Read chapter in full: www.biblegateway.com/passage/?version=ESV&search=Exodus+38

 

Exodus 38 English Standard Version (ESV)

Making the Court

⁹ And he made the court. For the south side the hangings of the court were of fine twined linen, a hundred cubits; ¹⁰ their twenty pillars and their twenty bases were of bronze, but the hooks of the pillars and their fillets were of silver. ¹¹ And for the north side there were hangings of a hundred cubits, their twenty pillars, their twenty bases were of bronze, but the hooks of the pillars and their fillets were of silver. ¹² And for the west side were hangings of fifty cubits, their ten pillars, and their ten bases; the hooks of the pillars and their fillets were of silver. ¹³ And for the front to the east, fifty cubits. ¹⁴ The hangings for one side of the gate were fifteen cubits, with their three pillars and three bases. ¹⁵ And so for the other side. On both sides of the gate of the court were hangings of fifteen cubits, with their three pillars and their three bases. ¹⁶ All the hangings around the court were of fine twined linen. ¹⁷ And the bases for the pillars were of bronze, but the hooks of the pillars and their fillets were of silver. The overlaying of their capitals was also of silver, and all the pillars of the court were filleted with silver. ¹⁸ And the screen for the gate of the court was embroidered with needlework in blue and purple and scarlet yarns and fine twined linen. It was twenty cubits long and five cubits high in its breadth, corresponding to the hangings of the court. ¹⁹ And their pillars were four in number. Their four bases were of bronze, their hooks of silver, and the overlaying of their capitals and their fillets of silver. ²⁰ And all the pegs for the tabernacle and for the court all around were of bronze.

 

REFLECTION

• Read this passage, or read the whole chapter if time allows.
• The curtains that formed the court which surrounded the tabernacle were some seven and a half feet high! No one could see over the fabric walls to glimpse the beauty of the tabernacle.  Yet the curtains that formed the court were also made of the finest material.  Any contact with God’s dwelling was intended to impress with His beauty.
• We come into daily contact with non-Christians, who may never have caught a glimpse of God. When we do, we serve as curtains that surround the holy place.  Our task is to impress them with the beauty of the Lord by reflecting Him in our character.

 

PRAYER

Continue to dwell on the concept of being the curtain of the Tabernacle which outsiders see daily.  What is the God you are reflecting daily?

 

Read chapter in full: www.biblegateway.com/passage/?version=ESV&search=Exodus+37

 

Exodus 37 English Standard Version (ESV)

The Ark

¹ Bezalel made the ark of acacia wood—two and a half cubits long, a cubit and a half wide, and a cubit and a half high. ² He overlaid it with pure gold, both inside and out, and made a gold molding around it. ³ He cast four gold rings for it and fastened them to its four feet, with two rings on one side and two rings on the other. ⁴ Then he made poles of acacia wood and overlaid them with gold. ⁵ And he inserted the poles into the rings on the sides of the ark to carry it.  ⁶ He made the atonement cover of pure gold—two and a half cubits long and a cubit and a half wide. ⁷ Then he made two cherubim out of hammered gold at the ends of the cover. ⁸ He made one cherub on one end and the second cherub on the other; at the two ends he made them of one piece with the cover. ⁹ The cherubim had their wings spread upward, overshadowing the cover with them. The cherubim faced each other, looking toward the cover.

The Lampstand

¹⁷ They made the lampstand of pure gold and hammered it out, base and shaft; its flowerlike cups, buds and blossoms were of one piece with it. ¹⁸ Six branches extended from the sides of the lampstand—three on one side and three on the other. ¹⁹ Three cups shaped like almond flowers with buds and blossoms were on one branch, three on the next branch and the same for all six branches extending from the lampstand. ²⁰ And on the lampstand were four cups shaped like almond flowers with buds and blossoms. ²¹ One bud was under the first pair of branches extending from the lampstand, a second bud under the second pair, and a third bud under the third pair—six branches in all. ²² The buds and the branches were all of one piece with the lampstand, hammered out of pure gold.  ²³ They made its seven lamps, as well as its wick trimmers and trays, of pure gold. ²⁴ They made the lampstand and all its accessories from one talent of pure gold.

