The Tabernacle in Exodus 25-29
– Its Typical Teaching
Ministry by C. A. Coates
– Part Four

Mr. Coates' notes are presented here with the conviction that they will open up the significance of the Tabernacle

• – both the glories of the Lord Jesus Christ and the formation of the features of Christ in the saints –

• in an edifying and challenging depth and detail beyond what is generally known.

G.A.R.

To take up the teaching of this chapter requires spiritual affections to be in energy. All the material for the tabernacle was to be furnished as the fruit of promptings of heart; all was to come, as it were, out of the affections of the people. That is a simple thing to see, but most important.

• Does it not say plainly that the whole vast scene of God's glory in Christ is to be made good through active affections? Everything that will go to make up the system of glory is being formed in the affections of saints now, so that each one may bring his bit of divine wealth and beauty to contribute to the perfection and glory of the whole.

A people furnished with divine wealth can bring a heave-offering. The giving has all been on God's part up to chapter 18, but as brought to God, and brought under divine teaching, the people are enriched so that they have precious things to bring to God.

• What has become precious substance in the affections of saints is suited material for the sanctuary. It has to be spiritually fashioned so as to fill its appointed place in the divine system, and all put together in blessed unity to form God's dwelling. It ought to be an exercise with us to have something that will do to form part of the true tabernacle.

The list of things which make up the "heave-offering" begins with "gold" and ends with "stones to be set in the ephod, and in the breast-plate".

• God has been pleased in His wisdom to use these symbols in communicating His mind to us, and it is our wisdom to apply ourselves to the understanding of them.

• It has been said that the language of symbols is as definite as any other. God has been pleased to speak in this language, and it is for us to learn in much dependence and sober exercise the language in which He speaks.

There is, no doubt, a moral order in the way these things are presented. I would suggest that "gold, and silver, and copper" speak of different ways in which the knowledge of God comes to us in Christ.

• Gold is the most precious metal of which Scripture takes account, and it fittingly represents what is wholly divine.

• Silver, being given as atonement-money, Exodus 30: 11-16, would typify the grace and faithfulness of God as known in redemption.

• While copper seems to speak of the unsparing judgment of evil, Numbers 16: 36-40, and as covering the altar there may be also in it the thought of ability to endure testing of the most severe nature. Compare Revelation 1: 15.

Then the seven things which follow – "Blue, and purple, and scarlet, and byssus, and goats' hair, and rams' skins dyed red, and badgers' skins" – are, I think, typical of the moral and official glories of Christ – God's anointed Man.

• "Blue" speaks of what He is as the heavenly One – the One "out of heaven", and "the Son of man who is in heaven". He is the One who is to have supremacy, and to be invested with official glory in God's system.

• "Purple" suggests His royal character and glory, His imperial supremacy, "King of kings and Lord of lords".

• "Scarlet" would set forth the true glory of man as seen in Christ, in contrast to all the vain-glory which marks man in the flesh; and which will appear full-blown in the beast and the clothing of the great harlot. Revelation 17.

• "Byssus" – fine Egyptian cotton – seems to speak of the even texture of a life where everything is in perfect adjustment God-ward and man-ward, and that in the minutest detail. This is righteousness in Man, seen in perfection in the Righteous One. The fineness of the fabric is its prominent characteristic.

• "Goats' hair" speaks of holy separation. We read of prophets, "neither shall they wear a hairy mantle to deceive", Zechariah 13: 4. There had been with them a pretence to separation, an attempt to pass off as being more holy then they were. But in the Lord Jesus there was true separation to God.

"Rams' skins dyed red" would indicate something of a very distinctive character, such as His disciples took knowledge of when they "remembered that it is written, The zeal of thy house devours me", John 2: 13-17.

• An intensity of devotedness to the will and glory of God, which found indeed its full expression when He went into death.
  • "That the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father has commanded me, thus I do. Rise up, let us go hence", John 14: 31.

• He went from the supper table to the garden and the cross, that His devotedness might be seen in all its intensity, and marked, as it were, in an indelible character.

"Badgers' skins" – the exterior covering of the tabernacle – would suggest, I think, the ability to resist every approach of evil, to withstand every temptation, contradiction, pressure, and persecution.

• Satan tempted Him, men sought to catch Him in His words, sinners contradicted, but every approach and attack was met with divine vigilance and ability to repel and overcome it.

It is good to meditate on these significant figures. We shall miss great spiritual wealth if we do not pay attention to them, and seek to learn by the Spirit their divine import.

• These seven things put together give us a wonderful setting forth, as we have said, of the moral character and official glory of Christ.

Then in the "acacia-wood" we have a figure of that holy humanity in which Jesus Christ came in flesh. It is called in the Septuagint Version "incorruptible wood".

• The moral qualities that were seen in perfection in the Lord Jesus, and the official glories with which He is invested and in which He will soon be publicly manifested, are such as could only be found attached to holy Manhood.

• The figure of a tree suggests what He was as growing up here; it is used of Him in different forms: "a tender sapling", "a root out of dry ground", "the Branch". But it is an entirely new kind of humanity, seen in One who did no sin, and who knew no sin, and in whom was no sin.

• The "acacia-wood" may also, as seen in the boards of the tabernacle, set forth what the saints are as born of incorruptible seed, and as formed in the moral qualities of the new man. There is that in them which corresponds morally with Christ, so that John can say,
  • "which thing is true in him and in you".

Then we come to types of the Spirit. "Oil for the light". In relation to the divine system the only Source of light is the Holy Spirit.

• Christendom is full of human substitutes for the Holy Spirit – trained intellect, impressive ritual, and much even amongst believers that is really an attempt to illustrate or explain truth so that the natural mind may be able to take it in.

• But "oil for the light" is absolutely essential. If saints do not give place to the Spirit they will not have divine light. We need to realize more the presence of the Holy Spirit.

• The Lord when here prepared a vessel for the Spirit; then He died to accomplish redemption, and went as a risen and glorified Man to the right hand of God in order that the Spirit might be given at Pentecost to fill the prepared vessel.

• The Spirit is here to maintain the ministry of Christ through the night of His rejection, and no other source of light has any spiritual value.

"Spices for the anointing oil". The priests and the whole tabernacle were to be anointed. The whole divine system and its service has to come under the anointing of "the Spirit all pervading".

• Everything that comes under the Headship of Christ shares in His anointing, and what we find here is that it is a fragrant anointing. Psalm 45: 8 gives the spices of the anointing:
  • "Myrrh and aloes, cassia, are all thy garments";

• everything is fragrant. Where the anointing is there must be the fragrance, for the "spices" are blended in it. Think how fragrant Christ was!

• But every grace that was fragrant in Christ is really blended in His Spirit, so that it may become characteristic of the priesthood, and of the whole divine system which is "the true tabernacle".

• One may say, 'I know I have the Spirit', but what about the "spices"? Is there a fragrance about us that cannot be hid? Are the precious graces of Christ yielding their sweet perfume in us?

"And for the incense of fragrant drugs".

• The spices in the anointing oil speak of the graces of Christ whose fragrance can be perceived by the saints with whom we come in contact,
  • but the "incense" is what is expressed of the Spirit of Christ God-ward, and for God's delight only.

