The tabernacle, the dwelling place for the hideout
“Make this tabernacle and its furnishings exactly like the pattern I will show you.” Exodus 25:9. The Mishkan, the tabernacle, literally means “dwelling.” It refers to God’s hiding place, the sanctuary — the place of His presence among His people. It also signifies the “place” where the “pact,” or agreement between the people and God, the Ten Commandments, was stored. The tabernacle, therefore, reminded the people that they had an obligation to obey God as they promised. However, among the Hebrews, the agreement — the Ten Commandments — served as a witness against the people, showing that they could not perfectly fulfill their part of the agreement with God.
The significance of the Mishkan—the temple—was that God would establish an eternal dwelling among His people. God’s permanent dwelling with humankind is now in the body of the Messiah, Jesus Christ. “Therefore, when Christ came into the world, he said: Sacrifices and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me;” Hebrews 10:5. Jesus confirmed that the temple—the Mishkan—symbolized his body. “Jesus answered them, ‘Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.’ The Jews replied, It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days? But the temple he had spoken of was his body.” John 2:19–21. Therefore, the Mishkan—the temple—was a shadow pointing to the genuine reality: the body of Jesus Christ. “These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ.” Colossians 2:17.
Jesus is the High Priest in the order of Melchizedek. Therefore, like Melchizedek, Jesus did not, and does not, serve in a building or physical structure. Instead, He served in His body. Jesus Christ is High Priest forever in his body. Melchizedek, as the priest to the God Most High, served in his body, not in a structure built by man, a temple. God, not man, created the human body Jesus shares with new humankind. Because Jesus is the High Priest forever, His body continues to serve as God’s dwelling place with His people.
Continued in the next blog.