 

REFLECTION

• Read this passage, or read the whole chapter if time allows.
• The importance of the tabernacle and its furnishings is seen in the fact that Exodus 35-40 repeats, often word for word, the description of Israel’s worship center in Exodus 25-30. For nearly 500 years Israel worshiped at this portable tent, which with its furnishings symbolized basic truths about personal relationship with God.
• The tabernacle and its furnishings, the writer of Hebrews says, are “a copy and shadow of what is in heaven” (8:5). God still uses symbols, and the symbol that most frequently serves as a bridge between God and the lost is a human symbol – the believer.
• Others do see Christians as representatives of God. We are symbols whether we chose to be or not.  What kind of a representative of God are you?  Does your life or your interaction with others reveal the majesty of God?  Do you respect and appreciate those believers that are different from you?  Do you realize how expensive your worth is?  Or do you have a very low self-evaluation?
• Mentally go through every sacred article in the tabernacle. Use the eyes of your heart to look at their beauty and glory.  Thank God for bringing you out of the pit to become a pure, bright and beautiful symbol of Him.  Thank God for His continued redemption to purify you of all the blemishes so that God’s glory may be further shone through you.

Read chapter in full: www.biblegateway.com/passage/?version=ESV&search=Exodus+36

 

Exodus 36 English Standard Version (ESV)

¹ “Bezalel and Oholiab and every craftsman in whom the Lord has put skill and intelligence to know how to do any work in the construction of the sanctuary shall work in accordance with all that the Lord has commanded.”

² And Moses called Bezalel and Oholiab and every craftsman in whose mind the Lord had put skill, everyone whose heart stirred him up to come to do the work. ……

 

⁸ And all the craftsmen among the workmen made the tabernacle with ten curtains. They were made of fine twined linen and blue and purple and scarlet yarns, with cherubim skillfully worked. ⁹ The length of each curtain was twenty-eight cubits, and the breadth of each curtain four cubits. All the curtains were the same size.

¹⁰ He coupled five curtains to one another, and the other five curtains he coupled to one another. ¹¹ He made loops of blue on the edge of the outermost curtain of the first set. Likewise he made them on the edge of the outermost curtain of the second set. ¹² He made fifty loops on the one curtain, and he made fifty loops on the edge of the curtain that was in the second set. The loops were opposite one another. ¹³ And he made fifty clasps of gold, and coupled the curtains one to the other with clasps. So the tabernacle was a single whole.

¹⁴ He also made curtains of goats’ hair for a tent over the tabernacle. He made eleven curtains. ¹⁵ The length of each curtain was thirty cubits, and the breadth of each curtain four cubits. The eleven curtains were the same size. ¹⁶ He coupled five curtains by themselves, and six curtains by themselves. ¹⁷ And he made fifty loops on the edge of the outermost curtain of the one set, and fifty loops on the edge of the other connecting curtain. ¹⁸ And he made fifty clasps of bronze to couple the tent together that it might be a single whole. ¹⁹ And he made for the tent a covering of tanned rams’ skins and goatskins.

 

REFLECTION

• Read the passage slowly. To get a broader picture, quickly read the whole chapter.
• The central symbolic meaning of the tabernacle was as a visible sign of God’s presence with His people. Note here the use of only the best and most expensive materials in its construction.  God deserves – and requires – the best we can provide.

 

PRAYER

Take this old hymn “I gave my life for thee” as God speaking to you.  Substituting thee for your own name. Listen and respond to God.  www.youtube.com/watch?v=1TjUsi7X28U

I gave my life for thee (insert your name), My precious blood I shed,
That thou might ransomed be, And quicken from the dead;
I gave, I gave My life for thee, What hast thou given for Me?

My Father’s house of light, My glory circled throne,
I left for earthly night, For wanderings sad and lone;
I left, I left it all for thee, Hast thou left aught for Me?