• Out-breathings of desire, and of holy and intelligent exercise, which answer to God's thoughts and purposes of love – prayers which have a true sanctuary character, and which go up to God in the fragrance of the Spirit of Christ.

Lastly, the "onyx stones, and stones to be set in the ephod, and in the breastplate" bring the saints before us according to the way in which they are sustained by Christ as Priest, and carried on His heart before God.

• The saints may be viewed as of divine generation – all alike children in the family of God – or they may be viewed in the diversity which marks them according to divine sovereignty. The stones in the breastplate represent them in the latter character.

• Each stone is diverse from the others; each carries a different ray of the glory and beauty of Christ. Peter is not like John, and John is not like Matthew; each has his own colour and beauty as derived from Christ, but all are held together in the breastplate in the unity of the testimony.

• Each saint is ever on the heart of Christ before God in accord with divine thoughts, and the object of His priestly service is that we should be sustained in the blessedness of those thoughts.

God has given us this wonderful summary of all the elements which go to make up the divine system as an introduction to what He would bring before us as to the tabernacle, which is a type of that system.

• God would have His people enriched, through grace, with the varied apprehensions of Himself and of Christ and of the Spirit that are here suggested. Apprehensions, too, of what the saints are called to be; their places in the divine system; and how they are sustained therein.

• He would have it all to take form in the affections of His saints so that it might become material in our souls for the true tabernacle. It is thus that His people are able to make Him a sanctuary.

• It is all to be constructed of spiritual material – the knowledge of God in Christ, and of all that Christ is as Head, learned in the light of the Spirit's ministry, and of all that the saints are as having come under the anointing, and as reflecting in many-coloured diversity the glory of Christ, and sustained ever by His priestly grace.

• How much energy in the affections is needed to become possessed of these things so as to be able to bring them as a heave-offering!

The contribution of each one was needed, and all had to be brought together.

• There was to be no independency, no breach of unity; each individual contribution had to find its place in relation to the whole. The tabernacle was one united whole, and all had eventually to come under the hand of Moses to be put together.

• The material had first to come from the affections of a devoted people, enriched through grace with that which had value before God, and which was suitable to His dwelling. Then it had to be constructed in the power of the Spirit, answering to spiritual formation. And finally it had to be put together
  • "as Jehovah had commanded Moses".

No type of Christ in Scripture is more wonderful than the ark, and in this chapter it is seen as "the ark of the testimony".

• That is a character of the ark peculiar to the wilderness; it is never spoken of as "the ark of the testimony" after the crossing of Jordan.

• Testimony is not needed in the sphere of resurrection or in heaven, for there is no evil or darkness there. (In Revelation 11: 19 it should read "the ark of his covenant".)

• Testimony is what comes into witness for God in a scene of darkness and contrariety, and every element of that witness is embodied in Christ, so that there is no true testimony except as He is held in our affections.

It is well to remember that in normal conditions the ark had its place in the holiest, and could only be contemplated there.

• I do not think that we could rightly understand what is presented in Exodus 25 except in the light of the holiest.

• Entering into the holiest is not a privilege reserved for very advanced saints; Scripture rather puts it as open to all who have remission of sins. See Hebrews 10: 14-22. If you have remission of sins in the witness of the Spirit you have the freedom of the holiest.

• Now the question is, Have you a true heart? Do you really love the Lord Jesus Christ? If so, you will delight to approach in full assurance of faith, sprinkled as to your heart from a wicked conscience, and washed as to your body with pure water, to contemplate all that Christ is as the Ark of the testimony and the Ark of the covenant.

"The Ark of the covenant" is Christ as the One in whom the love of God is made known, and the perfect answer to that love in a Man. Everything that gives character to the covenant is set forth in Him.

• "The love of God, which is in Christ Jesus", Romans 8: 39

• suggests to my mind the Ark of the covenant. Christ Jesus is the One in whom is perfectly set forth the disposition and thoughts of God man-ward.

• But then we cherish Him, too, as the One in whom all the suited conditions on man's side are secured also. Man is in the presence of the holy love of God in perfect response to it without a cloud or a trace of distance.

• And nothing can separate God's elect from that. It is eternally secured in Christ as the Ark of the covenant.

"The ark of Jehovah" is Christ as the One in whom all the rights of Jehovah are maintained. It is at the Jordan that this title comes in:

• "the ark of Jehovah, the Lord of all the earth", Joshua 3: 13.

• He asserts His title to everything, and maintains it in power. It was the far-reaching power of "the ark of Jehovah" that caused the waters of Jordan to stand "in a heap, very far".

• It was "the ark of Jehovah" that compassed Jericho and brought down its walls.

• And it was before "the ark of Jehovah" that Dagon fell on his face.

• Power completely victorious over all the strength of death and the enemy is seen in the ark under this title.

In the time of Eli they tried to use the ark to secure victory over the Philistines when their own moral condition was not at all in keeping with it, but God would not allow this to succeed.

• They thought they could repeat the triumph of Jericho, but the attempt only ended in disaster; the ark of God was taken.
  • "The ark of God" is a title much used in days when God had not His true place in Israel.

• Its being taken by the Philistines was the departure of glory from Israel. Its being brought back to Bethshemesh by the kine, and afterwards to the city of David by the king, strikingly pictures how all that is due to God has been maintained in the face of His public dishonour here.

• Christ has restored that which He took not away. He has brought it back in a path of suffering love, but of complete devotedness, which ended in the offering up of Himself.

• In a coming day as the true Solomon He will bring it all to its proper and public honour.

• In the meantime the place of the ark in the house of Abinadab on the hill, and in the house of Obed-Edom the Gittite, and "in the midst of the tent that David had spread for it", suggests
  • different aspects in which Christ is cherished and honoured before the day of His public recognition as Centre and Head of all things in the dispensation of the fulness of times.

In the wilderness the ark went before the people to search out a resting-place for them.

• But in moving forward there is always sure to be conflict. Hence, when the ark set forward, Moses said,
  • "Rise up, Jehovah, and let thine enemies be scattered; and let them that hate thee flee before thy face".

• But when the ark rested there was restful enjoyment for the time of the presence of Jehovah, so Moses said,
  • "Return, Jehovah, unto the myriads of the thousands of Israel", Numbers 10: 33-36.

• If the two and a half tribes had really been identified in their affections with the ark they would not have wanted to stop on the wrong side of Jordan when the ark went over.

The ark was to be made of acacia-wood.

• This speaks of a holy and incorruptible humanity brought in by the power of the Holy Ghost, and in which everything was suitable for the setting forth of the glory of God in a Man.

• There is clearly a difference between the acacia-wood, and the pure gold with which it was covered. The acacia-wood sets forth the kind of Man that Christ was as begotten in the virgin of the Holy Ghost.
  • "The Holy Spirit shall come upon thee, and power of the Highest overshadow thee, wherefore the holy thing also which shall be born shall be called Son of God", Luke 1: 35.

• There was nothing in Him but what was suitable for the Spirit of God to come into contact with. Everything inwardly and outwardly was of such a character that the Holy Spirit of God could descend upon Him and abide on Him.

