Prepare
Opening Prayer
Lord, thank you for this day and for your Word. Help us understand it today. In Jesus' name, amen.
Read
Scripture Passage
Building the Tabernacle
8 Then all the gifted artisans among them who worked on the tabernacle made ten curtains woven of fine linen, and of blue, purple, and scarlet thread; with artistic designs of cherubim they made them. 9 The length of each curtain was twenty-eight cubits, and the width of each curtain four cubits; the curtains were all the same size. 10 And he coupled five curtains to one another, and the other five curtains he coupled to one another. 11 He made loops of blue yarn on the edge of the curtain on the selvedge of one set; likewise he did on the outer edge of the other curtain of the second set. 12 Fifty loops he made on one curtain, and fifty loops he made on the edge of the curtain on the end of the second set; the loops held one curtain to another. 13 And he made fifty clasps of gold, and coupled the curtains to one another with the clasps, that it might be one tabernacle.
14 He made curtains of goats’ hair for the tent over the tabernacle; he made eleven curtains. 15 The length of each curtain was thirty cubits, and the width 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 curtain that is outermost in one set, and fifty loops he made on the edge of the curtain of the second set. 18 He also made fifty bronze clasps to couple the tent together, that it might be one. 19 Then he made a covering for the tent of ram skins dyed red, and a covering of badger skins above that.
20 For the tabernacle he made boards of acacia wood, standing upright. 21 The length of each board was ten cubits, and the width of each board a cubit and a half. 22 Each board had two tenons for binding one to another. Thus he made for all the boards of the tabernacle. 23 And he made boards for the tabernacle, twenty boards for the south side. 24 Forty sockets of silver he made to go under the twenty boards: two sockets under each of the boards for its two tenons. 25 And for the other side of the tabernacle, the north side, he made twenty boards 26and their forty sockets of silver: two sockets under each of the boards. 27For the west side of the tabernacle he made six boards. 28 He also made two boards for the two back corners of the tabernacle. 29 And they were coupled at the bottom and coupled together at the top by one ring. Thus he made both of them for the two corners. 30 So there were eight boards and their sockets—sixteen sockets of silver—two sockets under each of the boards.
31 And he made bars of acacia wood: five for the boards on one side of the tabernacle, 32 five bars for the boards on the other side of the tabernacle, and five bars for the boards of the tabernacle on the far side westward. 33 And he made the middle bar to pass through the boards from one end to the other. 34 He overlaid the boards with gold, made their rings of gold to be holders for the bars, and overlaid the bars with gold.
35 And he made a veil of blue, purple, and scarlet thread, and fine woven linen; it was worked with an artistic design of cherubim. 36 He made for it four pillars of acacia wood, and overlaid them with gold, with their hooks of gold; and he cast four sockets of silver for them.
37 He also made a screen for the tabernacle door, of blue, purple, and scarlet thread, and fine woven linen, made by a weaver, 38 and its five pillars with their hooks. And he overlaid their capitals and their rings with gold, but their five sockets were bronze.
The New King James Version (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1982), Ex 36:8–38
A — About
What Is This Passage About?
The gifted artisans construct the tabernacle exactly as God commanded, making its curtains, coverings, boards, bars, veil, and entrance screen. God provides the materials through Israel's departure from Egypt and prepares a dwelling place where he will be present with his people and receive their worship.
B — Best Verse
A Verse That Summarizes the Passage
Exodus 36:8
Distilled from the devotional exposition; the speaker did not explicitly name a best verse.
Then all the gifted artisans among them who worked on the tabernacle made ten curtains woven of fine linen, and of blue, purple, and scarlet thread, with artistic designs of cherubim they made them.
Bryan explicitly says he has nothing underlined, and the co-host identifies the gold as a notable detail rather than choosing a verse. Verse 8 is therefore distilled as the opening summary of the artisans beginning the tabernacle exactly as God directed.
C — Called or Christ
C — Christ Connection
Treasure God's presence with his people. The church is now made of living stones, God's Spirit dwells with believers, and Jesus is our high priest in the heavenly tabernacle; walk in the joy and peace that come from his loving presence.