I suffered much for thee, more than thy tongue can tell,
Of bitterest agony, to rescue thee from hell;
I’ve borne, I’ve borne it all for thee, What hast thou borne for Me?

Read chapter in full: www.biblegateway.com/passage/?version=ESV&search=Exodus+35

 

Exodus 35 English Standard Version (ESV)

Contributions for the Tabernacle

⁴ Moses said to all the congregation of the people of Israel, “This is the thing that the Lord has commanded. ⁵ Take from among you a contribution to the Lord. Whoever is of a generous heart, let him bring the Lord’s contribution: gold, silver, and bronze; ⁶ blue and purple and scarlet yarns and fine twined linen; goats’ hair, ⁷ tanned rams’ skins, and goatskins; acacia wood, ⁸ oil for the light, spices for the anointing oil and for the fragrant incense, ⁹ and onyx stones and stones for setting, for the ephod and for the breast piece. ……

¹⁰ “Let every skillful craftsman among you come and make all that the Lord has commanded: ……

 

²⁰ Then all the congregation of the people of Israel departed from the presence of Moses. ²¹ And they came, everyone whose heart stirred him, and everyone whose spirit moved him, and brought the Lord’s contribution to be used for the tent of meeting, and for all its service, and for the holy garments. ²² So they came, both men and women. All who were of a willing heart brought brooches and earrings and signet rings and armlets, all sorts of gold objects, every man dedicating an offering of gold to the Lord. ²³ And every one who possessed blue or purple or scarlet yarns or fine linen or goats’ hair or tanned rams’ skins or goatskins brought them. ²⁴ Everyone who could make a contribution of silver or bronze brought it as the Lord’s contribution. And every one who possessed acacia wood of any use in the work brought it. ²⁵ And every skillful woman spun with her hands, and they all brought what they had spun in blue and purple and scarlet yarns and fine twined linen. ²⁶ All the women whose hearts stirred them to use their skill spun the goats’ hair. ²⁷ And the leaders brought onyx stones and stones to be set, for the ephod and for the breastpiece, ²⁸ and spices and oil for the light, and for the anointing oil, and for the fragrant incense. ²⁹ All the men and women, the people of Israel, whose heart moved them to bring anything for the work that the Lord had commanded by Moses to be done brought it as a freewill offering to the Lord.

Construction of the Tabernacle

³⁰ Then Moses said to the people of Israel, “See, the Lord has called by name Bezalel the son of Uri, son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah; ³¹ and he has filled him with the Spirit of God, with skill, with intelligence, with knowledge, and with all craftsmanship, ³² to devise artistic designs, to work in gold and silver and bronze, ³³ in cutting stones for setting, and in carving wood, for work in every skilled craft. ³⁴ And he has inspired him to teach, both him and Oholiab the son of Ahisamach of the tribe of Dan. ³⁵ He has filled them with skill to do every sort of work done by an engraver or by a designer or by an embroiderer in blue and purple and scarlet yarns and fine twined linen, or by a weaver—by any sort of workman or skilled designer.

 

REFLECTION

• Read the passage slowly.
• Bezalel is filled with the Holy Spirit to work on the tabernacle. The people contribute to its construction out of their own free will (vv21, 22, 26).  A community builds the tabernacle, not an elite handful; a community creates a house for God.  All the people contribute, not just the leaders.  Everyone who has a heart for it is part of it.  It is a spirituality of the many, not the few, that makes it possible for God to have a home among his people.

 

PRAYER

Would your heart be “stirred” and your spirit “willing” to give your gold jewelry and silver flatware to your place of worship (the church) to be melted down to make a Communion set or altar pieces?  When you were considering this possibility, how much unwillingness did you feel?  Ask God to speak to you how He is at work within you, and who He is calling you to be.

