I wanted to invite you along on a journey with me. We’ll be heading back in time thousands of years. Picture several million people moving through the desert, setting up camp here and there, running from a past filled with slavery on a mass exodus towards freedom and a promised land of their own.

The landscape is rocky, dry, and barren.

The leader of this huge group of former slaves hears a message from God and rallies his people together to create a beautiful resting place for the very presence of God. It was called the Tabernacle.

“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.” (Exodus 25:8-9)

Nutshell: The Tabernacle was the place where God’s presence rested. The word tabernacle roughly means to lodge over night. It was a temporary foreshadowing of God’s eternal “meeting with us” through Jesus Christ. God told Moses to build a place for Him, so that He could meet with the people and with Moses. The inner place of the tabernacle is also called the “Tent of Meeting” and the Tabernacle itself, is sometimes called the “Tabernacle of Encountering.”

The Tabernacle is made up of 3 distinct areas.

1) Outer Courts: The most public of the 3 areas. (outside)
2) The Holy Place (through the first curtain, inside the Tent)
3) The Holy of Holies (through the second curtain, inside the Tent)

The Tabernacle layout and the “approach” to the Holy of Holies is a beautiful picture of a lifestyle of worship. But, more importantly, it points to Jesus Christ.

In the Old Testament, the Tabernacle was designed by God to bring an awareness to the worshiper of God’s holiness, and in that, bringing them an awareness of their own sinfulness. When an Israelite recognized that he had sinned, and that this separated him from his God, if he wanted to be forgiven he made his way to the God appointed place, the Tabernacle.

For us, today, it paints a wonderful picture of Jesus Christ being the “way” to that forgiveness. We don’t find forgiveness in daily ritual or animal blood sacrifice, but through ONE sacrifice, that of Jesus Christ, in which He laid His life down for every man and woman.

We can also look at the practices of Tabernacle worship and glean meaningful insights from Scripture.

Tomorrow we’ll continue with our study.