood outside that
tabernacle. And when God spoke, he'd hear
the voice of the Lord. And the priest went in there
and they ministered all their services inside there. And beloved,
if we're going to worship God, There's only one place we can
worship him at. And the scriptures tells us that
we offer spiritual sacrifices unto God. And in Hebrews, let's
look at it together. Let's look at Hebrews chapter
13, 15. I could quote this to you and read it to you, but let's
look at it. You know, we ain't looked at
this in a long time. Hebrews 13, 15. Oh, the worship, the worship,
the worship. Look what he said here in verse
15 now. By Him. By Him. Therefore let us offer and this
is all we can offer like he read tonight praise ye the Lord Let
everything that hath breath praise you the Lord by him therefore
Let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually that
is the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name That's all
we can offer And I tell you what in this through him and by him
that we come to a throne of grace come to a throne of grace. If
a man wanted to worship here from God, we worship in our Lord
Jesus Christ. And here's the last thing about
the tabernacle. About the tabernacle. The tabernacle
had just one door. Just one way in. Just one door. Just one door. One way in, one way out. And here's this tabernacle, here's
this outer court. There's only one way in. And
there was only one way in to that holiest of holies. Only
one way in to the holiest of holies. Only one way in to the
holy place. You think of the big, large building with but
one entrance. Oh my. With all that outer court
and all that, there was one gate only. There is only one way to
go in there, into the presence of a holy God. And there is only
one way, one way, if we can go into the presence of God. You
know what our Lord Jesus Christ said? He said, I'm the door. You know, everything about our
Lord is so simple to understand. He spoke in, most of the time,
one and two syllable words. You know that? I am, that's easy
to understand. Door, that's easy to understand.
Shepherd, that's easy to understand. Savior, that's... Mediator, and
a door. And a door's for two reasons. To go in, and to come out. But when you go in this door,
you don't want back out. You know we got doors here, we
got doors, we got one, two, three. Three doors, four doors in this
place. You can go out any way you want to, come in any way
you want to. But boy, when we come to God ain't but one way
and one door. That's so simple, ain't it? Oh,
yeah. Well, there's a door. Where does
that take us? That takes us into the presence
of Christ. And you know who opens the door?
I don't. Did you ever open the door when
you come to Christ? We should get ahold of the handle
and turn the knob. God opened that door. He opened that door. He opened
the way into His holy presence. In His holy presence. Oh, I bless
the Savior. What a Savior. What a Savior.
What a Savior. I hope that was a blessing. We've
got so much more to say about these things. And I pray the
Lord will bless us and enable us to worship Him as we do.