Read chapter in full: www.biblegateway.com/passage/?version=ESV&search=Exodus+34

 

Exodus 34 English Standard Version (ESV)

Moses Makes New Tablets

¹ The Lord said to Moses, “Cut for yourself two tablets of stone like the first, and I will write on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke. ² Be ready by the morning, and come up in the morning to Mount Sinai, and present yourself there to me on the top of the mountain. ³ No one shall come up with you, and let no one be seen throughout all the mountain. Let no flocks or herds graze opposite that mountain.” ⁴ So Moses cut two tablets of stone like the first. And he rose early in the morning and went up on Mount Sinai, as the Lord had commanded him, and took in his hand two tablets of stone. ⁵ The Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the Lord. ⁶ The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, ⁷ keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.” ⁸ And Moses quickly bowed his head toward the earth and worshiped. ⁹ And he said, “If now I have found favor in your sight, O Lord, please let the Lord go in the midst of us, for it is a stiff-necked people, and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for your inheritance.”

 

REFLECTION

• To get a broader feel for what’s happening, you may start reading from 33:12.
• God directed Moses to restore the covenant revelation by recopying the Ten Commandments on two new stone tablets. God both provided and wrote on the first tablets, but Moses provided and God wrote on the second set of tablets.
• God also revealed His character to Moses. Moses experienced the character of God in a dramatic way. This was summed up in one of the Old Testament’s most famous confessions:

The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness,  keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.(vv6-7)

• God’s compassion and love must be seen against the background of His obligation to punish sin. The God who “will by no means clear the guilty” is first of all the God who displays overwhelming compassion and grace. His loving, gracious, and giving character do not “cancel out” His righteousness. Because of the work of Jesus, the righteousness of God is satisfied and the grace and mercy of God are righteously given.
• Moses’ first, and primary reaction was simply worship. When we come to know who God is and all His great love for us, the most practical thing it makes us do is worship Him more than ever.
• How well do you know and appreciate who God is? How compelled are you to worship and obey God? Read vv6-7 slowly a few times, ponder deeply what His character mean to you. Have a conversation with God for clarification, correction or acknowledgement and thanksgiving.

Read chapter in full: www.biblegateway.com/passage/?version=ESV&search=Exodus+33

Exodus 33 English Standard Version (ESV)

The Tent of Meeting

⁷ Now Moses used to take the tent and pitch it outside the camp, far off from the camp, and he called it the tent of meeting. And everyone who sought the Lord would go out to the tent of meeting, which was outside the camp.⁸ Whenever Moses went out to the tent, all the people would rise up, and each would stand at his tent door, and watch Moses until he had gone into the tent. ⁹ When Moses entered the tent, the pillar of cloud would descend and stand at the entrance of the tent, and the Lord would speak with Moses. ¹⁰ And when all the people saw the pillar of cloud standing at the entrance of the tent, all the people would rise up and worship, each at his tent door. ¹¹ Thus the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend. When Moses turned again into the camp, his assistant Joshua the son of Nun, a young man, would not depart from the tent.

Moses’ Intercession

¹² Moses said to the Lord, “See, you say to me, ‘Bring up this people,’ but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. Yet you have said, ‘I know you by name, and you have also found favor in my sight.’ ¹³ Now therefore, if I have found favor in your sight, please show me now your ways, that I may know you in order to find favor in your sight. Consider too that this nation is your people.” ¹⁴ And he said, “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” ¹⁵ And he said to him, “If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here. ¹⁶ For how shall it be known that I have found favor in your sight, I and your people? Is it not in your going with us, so that we are distinct, I and your people, from every other people on the face of the earth?”

¹⁷ And the Lord said to Moses, “This very thing that you have spoken I will do, for you have found favor in my sight, and I know you by name.” ¹⁸ Moses said, “Please show me your glory.” ¹⁹ And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The Lord.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. ²⁰ But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.” ²¹ And the Lord said, “Behold, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock, ²² and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by. ²³ Then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen.”