• But then this was in view of all that God was being expressed in a Man, and this is the gold. The acacia-wood and the gold came into most intimate contact in the type, though clearly distinguishable one from the other, and we see what answers to both in Christ – perfection in Manhood, and the setting forth of all that God is in a Man.

"A border of gold" is on the ark, the table, and the golden altar. It indicates something which applies in a distinctive way to these three types.

• The ark is that of the testimony,

• the table speaks of an order and administration in which the people of God are maintained before Him in accord with the testimony,

• and the golden altar teaches us that all is sustained by intercession – by the activity of dependent affections.

• The "border of gold" – a double border in the case of the table – is in each case "round about". It seems to intimate that the apprehension of Christ in each type is to be held in the soul as surrounded – one might say, guarded – by a distinct sense of the divine glory of His Person.

• This is essential to any right thought of the testimony or the covenant, and it is essential to all priestly intercession, and the type would suggest that it is doubly essential, if one may say so, to any true communion of saints in accord with divine order and administration.

• This will come before us, if God will, when we consider the table.

Then the "rings" and the "staves" – whether on the ark or the other things – tell us plainly that all was intended to be carried.

• Everything that is of God, every divine thought that has been made good in Christ, is to be carried in testimony through the wilderness. This is an important part of Levitical service, and it has to be carried out under priestly direction.

• It is the privilege of all who have the Spirit to be Kohathites, and to bear the most holy vessels, but how far we are spiritually competent to take up this service is another matter.
  • "Be ye clean, that bear the vessels of Jehovah", Isaiah 52: 11, is a very important word in this connection.

No one is debarred from being a Kohathite if he has desire and affection to take up this service. But only sanctified persons can take charge of the ark.

• The men of Kirjath-Jearim had a sense of what was due to the ark when they hallowed Abinadab's son Eleazar to keep it. 1 Samuel 7: 1.

• I do not think that Uzzah was a hallowed person; his touching the ark was not a hallowed touch, so "he died by the ark of God", 2 Samuel 6: 7.

• Indeed, putting the ark on "a new cart" was not at all "after the due order"; such an expedient might be allowed in Philistines, but not in David.

• The religious world uses many "new carts", but woe betide us if we depart from "the due order".

When the ark was brought into the temple the staves seem to have been partly removed to indicate that its journeyings were over, and it was now in rest.

• But "the ends of the staves were seen from the holy place before the oracle", 1 Kings 8: 8.

• Every divine thought will be brought to fruition and rest as manifested in glory, but it will never be forgotten amid the holy splendour of the kingdom that all was once carried in testimony through a scene of difficulty.

• It will never be forgotten that saints have carried the ark in testimony for two thousand years before it was brought to the place of its rest. There will be no burden-bearing then; so that we find each family of the Levites taking its part in the service of song.

• But even in the wilderness the ark was not always being carried. From time to time it sought out a resting-place for the people. That answers to the coming together in assembly, where it may be realized that:

"The Spirit's power
Has ope'd the heavenly door,
Has brought us to that favoured hour
When toil shall all be o'er". (Hymn 74)

"And thou … shalt put in the ark the testimony that I shall give thee".

• In chapters 19 and 24 the law is spoken of as the covenant, and morally the covenant comes before the testimony. That is, we must know the covenant before we can be really identified with the testimony.

• The covenant is private rather than public; it is the bond between God and His people, the terms proposed by Him and definitely accepted by them as committed to Him in affection.

• If we are not in "the bond of the covenant", how could we be identified with the testimony? The testimony is the public witness on God's part. As written with His finger on
  • "the two tables of testimony, tables of stone", Exodus 31: 18,

• it signifies that His will is to prevail universally. But this was to be brought about by the introduction of One who could say,
  • "Behold, I come, in the volume of the book it is written of me, To do thy good pleasure, my God, is my delight, and thy law is within my heart", Psalm 40: 7-8.

The will of God – His good pleasure – has come into the world as having its place in the heart of Christ, and just as everything in the tabernacle centred in the ark, and, one might say, took character from it,

• so Christ has come in to be the Head and Centre of God's moral universe, and to give character to everything that stands in relation to Him.

• At the present moment God is giving testimony to His good pleasure by setting forth Christ as the One who came to do it. Hebrews 10 is a wonderful setting forth of the will of God as brought in and established by Christ.

Christ is the Ark of the testimony. The will of God has come into the world in a way of supreme blessing for man.

• Every man may now be blessed in Christ according to the good pleasure of God without any compromise of what is due to God.

• To believe in Christ is to accept His Headship, and to be blessed in Him according to the wealth of God's good pleasure.

• But if the divine testimony is refused or disregarded, judgment is inevitable, for God's will must prevail. If man's lawless will is not judged and set aside in repentance, in presence of all the blessedness of God's will made known in Christ, it must go out as expelled from His presence in judgment. It is utterly unfit to have a place with Him; it cannot be part of the reconciled universe.

How blessed to get an apprehension of Christ as the Ark of the testimony! To see Him as the One who not only delighted to do God's will personally, but as great enough to give effect to God's pleasure in relation to men, and indeed to all things.

• It is God's pleasure that men should be blessed through believing in Him who has come to give effect to His will in a scene of lawlessness. Those who believe on Him receive His Spirit, and are thus brought into moral accord with Him.

• They then delight to contemplate Christ as the Ark of the testimony – to see in Him the expression of God's blessed will, and to know that He will make that will the law of the universe.

• The will of God is known in Christ as a will to bless man infinitely, so that, though fallen and lost through sin, he may know God as One who willed his blessing, and who sent forth One who came in obedience and love to establish that will.

• Christ is the great Testimony of what is in the will of God for man, and indeed for the universe. God has made Him the Head of every man, the Head of all principality and authority, the Head over all things. Everything must take character from Christ; this is God's great testimony in His universe.

Christ coming to do the will of God, and with God's law in His heart, was with a view to God being known as sovereign in mercy.

• The Ark of the testimony sustains the Mercy-seat, and from above the Mercy-seat God speaks with the Mediator, and through Him to His people.

"Thou shalt make a mercy-seat of pure gold". God sets forth in the Mercy-seat what is altogether of Himself, hence it is of "pure gold".

• It supposes utter and hopeless ruin on man's side, so that nothing but mercy will meet the case; everything must stand in mercy. It is God coming out according to what He is in Himself when His creature has become fallen and lost.

• It is the setting forth of God's righteousness in the way of mercy, but it is founded on the fact that His will has been established in Christ. The Ark supports the Mercy-seat.

It is through death that Christ has become the Mercy-seat; the blood is on the gold.

• Man being what he is, and God being what He is, death was a necessity if God's rights in mercy were to be established.
  • "The redemption which is in Christ Jesus; whom God has set forth a mercy-seat, through faith in his blood,

    "for the shewing forth of his righteousness in the present time, so that he should be just, and justify him that is of the faith of Jesus", Romans 3: 24-26.

Nothing is more wonderful than that God should assert His sovereign rights in the way of mercy and grace. The Mercy-seat was sustained and measured by the Ark of the testimony.

• God has brought in One by whom His will has been done, and by whom His pleasure will be established in the whole universe. It is in Him that God sets forth His righteousness in the way of mercy.