Devotional Study
Transcript of the devotion. Minor transcription errors may remain.
Well, good morning, good morning, good morning. Welcome to Coffee and Devotions. It's where every day you and I, we get together, we have a little bit of coffee or tea, we get into God's Word, and we grow in our love for the Lord together. And this year, 2023, we'll make it from Genesis through Leviticus. That's right. Why don't we have some coffee, we'll pray, and we'll get into God's Word.
Stop. Your tea is too hot? Okay, well you can get it when you're ready. Alright, you guys ready to pray? Lord, we thank you so much for this day and we thank you for your word. Please God, help us to understand it today. In Jesus' name, Amen. Alright, so we are in the book of Exodus. We're getting really close to being done with Exodus. Exodus chapter 36 beginning at verse 8.
Then all the gifted artisans among them who worked on the tabernacle made ten curtains woven of fine linen, and of blue, purple, and scarlet thread, with artistic designs of cherubim they made them. The length of each curtain was twenty-eight cubits, and the width of each curtain four cubits.
The curtains were all the same size. And he coupled five curtains to one another. and the other five curtains he coupled to one another. He made loops of blue yarn on the edge of the curtain on the selvedge of one set, likewise he did on the outer edge of the other curtain of the second set. Fifty loops he made on one curtain, and fifty loops he made on the edge of the curtain on the end of the second set. The loops held one curtain to another. And he made fifty clasps of gold, and coupled the curtains to one another with the clasps, that it might be one tabernacle. Alright, so, ten curtains? 10 curtains, 5, and 5, what's he do with them? Joins them together. That's right. Good. He made curtains of goat's hair for the tent over the tabernacle.
He made 11 curtains. The length of each curtain was 30 cubits, and the width of each curtain was 4 cubits. The 11 curtains were the same size. He coupled five curtains by themselves and six curtains by themselves. And he made 50 loops on the edge of the curtain, that is, outermost in one set. And 50 loops he made on the edge of the curtain of the second set. He also made 50 bronze clasps.
It's a hard word for me to say. Can you say it? Clasps. Oh, you guys can say it easy. OK, clasps. He also made 50 bronze clasps to couple the tents together, that it might be one. Then he made a covering for the tent of ram skins dyed red, and a covering of badger skins above that." So you have ram, and then you have badger, and then you have goat's hair. So there's like three parts of the covering over the tabernacle.
You think that would be heavy or light? Heavy. But do you imagine carrying all that? Yeah. And the coat? Yeah, if you had to carry all that, like the coat, the Kohathites would have to carry all of it. Well, here we go. Let's keep going. For the tabernacle, he made boards of acacia wood standing upright. The length of each board was 10 cubits, and the width of each board was a cubit and a half. Each board had two tenons for binding one to another. Thus he made for all the boards of the tabernacle. Go ahead. You need to sneeze again? Okay.
And he made boards for the tabernacle, 20 boards for the south side. 40 sockets of silver he made to go under the 20 boards. Two sockets under each of the boards for its two tenons. And for the other side of the tabernacle, the north side, he made 20 boards. And there are 40 sockets of silver, two sockets under each of the boards. For the west side of the tabernacle, he made six boards. He also made two boards for the two back corners of the tabernacle, and they were coupled at the bottom and coupled together at the top by one ring. Thus he made both of them for the two corners. So there were eight boards and their sockets, sixteen sockets of silver, two sockets under each of the boards.
So what is this saying? It says that they're making the tabernacle. Yeah, and now it's like the boards, right? So we've had curtains and we've had coverings and now we have the boards in verse 31. And He made bars of acacia wood. 5 for the boards on one side of the tabernacle, 5 bars for the boards on the other side of the tabernacle, and 5 bars for the boards of the tabernacle on the far side westward. And he made the middle bar to pass through the boards from one end to the other. He overlaid the boards with gold. made their rings of gold to be holders for the bars and overlaid the bars with gold. So they made the boards and now what are they making? The bars. The bars are wood but they're overlaid with what? Gold. With gold.