 

REFLECTION

• Read this passage, or read the whole chapter if time allows.
• Many qualities made Moses a strong spiritual leader. He was courageous.  He sought to please God rather than men.  He was willing to take a stand.  He rallied support.  He prayed for sinners, and yet was willing to confront them.  But the secret of Moses’ greatness is found in the “tent of meeting”, where Moses met the Lord face-to-face.
• No one knew what went on within the tent, though the pillar of cloud came down to stand by the tent door when Moses was inside. Yet the very fact that Moses met with God there instilled awe, and the evidence of God’s presence caused the people to worship the Lord.  Moses’ greatness was not his own, it was God’s.
• We have constant opportunities to influence others. They include our children, our neighbors, and coworkers as well as members of our church.  The only way we will truly influence others is to follow the path of Moses and meet God regularly face-to-face.
• Others won’t know what happens in our private time with the Lord. But the aura of God’s presence will go with us.  Being with God changes us – and the change God works in us is the key to our ability to influence others to worship and obey Him.

 

PRAYER

Use this hymn as a prayer for today.

Make Me a Blessing Ira B. Wilson, 20th cent. George S. Schuler, 1924

www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMYx5bvuvgA

Out in the highways and byways of life, many are weary and sad;
Carry the sunshine where darkness is rife, making the sorrowing glad.

Tell the sweet story of Christ and His love; Tell of His pow’r to forgive:
Others will trust Him if only you prove true ev’ry moment you live.

Give as ’twas given to you in your need; Love as the Master loved you;
Be to the helpless a helper indeed; Unto your mission be true.

[Chorus]

Make me a blessing, make me a blessing, Out of my life may Jesus shine;
Make me a blessing, O Savior, I pray, Make me a blessing to someone today.

Read chapter in full: www.biblegateway.com/passage/?version=ESV&search=Exodus+32

 

Exodus 32 English Standard Version (ESV)

The Golden Calf

¹ When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, the people gathered themselves together to Aaron and said to him, “Up, make us gods who shall go before us. As for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.” ² So Aaron said to them, “Take off the rings of gold that are in the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me.” ³ So all the people took off the rings of gold that were in their ears and brought them to Aaron. ⁴ And he received the gold from their hand and fashioned it with a graving tool and made a golden calf. And they said, “These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!” ⁵ When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it. And Aaron made a proclamation and said, “Tomorrow shall be a feast to the Lord.” ⁶ And they rose up early the next day and offered burnt offerings and brought peace offerings. And the people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play.

⁷ And the Lord said to Moses, “Go down, for your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves. ⁸ They have turned aside quickly out of the way that I commanded them. They have made for themselves a golden calf and have worshiped it and sacrificed to it and said, ‘These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!’” ⁹ And the Lord said to Moses, “I have seen this people, and behold, it is a stiff-necked people. ¹⁰ Now therefore let me alone, that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them, in order that I may make a great nation of you.”

¹¹ But Moses implored the Lord his God and said, “O Lord, why does your wrath burn hot against your people, whom you have brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? ¹² Why should the Egyptians say, ‘With evil intent did he bring them out, to kill them in the mountains and to consume them from the face of the earth’? Turn from your burning anger and relent from this disaster against your people. ¹³ Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, to whom you swore by your own self, and said to them, ‘I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have promised I will give to your offspring, and they shall inherit it forever.’”¹⁴ And the Lord relented from the disaster that he had spoken of bringing on his people.

 

REFLECTION

• Please read the whole chapter once, then re-read the above passage.
• Moses had been gone a long time. Meanwhile, the people, impatient to get on with their new life of freedom, decided that they wanted to develop their own worship that they could “get something out of”.  So they talked Aaron into providing them with worship that satisfied their desire – something that turned out to be pretty much a reflection of the Egyptian world in which they had so recently been oppressed.
• Their golden calf worship nearly destroyed them. And it is the same with us.  Refusing to wait for God to speak, we many times fill in His silence with activity.  Fund raising, building project, we model worship after patterns that are familiar to us and seem to work for others, patterns that leave out ambiguity and mystery as well as waiting on God and listening for Him.  No wonder we feel disillusioned, isolated, inauthentic, and burned out.

 

PRAYER

Please read Day 14 of “Purpose Driven Life” on When God Seems Distant ( purposedrivenlife2005.blogspot.ca/2005/03/day-14-when-god-seems-distant.html ).  Then have a conversation with God:  God is real, no matter how you feel, really?  How can you stay focused on God’s presence, especially when He seems distant?