• Christ coming to do the will of God involved the removal of man after the flesh, and the glorifying of God as to all that that man was, and had done, and this becomes the support of the Mercy-seat.

It was a wonderful moment when God had Christ here under His eye. We can understand the heavenly host saying,

• "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good pleasure in men".

• The Ark was there, and everything was secured for God and man; the sure pledge of everything was there; an unshakable pillar for the support of God's moral universe. But all this involved His death; we can only read the Gospels rightly in the light of His death.

• The Epistles really prepare us for the Gospels, for they show us – Romans for example – how every question that was connected with our guilt and state has been met, and that sets us free to come to the Gospels and contemplate that wonderful Person who is the Ark of the covenant and the Ark of the testimony.

• Then in the light of the Epistles and the Gospels we can take up the Old Testament Scriptures and see how "the things concerning himself" are everywhere and presented with most instructive detail, and in moral connections that add greatly to our apprehensions of Christ.

Then the two cherubim of gold were to be made "out of the mercy-seat … at the two ends thereof".

• The only place where cherubim had appeared before was as guarding the way to the tree of life. Genesis 3. Man, as fallen, could not be allowed access to the tree of life to perpetuate a sinful life upon the earth.

• But the cherubim are seen here in a very different character. In Genesis 3 they were found with "the flame of the flashing sword", but what is made prominent here is their outstretched wings over the mercy-seat.

• I think the cherubim are representative of what must ever be attendant on God's throne; they enforce in a judicial way what is morally suitable to all the attributes of God.
  • "Righteousness and judgment are the foundation of thy throne".

• The seraphim seem to be more identified with the divine nature; they ascribe holiness to God, and fly with the swiftness of divine love. Isaiah 6.

• But when God comes out as revealed in Christ according to what He is in His nature, it is seen that all His attributes are in perfect accord with mercy. His throne can take publicly the character of a Mercy-seat, and be glorified in doing so.

• The cherubim were to be made "out of the mercy-seat", and they were to cover it over with their wings. In Christ and through His death all God's attributes are seen to be in accord with what is in His heart. God's rights in mercy are secured and protected by all His attributes. As we sing:

"The glories that compose thy Name
All stand engaged to make us blest". (Hymn 330)

His righteousness, and all that is concerned in His moral government of the universe, are in harmony with His sovereign mercy. How could this be, save through the death of Christ?

• We can understand it now, but it is divinely wonderful, and it claims adoration and praise from every heart that perceives it.

"Toward the mercy-seat shall the faces of the cherubim be turned".

• They were not to look outward to take account, as it were, of man's state or guilt,
  • but inward and downward on that "pure gold" which ever carried, as we know, the blood sprinkled there on the day of atonement.

• The righteousness of God is not at the present moment taking account of men's sins and their state for judgment, but is taking account of the infinite value of the blood of Christ, so that men universally are in God's view from the standpoint of Christ and His death.

• Justification, forgiveness, reconciliation, are God's thoughts – what He has in His heart – for all men. People do not believe it, but it is so. God would be known by all men as having come out in Christ, and as having secured His rights in mercy through the death of Christ. He is a Saviour God; it is His glory to be so.

Then it is "from above the mercy-seat, from between the two cherubim which are upon the ark of the testimony", that God speaks.

• All that He has to say to men at the present time is from thence, whether it be to His people or to men universally. The Mediator is introduced also.
  • "There will I meet with thee, and will speak with thee".

• God is speaking to men by Christ, and all that He says is in keeping with what Christ is as the Ark and the Mercy-seat. It is the speaking out of all that God is in supreme and infinite grace. And it can be spoken because the testimony is in the Ark.

• God's will has been done, His glory and all that was due to Him maintained even as to sin, the man that was an offence to Him removed. The Ark with the testimony in it is the support of the Mercy-seat, and the wings of the cherubim cover it.

"God's righteousness with glory bright,
Which with its radiance fills that sphere,
E'en Christ, of God the power and light,
Our title is that light to share.

O mind divine, so must it be
That glory all belongs to God:
O love divine, that did decree
We should be part, through Jesus' blood.

O keep us, love divine, near Thee,
That we our nothingness may know,
And ever to Thy glory be
Walking in faith while here below". (Hymn 88)

The set feasts in Leviticus 23 are repeatedly spoken of as "an everlasting statute", and so are the dressing of the lamps, and the eating of the shew-bread by Aaron and his sons. But placing the shew-bread before Jehovah is

• "on the part of the children of Israel: an everlasting covenant".

• There is in it the thought of a bond between God and His people; it seems to indicate the pleasure of God in having Christ thus before Him as identified with His people, and also their pleasure in taking up and answering to His thought.

The word "continually" suggests to me what abides under the eye of God.

• "And it shall be a bread of remembrance".

• The saints in divine order, as typified by the cakes of shew-bread, become the memorial of Christ before God. It is said that Moses "arranged the bread in order" upon the table before Jehovah, or, as it is literally,
  • "set in order upon it the order of bread", Exodus 40: 22-23.

• The "order" is emphasized, and I think we are justified in saying that any order which is pleasing to God must be a spiritual order, and not merely outward correctness.

• The bread on the table does not typify what is before men, nor does it speak quite of what the saints are as set together in fellowship for the support of the testimony in a hostile scene. We shall come to that presently in other types.

• But here it is what the saints are as sustained by Christ, having Him as their life, and carrying His fragrance – as having frankincense upon each row, Leviticus 24: 5-9 – under God's eye for His pleasure.

• It is in keeping, if I understand it aright, with the truth as presented in the Epistle to the Colossians – the spiritual order of the saints as under God's eye.
  • "I am with you in spirit, rejoicing and seeing your order".

• What was before Paul was that the Colossian saints should hold fast
  • "the head, from whom all the body, ministered to and united together by the joints and bands", should increase "with the increase of God".

• He would have the body to come into view, and a spiritual order that was in keeping with the mystery, not exactly for testimony but for the pleasure of God.

Christ is presented in Colossians as "the head of all principality and authority".

• The universe will be set in order for the divine pleasure under His headship, but before He is manifested in this character
  • "He is the head of the body, the assembly".

• He sustains a spiritual order of things which is for the pleasure of God – the continuation of Christ here in His body for God's delight – the bread of remembrance before Him.

• There is no spiritual order for God's pleasure in Israel yet; there will be in another day;
  • but in the meantime Gentile saints as sustained by Christ and holding Him as Head, are before God, having Him as their life, and having His fragrant grace upon them, Colossians 3: 12-17, and they are for God's delight – His elect, holy and beloved.

• They will soon be manifested with Christ in glory to be in universal administration – the number twelve speaks of this – but all that is in divine order, and suitable to be in administration for God, has come before His eye already in His saints.

I am speaking of the divine thought; I do not say how much or how little it has been spiritually made good in us. We see the deep exercises of the Apostle as to this.

• But God puts it before us as His thought in regard to us that we may be exercised about it. If Paul and Epaphras agonized for the saints it might be well if we, too, laboured fervently in prayer that we and all saints might stand perfect and complete in all that is in God's will for us.

The loaves on the "pure table" suggest that it is God's will that all His people should be before Him in spiritual order as a remembrance of Christ.

• This order and memorial would come out very much in the way we walk together, and in all our mutual relations as saints.