And he made a veil of blue, purple, and scarlet thread, and fine woven linen. It was worked with an artistic design of cherubim. He made for it four pillars of acacia wood, and overlaid them with gold, with their hooks of gold. And he cast four sockets of silver for them."
All right, so now he's making a veil. The veil is what's going to go from the inner Holy of Holies to the temple, to the tabernacle, the holy place. So he's making that part now. And then he says in verse 37, now we're almost to the end. He also made a screen for the tabernacle door of blue, purple, and scarlet thread, and fine woven linen made by a weaver. And it's five pillars with their hooks. And he overlaid their capitals and their rings with gold. But their five sockets were bronze. All right, so he made the ten curtains.
He made the goat hair and the badger skin and all that for the top going around. The badger skin cost $80. Yeah, we saw badger skin. One badger skin cost $80. And was that big or was it small? Small. Could you imagine doing a whole roof for this room with badger skins? That would be $5,000. That would be a lot of money, wouldn't it? That's right.
And so you have the curtains, you have the boards, you have the bars, you have the veil, you have the screen. What is this all talking about? What's going on in this part of the Bible? What do you think? They're making the tabernacle. Who told them to make the tabernacle? God. Why do they need a tabernacle? So they can worship Him. To worship Him? Yeah, right. So the tabernacle is where God's going to dwell with His people and they can worship Him.
So This is a hard one. I don't have anything underlined in my Bible for this. Do you think you would underline something for this? Is there something that stood out to you? What part of the tabernacle stood out to you as they're actually making it now?
That they have gold. That they have gold? Okay. How do you think they got the gold? Bought it. They didn't buy it. They mined it. They didn't mine it. They traded? They bartered for it? They didn't trade or barter. They just got it. How? Because when they left Egypt, the people gave it to them. They just gave it to them. God said, go to your neighbors, ask them for gold earrings and all this stuff, and they'll just give it to you. And the Israelites didn't. Guess what happened? They were like, I don't know. You just go. Yeah, exactly. They gave them all the gold and all the silver and all the stuff and they said, yeah, go. So God said they plundered Egypt. Right?
So they were sent out into the wilderness with all this stuff. And part of it was going to be for making the tabernacle where God would dwell with them. It was like God's palace, God's mansion, God's special tent with his people. Well, do you think that God still dwells with us today?
Yeah. Do we have a temple we go to? Yes? Oh, where's your temple? In heaven. Oh, your temple's in heaven? That's where your tabernacle is? I wonder what it looks like there. What'd you say, Nathan? We are the temple. You think we're the temple now? So what is it? Is there a temple here on earth or is there a tabernacle in heaven? Hmm, I think both. Both? What do you think?
Because heaven is basically the tabernacle, because the Lord is there. But in earth, we are the church, in other words, the tabernacle. Oh yeah, we're the living stones, right? The temple of God. When we get together, we're the living stones now. But in heaven, there's a heavenly tabernacle, and who's our high priest there? Yeah, Jesus is. So if you remember the gold, what's the street to the tabernacle going to look like in heaven?
Pure gold. Pure gold. Not just the sockets for inside, but even the street. Yeah, pure gold. That's right. I'm excited to see that. What about you? Alright, let's go ahead and pray. Father, we thank you so much for caring for us Thank You that You dwell with us by Your Spirit. Lord, we pray that we would love You and that we would treasure Your presence with us. In Jesus' name, Amen. May God bless you. May you walk in the joy and peace of Jesus Christ, knowing that His Spirit is given to you by His love. Bye! Bye. Bye.
Thanks for listening to this week's message from God's Word for You, a ministry of Sharon R.P. Church in rural southeast Iowa. We pray that the message would be used by God to transform your faith and your life this week. If you'd like to get more information about us, feel free to go to the website, SharonRPC.org. We'd love to invite you to worship with us. Our worship time is 10 a.m. every Sunday at 25204 160th Avenue. Morning Sun, Iowa, 52640. May God richly bless you this week.