Read chapter in full: www.biblegateway.com/passage/?version=ESV&search=Exodus+31

 

Exodus 31 English Standard Version (ESV)

The Sabbath

¹² And the Lord said to Moses, ¹³ “You are to speak to the people of Israel and say, ‘Above all you shall keep my Sabbaths, for this is a sign between me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I, the Lord, sanctify you. ¹⁴ You shall keep the Sabbath, because it is holy for you. Everyone who profanes it shall be put to death. Whoever does any work on it, that soul shall be cut off from among his people. ¹⁵ Six days shall work be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the Lord. Whoever does any work on the Sabbath day shall be put to death. ¹⁶ Therefore the people of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, observing the Sabbath throughout their generations, as a covenant forever. ¹⁷ It is a sign forever between me and the people of Israel that in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested and was refreshed.’”

¹⁸ And he gave to Moses, when he had finished speaking with him on Mount Sinai, the two tablets of the testimony, tablets of stone, written with the finger of God.

 

REFLECTION

• God chose workers to build the tabernacle. Once again, He reminded the Israelites to keep the Sabbath whether they are working for the sacred work or others.
• “Above all you shall keep my Sabbaths” (v13). This command was strategically placed – at the very end of all the commands to build the tabernacle. Though God gave Israel a work to do in building the tabernacle He did not want them to do that work on the Sabbath. God’s rest still had to be respected.
• Is the Sabbath for Christians? The passage states that the Sabbath is a sign of God’s covenant with Israel. On the other hand, Christians from the beginning have met on Sunday, not Sabbath – the seventh day of the week. While the Sabbath commemorates creation (v17), the first day of the week commemorates Jesus’ resurrection (Matt 28:1, Acts 20:7). What links the two is that each serves as a weekly reminder to believers of their personal relationship with God.
• If we are going to live appropriately in the world, we must keep the Sabbath. We must stop running around long enough to see what God has done and is doing.  We must shut up long enough to hear what He has said and is saying.  Without silence and stillness, there is no spirituality.
• Pastors and congregational leaders commonly cram the Lord’s Day with work: committee meetings, congregational meetings, projects, mission events, and social activities. But talking and doing displace Sabbath quietness and stillness.  All of this activity is very well intentioned but nevertheless all very wrong.  How might we re-organize our lives and priorities in order that we might actually practice Sabbath-living?

 

PRAYER

Recall last Sunday.  How did you spend it?  Did you enjoy the rest and time with God?  Enjoy a few moments of silence with God knowing that God is enjoying it, too.

Read chapter in full: www.biblegateway.com/passage/?version=ESV&search=Exodus+30

 

Exodus 30 English Standard Version (ESV)

The Census Tax

¹¹ The Lord said to Moses, ¹² “When you take the census of the people of Israel, then each shall give a ransom for his life to the Lord when you number them, that there be no plague among them when you number them. ¹³ Each one who is numbered in the census shall give this: half a shekel according to the shekel of the sanctuary (the shekel is twenty gerahs), half a shekel as an offering to the Lord. ¹⁴ Everyone who is numbered in the census, from twenty years old and upward, shall give the Lord’s offering. ¹⁵ The rich shall not give more, and the poor shall not give less, than the half shekel, when you give the Lord’s offering to make atonement for your lives. ¹⁶ You shall take the atonement money from the people of Israel and shall give it for the service of the tent of meeting, that it may bring the people of Israel to remembrance before the Lord, so as to make atonement for your lives.”

The Bronze Basin

¹⁷ The Lord said to Moses, ¹⁸ “You shall also make a basin of bronze, with its stand of bronze, for washing. You shall put it between the tent of meeting and the altar, and you shall put water in it, ¹⁹ with which Aaron and his sons shall wash their hands and their feet. ²⁰ When they go into the tent of meeting, or when they come near the altar to minister, to burn a food offering to the Lord, they shall wash with water, so that they may not die. ²¹ They shall wash their hands and their feet, so that they may not die. It shall be a statute forever to them, even to him and to his offspring throughout their generations.”