• I am not thinking, for the moment, of testimony, but of those holy bonds and relations in the divine nature, and that mutual flow of nourishment, encouragement, increase, and knitting together which are delightful to God as developing before Him the present fruit of the Headship of Christ in the saints as His body.

• It is this side of things which I believe to be suggested in the table and "the bread of the presence". It is a great thing when exercise is found with saints as to what is before God for His pleasure.
  • "Shew-bread before me continually".

• The consideration of this would give an entirely different character to the exercises of many of us.

The table is typical of Christ as the One who can sustain His saints in a divine and spiritual order for the pleasure of God. But for this to be brought about in reality He must be held as Head.

• I think the way that Paul enlarges upon the greatness and glory of Christ in Colossians 1 very much answers to the "border of gold round about" the table. He would have us to know the divine glory of the Head. Then, again, it is said,
  • "Thou shalt make for it a margin of a handbreadth round about".

• The word here translated "margin" is found in Psalm 18: 45 and Micah 7: 17, where the marginal reading is in each case "fortified places". It suggests a necessity for the defence and safeguarding of all that the "pure table" represents. Paul says,
  • "To the end that we may present every man perfect in Christ. Whereunto also I toil, combating according to his working, which works in me in power.

    "For I would have you know what combat I have for you … to the end that their hearts may be encouraged, being united together in love, and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, to the full knowledge of the mystery of God; in which are hid all the treasures of wisdom and of knowledge.

    "And I say this to the end that no one may delude you by persuasive speech … . See that there be no one who shall lead you away as a prey through philosophy and vain deceit, according to the teaching of men, according to the elements of the world, and not according to Christ".

• All this seems to me to be in keeping with the thought suggested by the "margin" or "fortified place" round about the table. And then he adds what may answer to the "border of gold for the margin thereof round about" when he says,
  • "For in him dwells all the fulness of the Godhead bodily; and ye are complete in him, who is the head of all principality and authority".

In the spiritual order which Christ sustains for the pleasure of God, everything is really of Himself.

• "Christ is everything and in all".

• If we have before us that there is such an order, it becomes a deep exercise that nothing should be admitted that is contrary to it. Hence the combating of Paul and Epaphras for the Colossians.

• The enemy has ever sought, and ever will seek, to bring in that which would mar the spiritual order by the introduction of elements which are not according to Christ, so as to spoil God's pleasure in His saints.

• If the will and wisdom of man are kept out, and nothing allowed but what is of Christ, the saints as holding the Head would be for God's pleasure; they would be sustained in holy and divine order.

God would teach us by the "pure table" the ability of Christ as Head to sustain the saints in a spiritual order for His pleasure. His body, deriving from Him, carries His graces for God's pleasure.

• To hold the Head is an exercise of affection. We do not become pleasurable to God by effort, but by holding Christ as Head in reverence and affection.

• It is as much the mind of God that we should be before Him for His pleasure in a spiritual order as that we should be justified. The more we see this, and perceive the greatness and divine glory of Christ who can sustain His saints in such an order, the more jealously shall we watch against every intrusion of what is unholy and of man's mind.

• In that which Christ sustains in all the grace of Headship there is nothing but what is of Himself.
  • "Wherein there is not Greek and Jew, circumcision and uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, bondman, freeman; but Christ is everything and in all", Colossians 3: 11.

It is the aspect of the table God-ward that is the subject in Exodus. It has not only the shew-bread, but

• "the dishes thereof, and cups thereof, and goblets thereof, and bowls thereof, with which to pour out: of pure gold shalt thou make them".

• These things speak of the saints as holy vessels for the outpouring before God of joy and praise, everything in His service being by the Spirit of God and thus answering to "pure gold", and all sustained by Christ.

• All is seen in the type according to the purity and perfection of the divine thought, that we may know the true character of what is pleasurable to God. To answer to it spiritually requires the taking up of the exercises of Colossians 3: 5-15.

We learn from Leviticus 24 that the cakes of shew-bread were twelve in number. This suggests an administrative thought. It intimates that what is pleasurable to God will be set in administration for God.

• The holy city in Revelation 21 answers perfectly to measurement by the "golden reed"; it comes up to every requirement of divine pleasure; and hence it can become the great centre of divine administration. God intends to order and benefit the universe by setting forth all that is of Himself in His saints.

• The blessed knowledge of God as known in the Ark and Mercy-seat will be administered in the universe through the twelve gates of the holy city. The out-goings of the city are towards "the twelve tribes of the sons of Israel", for their names are inscribed at the gates thereof. And on earth the twelve tribes will have an administrative place towards the nations.

• Divine order will appear in the universe where lawlessness has been; it will be seen in the holy and heavenly city, and it will be seen on earth in the twelve tribes, and its influence will extend to all that comes into reconciliation. All will be sustained by Christ as Head, for God's
  • "good pleasure which he purposed in himself for the administration of the fulness of times" is "to head up all things in the Christ, the things in the heavens and the things upon the earth".

Israel will then have the Spirit of Christ, and as having the law written in their hearts they will be in divine order and administration. God will be able to say of them,

• "This people have I formed for myself"

• – that would answer to the "shew-bread before me" – then
  • "they shall shew forth my praise" would answer to the administrative place in which He will set them.

The sabbath day prefigures the rest of God when all this will come to fruition.

• "Every Sabbath day he shall arrange it before Jehovah continually".

• It is striking that the only two priestly activities specially connected with the Sabbath day are the offering of "the burnt-offering of the sabbath" with its meat-offering and drink-offering, Numbers 28: 9-10, and the arranging and eating of the shew-bread.

• One gives the ground on which the rest of God will be brought in, and the other is typical of the divine order in which Israel will be sustained before God for His pleasure, and in administration for Him.

The table sets forth Christ, I believe, in His ability to sustain His saints in an order of things which is of Himself, and which is, in the first place, pleasurable to God, and which can then be in administration for God.

• Before the day when all this will have its answer in Israel, it has an answer spiritually in saints of the assembly as they hold Christ as Head.

• One owns with sorrow the feebleness and departure which are evidenced on all hands. But strength and recovery are brought about by a return to the divine thought.
  • The revival of the truth of the Headship of Christ is the distinctive feature of God's present ways with His saints,

• and as we hold Him as Head, the different features suggested as sustained by the table – the bread of the presence, the vessels for out-pouring before God, and the divine administration – will assuredly be in evidence.

At the end of each week the shew-bread became the food of Aaron and his sons. What is before God for His pleasure becomes food for the priesthood.

• All that Christ is as identified with His saints, and as giving character to them for God's pleasure, is to be fed upon. The saints viewed as the priesthood are privileged to feed upon it – to appropriate what Christ is, not only in what He is personally,
  • but in what He is as in relation to those "reconciled in the body of his flesh through death", and whom He presents "holy and unblameable and irreproachable before" the Fulness of the Godhead.

• God would have us to be nourished and sustained by all that which was so perfectly to His delight as seen in Christ personally, but which is now to His delight as seen in His elect saints, holy and beloved, the continuation of Christ as His body here. If we feed on this we shall understand the mystery, and know that His body is here, which is the assembly.