 

REFLECTION

• This chapter contains instructions not mentioned in the other chapters. Read this passage, or read the whole chapter if time allows.
• The half shekel tax “atonement money” (11-16) is to be collected from each Hebrew male, rich and poor, everyone has to pay the same small amount. This is to remind us that God’s redemption is equal to all.
• Eph 2:8-9 says: “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast”. This tells us that our redemption is free to us, and we don’t need to pay the “atonement money”.  However, the redemption is not cheap, as Dietrich Bonhoeffer called it, it is indeed very costly.

Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life. It is costly because it condemns sin, and grace because it justifies the sinner. Above all, it is costly because it cost God the life of his Son: “ye were bought at a price,” and what has cost God much cannot be cheap for us. Above all, it is grace because God did not reckon his Son too dear a price to pay for our life, but delivered him up for us. Costly grace is the Incarnation of God.

“Cheap grace is the deadly enemy of our church. We are fighting today for costly grace. Cheap grace means grace sold on the market like the cheap jack wares. Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession, absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.”

 

PRAYER

An excerpt from “The Cost of Discipleship” can be found at: www.crossroad.to/Persecution/Bonhoffer.html. Reflect on your life as a disciple of Christ.  What kind of grace is expressed in your life?  Ask God to show and direct you.

Read chapter in full: www.biblegateway.com/passage/?version=ESV&search=Exodus+29

 

Exodus 29 English Standard Version (ESV)

Consecration of the Priests

¹ “Now this is what you shall do to them to consecrate them, that they may serve me as priests. …….

³⁵ “Thus you shall do to Aaron and to his sons, according to all that I have commanded you. Through seven days shall you ordain them, ³⁶ and every day you shall offer a bull as a sin offering for atonement. Also you shall purify the altar, when you make atonement for it, and shall anoint it to consecrate it. ³⁷ Seven days you shall make atonement for the altar and consecrate it, and the altar shall be most holy. Whatever touches the altar shall become holy.

³⁸ “Now this is what you shall offer on the altar: two lambs a year old day by day regularly. ³⁹ One lamb you shall offer in the morning, and the other lamb you shall offer at twilight. ⁴⁰ And with the first lamb a tenth measure of fine flour mingled with a fourth of a hin of beaten oil, and a fourth of a hin of wine for a drink offering. ⁴¹ The other lamb you shall offer at twilight, and shall offer with it a grain offering and its drink offering, as in the morning, for a pleasing aroma, a food offering to the Lord. ⁴² It shall be a regular burnt offering throughout your generations at the entrance of the tent of meeting before the Lord, where I will meet with you, to speak to you there. ⁴³ There I will meet with the people of Israel, and it shall be sanctified by my glory. ⁴⁴ I will consecrate the tent of meeting and the altar. Aaron also and his sons I will consecrate to serve me as priests. ⁴⁵ I will dwell among the people of Israel and will be their God. ⁴⁶ And they shall know that I am the Lord their God, who brought them out of the land of Egypt that I might dwell among them. I am the Lord their God.

 

REFLECTION

• The theme of this chapter is the sanctification of priests. If time permits, read through the whole chapter once.  Then re-read the selected portion above.
• Priests has to wash and offer sacrifices to symbolize being cleansed before he can put on the sacred clothing. God accepts their morning and evening sacrifices (v42), and promises to be with the people always.  This foretold the truth “come near to God and he will come near to you” (James 4:8).
• In verses 44-46, “dwell” has the sense of abiding, living among, taking up residence. God’s purpose in delivering the Israelites out of Egypt is to live among them.  God is also dwelling in the hearts of believers today.

 

PRAYER

How would you react if God’s presence became visible in the building where you attend worship services?  Next Sunday try a little experiment: arrive at the worship service fifteen minutes early, sit quietly in the sanctuary, and pray for God’s presence to be especially strong.  What difference did this exercise make in your attitude during worship?