We may see in 1 Corinthians 10 how Paul passes from the thought of "the body of the Christ" – referring to Christ personally – to the thought of the saints being

• "one loaf, one body; for we all partake of that one loaf".

• The shew-bread is Christ in His continuing character. The word "continually" is to be noted, and it is "on the part of the children of Israel". It is that which is carried on "continually" here on the part of the saints for God's pleasure.

• It is good to feed on this in a holy place – to be nourished and strengthened by the appropriation of it into one's moral being.

It is the privilege of the priests to feed on Christ in many different characters – as the meat-offering, as the sin-offering, as the breast and shoulder of the peace-offering, as the consecration offering – but the last to be presented in Leviticus is feeding on Him as the shew-bread.

• It involves for us, if we are able to take it up, the knowledge of the mystery, and personal identification with it, so that we come out here as strengthened for the expression of Christ under the eye of God.

• Just as we are built up and strengthened physically by what we feed on, so are we built up and strengthened spiritually by what is given to us as priestly food, so that we may take character from it.

But this is not found in Exodus. It is the table as sustaining what is upon it, whether it be the golden vessels or the shew-bread.

• It is Christ as the One who sustains every vessel from which there is an out-pouring of joy and praise in God's service, and who sustains "continually" that which is a pleasure to God as the continuation of Himself in His saints.

Aaron had to light the lamps "between the two evenings", Exodus 30: 8, and they burned "from evening to morning", Leviticus 24: 3.

• I take it that the lamp-stand and its lamps speak of Christ as sustaining light for His saints "continually" by the ministry of Himself in the power of the Holy Ghost. For it is to be noted that the lamps were to shine out before the lamp-stand, Exodus 25: 37, and
  • "the seven lamps shall give light over against the lamp-stand", Numbers 8: 2.

• This seems to intimate that the primary object of the lamps was to throw light on the lamp-stand itself.

• Then we read further in chapter 26: 35 that the lamp-stand was to be "opposite to the table"; this would seem to suggest that the saints as represented by the shew-bread on the table – are to be continually in the shining of the lamps.

The ministry of Christ by the Spirit is not sustained without much exercise. It is not as if Christ and the Spirit were acting directly without vessels;

• they act through human vessels, whether it be primarily the apostles and prophets, or other gifts and vessels of ministry.

• This brings in an element of exercise connected with what is divinely wrought, so that there may be spiritual competency to minister Christ through the way in which God has made Him known in the affections and spiritual intelligence of His servants. I think the "beaten work" speaks of this, and we may also note what is said in chapter 27: 20,
  • "And thou shalt command the children of Israel, that they bring thee olive oil, pure, beaten, for the light, to light the lamp continually".

• The same character attaches to the oil as to the lamp-stand. While the oil clearly typifies the Spirit, it is the Spirit viewed as acting through human vessels, and therefore there must always be the element of exercise and diligence, so that what is of Christ and the Spirit may be known and preserved in purity, and the candlestick may truly answer to its description as "the pure candlestick".

The "beaten work" was the result of patient and skilful labour – a striking contrast to the golden calf which was cast in a mould.

• What is idolatrous, or according to man's mind, can be quickly and easily cast into shape,
  • but for the shining forth of what is of Christ in the power of the Spirit there must be "beaten work" and "beaten oil".

• It suggests spiritual exercises leading to apprehensions of the preciousness of Christ which become available in ministry as light. It is only as "the unsearchable riches of the Christ" are known that they can become available as light in the holy place.

• We see in the apostles men who were divinely wrought, and had apprehensions and appreciations of Christ which they ministered as light amongst the saints, and this ministry of Christ is to be maintained "continually".

• It was the first service and care of Aaron and his sons – the priestly family – "to light the lamp continually", 27: 20-21.

The children of Israel had to furnish the lamp-oil. A people giving place to the Spirit, and walking in self-judgment, are spiritual, and support the light.

• Praying in the Holy Ghost is a good way to supply oil for the light. Many prayers are just the expression of personal needs, but it is a blessed thing to get into the line of desires which are formed in the Holy Ghost so that one prays in the Spirit for Christ's interests, and for the ministry of Himself.

• That the ministry of Christ in the power of the Spirit should be maintained is the first care of the holy priesthood. The state of a carnal people, instead of ministering to the light, really hinders the light from shining.
  • "And I, brethren, have not been able to speak to you as to spiritual, but as to fleshly; as to babes in Christ", 1 Corinthians 3: 1.

Then it is a priestly exercise to dress the lamps, and to use "the snuffers thereof, and the snuff-trays thereof, of pure gold".

• The provision of such utensils shows that the lamp-stand and its lamps typify Christ as ministered by the Holy Ghost through human vessels. If it were Christ personally one need hardly say there would be no need for "snuffers", nor if the Spirit were viewed apart from the vessels in which He dwells.

• But if it speaks of the ministry of Christ maintained by the Spirit as light through human vessels, one can understand that an element of responsibility comes in, and a constant need for the golden "snuffers" and "snuff-trays". They speak of the careful removal of everything that would tend to dim the light.

• In 1 Corinthians Paul was using the golden snuffers to remove that which was causing the light to burn dim, but in 2 Corinthians I think we may say he was rather replenishing the lamps with oil!

The ministry of the apostles was a pure and unadulterated ministry of Christ.

• They had been called to know Him in a peculiar and blessed way, their knowledge of Christ was divinely wrought, and their own exercises and the way they were instructed and disciplined in view of their service all had the "beaten work" character
  • and it resulted in their ability to set forth Christ in ministry in the power of the Holy Ghost, so that though Christ was personally absent He was maintained in ministry as light in the holy place.

• And we see what care they exercised that nothing should dim the light.
  • "Giving no manner of offence in anything, that the ministry be not blamed; but in everything commending ourselves as God's ministers, in much endurance, in afflictions … in watchings, in fastings, in pureness, in knowledge, in long-suffering, in kindness, in the Holy Ghost, in love unfeigned, in the word of truth, in the power of God …", 2 Corinthians 6: 3-7.

Christ as known in the ministry of the apostles is the light of the holy place.

• The Holy Spirit came to bring all things to their remembrance whatsoever He had said to them, and He came also to be the witness of all that He is at the right hand of God.

• That Divine Person in whose power the apostles presented Christ in ministry is still here to glorify Christ.

• It should be a great exercise with us that nothing should be allowed which would hinder or grieve Him, and that Christ should be so known in the affections of His own that the ministry of Himself should be maintained in spiritual completeness – seven lamps would speak of this – and in undimmed brightness and purity.

• The seven lamps would suggest that the ministry of Christ by the Spirit comes out in its perfection through different vessels. We see this very distinctly in the apostles, and in principle it is so still.

The "base" of the lamp-stand – it is, literally, "thigh" – would suggest, I think, the truth as to His Person and work which is the strength and support of everything that is contained in the ministry of Christ.

• Its "branches" would indicate the widespread scope of all that is presented in that ministry.

• The "cups" in six series of three, and in one series of four, would perhaps speak in figure of the divine and universal supply which the fulness of Christ affords, and which is made known in the ministry of Himself.

The "knobs" or "chapiters" are closely connected with the "flowers". I understand that the word signifies the ornamental work at the head of a sculptured column.

• The only other places where it occurs are Amos 9: 1 and Zephaniah 2: 14. Amos 9: 1 speaks of that which is elevated and conspicuous in Israel being smitten, and in Zephaniah 2: 14 it is the pride and glory of Nineveh which are seen to be given over to the pelican and the bittern.

• The prophets thus show how the "chapiters" – everything that appeared to be eminent and glorious – both in Israel and among the Gentiles will be laid low.

• But the Spirit of God shows us in Exodus 25 "chapiters" on the lamp-stand, suggesting the dignity and eminence which attach to Christ as the One who, though cast aside as worthless by men, will yet be "the head of the corner".

• Everything that is rightly conspicuous, and that has true beauty and ornament, and is suited for elevation to the supreme place, is seen in Christ, and is ministered by the Spirit in the holy place as attaching to Him.

The "flowers" suggest a corresponding thought. This word is used of the lily-blossoms on the rim of Solomon's brazen sea, and of the blossom which appeared on Aaron's rod. Numbers 17: 8. In each of these cases its reference to Christ is as obvious as it is in the lamp-stand.

• There are only three other occurrences of the word.
  • "Their blossom shall go up as dust; for they have rejected the law of Jehovah of hosts, and despised the word of the Holy One of Israel", Isaiah 5: 24. That is Judah and Jerusalem.

  • "For before the harvest, when the blossoming is over and the flower becometh a ripening grape, he shall both cut off the sprigs with pruning-knives, and take away and cut down the branches", Isaiah 18: 5.

    That is the end of all that may be done by the "land shadowing with wings" to restore the Jews to their own land. All human attempts to restore them will end in failure and judgment.

  • "Bashan languisheth, and Carmel, and the flower of Lebanon languisheth", Nahum 1: 4. These are the most fertile spots naturally.

• It is striking that in each case the "flower" is seen as withered to dust, or as cut off, or as languishing.

• But when we turn to the lamp-stand we see "flowers" of perennial beauty and freshness, for they are brought forth in the power of an endless life.

• The "almonds" carry our thoughts to Numbers 17, where Aaron's staff "for the house of Levi" had budded and brought forth buds, and bloomed blossoms – same word as "flowers" in Exodus 25 – and "ripened almonds".

• For the dead staff thus to bring forth is a clear type of resurrection, and the lamp-stand is marked by the sign of resurrection. It is Christ as the Risen One who is set forth in it, and everything in Him is beyond the reach of death; it is unfading and eternal.

"Almond" means "watchful" or "vigilant", and is used with this signification in Jeremiah 1: 11-12.

• "And I said, I see a rod of an almond tree. And Jehovah said unto me, Thou hast well seen; for I am watchful over my word to perform it".

• God has seen to it that His every word and promise has been substantiated in a Risen Christ.

• It is of interest to know that the almond-tree is the first of all trees to bud. If everything fails and comes to the dust of death in connection with man in the flesh, God has seen to it that all His thoughts and purposes have been established in Christ Risen. Everything there is glorious, incorruptible, and unfading.

Christ is the Subject of all true ministry, and He is also the Sustainer of it, so that it becomes the blessed evidence that He is alive for evermore.

• The gifts come from an ascended Christ, and their presence and ministry bears witness that Christ is victorious and living.

It is noticeable that no dimensions are given of the lamp-stand, but its weight is specified.

• "Of a talent of pure gold shall they make it".

• All true ministry of Christ must be marked by moral weight in itself and in its ministers; there can be no levity about it. "Did I then use lightness?"

It is helpful to see the different connections in which the lighting of the lamps is referred to. In Exodus 25 they throw their light on the lamp-stand itself; this is the primary thought.

• The Spirit is here to glorify Christ, to display every feature of His glory and beauty, and to cause it to be illumed by living light. Whenever a priest entered the holy place at night the first object to arrest and engage his attention must have been the golden lamp-stand shining in the light of its seven lamps.

• The Spirit's ministry makes Christ the all-glorious and attractive Object in the holy place.

Then in Exodus 26: 35 we are told the lamp-stand was to be set "opposite to the table".

• This would suggest that the saints, as represented by the cakes of shew-bread, are set in the shining of Christ as made known by the Spirit's ministry.

Numbers 8 gives the lighting of the lamps immediately before the cleansing of the Levites,

• indicating that all service must be regulated in the light of the ministry of Christ, and must take character from it.

Then in Leviticus 24 the command as to the light is repeated in another and a solemn connection.

• Here it precedes the account of the man – product of an unholy alliance between an Israelitish woman and an Egyptian – who blasphemed the Name. This speaks of apostasy. But even at such a time the lamp is to be kept burning.

• We can discern in our own day in an unmistakable manner the working and development of elements which are really apostate. But in presence of such conditions the ministry of Christ is to be maintained in its purity and spiritual power.

• It is the divine antidote to every evil of the last days in a corrupt profession. It is an abiding exercise for all the people of God, and for the holy priesthood, that it should be maintained. And we may note what is said in Exodus 30: 7-8. Referring to the golden altar, it is said,
  • "And Aaron shall burn thereon fragrant incense; every morning, when he dresseth the lamps, he shall burn the incense. And when Aaron lighteth the lamps between the two evenings, he shall burn the incense – a continual incense before Jehovah throughout your generations".

• This speaks of continual prayer in connection with the continual light, and it indicates plainly that the ministry of Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit is maintained by priestly intercession.

• How much Paul prayed, and how earnestly he sought the prayers of the saints! It is our privilege to keep the light burning through the activity of dependent affections.

The seven golden lamp-stands in the Revelation represent the assemblies as in responsible witness here. They show that the assemblies, as being in the light of the ministry of Christ, were set to be light-bearers here.

• And as such all the exercises connected with the pure lamp-stand should have had place with them – the "beaten work", and the supply of "beaten oil", the diligent use of the golden snuffers to remove every element that tended to dim the light, the "continual incense" of prayer.

• Had these exercises been maintained, the seven lamps would have retained their truly "golden" character; the assemblies would have been characterized by what was spiritual and divine; and their state and activities would have been the practical answer to that ministry of Christ which is the light of the holy place.

• The assemblies should have corresponded with "the pure lamp-stand" of the sanctuary. That they have not done so is made manifest in Revelation 2 and 3.

But the Lord has restored, and maintains in the sovereignty of His love, a ministry of Himself in the power of the Spirit.

• There are still, through His grace, priestly exercises and activities, and vessels through whom Christ is ministered. The lamps are still shedding their holy light on the pure Lamp-stand.

• And as we appreciate that ministry, and take up the exercises which it involves, we shall be found overcomers. The overcomer is one who rises superior to the influences which have dimmed the light, and as we do so there is that which, in its measure, shines in light-bearing character in this dark scene.

Now in chapter 26 we come to the tabernacle in which the things spoken of in chapter 25 were to be contained.

• The ten curtains are spoken of as "the tabernacle",

• the eleven curtains of goats' hair are the "tent over the tabernacle",

• and the rams' skins and badgers' skins are called coverings.

I believe the ten curtains – each twenty-eight cubits – seven by four long and four cubits in breadth – represent the saints seen in spiritual completeness as those suited to cherish the great divine realities set forth in the ark, mercy-seat, table, and lamp-stand.

• The tent of goats' hair, and the two coverings, suggest that which is needed to preserve the tabernacle from defilement or injury.

• The boards are for the support of the tabernacle; that is, to hold up the ten curtains. They speak of the saints as marked by stability, each set up on the firm basis of two silver sockets, and able to stand up.

• I think Romans would give us the saints viewed as boards; Colossians and Ephesians would more answer to the ten curtains.

• The veil is clearly Christ personally. Hebrews 10: 20. There are no "couplings", "loops", or "clasps" in the veil; it is one fabric – holy type of the flesh of Christ.

But the curtains correspond with the veil. They represent saints viewed as having taken character from Christ – as having put on the new man.

• John says, "which thing is true in him and in you".

• But the order of description is different in the veil from the curtains.

• In the veil the "blue" comes first, indicating that the first thing as to Christ is that He is the heavenly One – the One out of heaven; but in the curtains the "twined byssus" comes first; righteousness must be the basis of all the features that mark the saints.

• If we are not marked by righteousness it is evident that we shall not carry the heavenly colour. The "twined byssus" speaks of the fine and even texture of a life in which all that is due to God and to man has its place.

• Then the "blue" comes in – what is characteristically heavenly.

• "Purple" signifies royalty; the saints are to reign with Christ, but it is not the reigning time yet; the royal character comes out at the present time in the way of suffering.
  • "If we endure we shall also reign together".

• "Scarlet" is the true glory of man in contrast to all that is vainglory.

• The "cherubim" speak of ability to discern and judge things according to God's mind.
  • Paul told the saints at Corinth that they would judge the world and angels. It was a strange thing that such persons should carry their differences before the world's tribunal for adjustment. If saints were to judge the world, surely they could settle a petty dispute between two brothers! The "cherubim" were not in evidence as they ought to have been.

• But "artistic work" is needed for this feature. The saints must be "full-grown men, who, on account of habit, have their senses exercised for distinguishing both good and evil", Hebrews 5: 14.

All these moral and official glories were seen perfectly in Christ, and as the saints come under His influence they take character from Him.

• Do we accept this as God's mind for us? If we do, we shall give ourselves up more unreservedly to the influence of Christ. There will be more surrender as to things here, because we are learning the character, and dignity, and beauty of what attaches to us in our divine calling.

• These beautiful curtains were not seen without; they speak of what is known within rather than of what is displayed without. But it is instructive to see that the measure in length of these curtains corresponds with that of the hangings of twined byssus which formed the court.

• The hangings of the court represent what the saints are in the presence of men; they can be taken account of there as righteous persons. What the saints are spiritually within has its answer in what they are before men. It is a shame when it can be said of those who profess to know God, 'These people can talk of wonderful things, but their lives do not correspond'.

• Let us remember that the 280 cubits of curtains within have a corresponding 280 cubits of twined byssus without! Indeed, the fact that there are ten curtains intimates that all which is seen typically in the curtains has a bearing on responsibility.

• There is no privilege, relationship, or spiritual dignity in which divine grace sets us which is not intended to have a direct bearing on what we are as in responsibility here.

There is a difference in width between the curtains and the hangings.

• The curtains are four cubits wide, which indicates completeness; we have four Gospels to give us the complete presentation of Christ as come in flesh, and when the holy city comes down it "lies four-square". The saints are "complete" – "filled full" – in Christ.

• The five cubits of the hangings would perhaps suggest the weakness which ever casts the saints upon divine grace in their whole responsible course.

• The curtains speak of what the saints are as forming a shrine for the cherishing of all that is of God in Christ. They have a character suited to it spiritually; but if this is so it must necessarily work out, as it were, to the outer circle, and manifest what is worthy of God in that responsible life which comes under the eye of men.

In connection with the curtains prominence is given to the thought of coupling. It is one of the chief thoughts presented in the tabernacle and the tent.

• There is a tendency with us all to be too individual, but we belong to a system marked by "couplings" and "loops" and "clasps of gold" and "clasps of copper" and "rings", and the true character of the tabernacle is not realized if we do not see to this in a practical way. The great thought is
  • that the tabernacle may be one [whole]",

• and the same words are used in connection with the tent.

• I remember a book being written on the features of the assembly that did not mention unity! Yet that is clearly a very essential feature of the assembly. When the Lord presented Himself at the golden altar, if we may so say, in John 17, His prayer was that His saints might be one.

We have to see, too, that our links even with fellow believers are really "loops of blue" and "clasps of gold". It is possible to have couplings that are neither heavenly nor divine.

Christ is the Altar as well as the Sacrifice and the offering Priest.

• The Spirit of God presents Him to us in the Ark as One personally great enough to bring in the will – or pleasure – of God, and to establish it in a universe where lawlessness had been.

• But in the Altar we see that in such a universe the will of God could only be established on the footing of sacrifice, and Christ is great enough to sustain all that is involved in this.

He has come in holy Manhood – the acacia-wood typifies that – and He was found here in those conditions of weakness and dependence which rightly mark man and force him into dependence upon God. I believe the five cubits are suggestive of this.

To take this up requires those who are "wise-hearted, whom I have filled with the spirit of wisdom", verse 3

• Only spiritual persons can apprehend what is characteristic of Christ as Priest and the assembly viewed as the anti-type of Aaron's sons. To be willing-hearted – Isaiah 11: 2.

• If I have not wisdom it proves that I am not spiritual; one feels self-condemned in saying this, but it is the strict truth! Paul spoke wisdom amongst those that were full-grown. Many have the Spirit who have not given Him much place, and hence they are not spiritual; they have not grown up to wisdom; they are still babes.

• So that one feels inclined to pause and ask whether we are really "wise-hearted". Are we spiritually capable of understanding that of which these holy garments speak? They indicate what is characteristic of Christ as Priest, and God delights that His saints should take them up in intelligent affections so as to be able to invest Him with all that truly attaches to Him as Priest.

• Many know the Lord Jesus as Saviour and Redeemer who have very little apprehension of Him as Priest. But if we give place to the Spirit, He will enable us to put together in our souls these varied features and glories so that Christ may be invested with them in our apprehension and appreciation.

• This is wondrous enrichment of the heart and mind. From the breast-plate to the girdle of skilful workmanship each detail of the holy garments is full of precious meaning.

"Gold" is the first thing mentioned in connection with the making of the ephod. I suppose that the gold speaks of the divine glory of His Person.

• Its omission from the veil and the door, etc., might indicate that what is set forth there is rather the divine grace in which He came in flesh.

• But when it is a question of the place which He takes as Priest God-ward the glory of His Person is seen to be interwoven with every characteristic. God is fully revealed, and approach on the part of Man fully corresponds with that revelation.

• The divine glory of the Priest is equal to the divine glory of the Ark and the Mercy-seat, for it is the same Person who is the Ark and the Mercy-seat on God's side man-ward, who is the Priest on man's side God-ward.

"And they beat the gold into thin plates, and cut it into wires, to work it artistically into the blue, and into the purple, and into the scarlet, and into the byssus", Exodus 39: 3.

• We have spoken before of the blue, purple, scarlet, and byssus, and I think we may see what answers to each i