God is looking for a home... a study in Exodus 25

Introduction

House hunting is a lonely, cruel, disappointing enterprise. Oh, if you are wealthy and have no time limit as well as no funding limitations, then buying a place or renting a stable for your horses is as easy as telling Jeevz to go and fetch something. But if you are like the rest of us, hunting an apartment or a house for you, for your relatives, for your business… it’s a tough go out there. 

 

Contribution

We’ll get back to consider housing in a moment, but let’s look at the beginning of this 25^th chapter and recall a word from previous lessons. The Hebrew word is “lee” and means ‘to me’ or “for me”. It’s found again here twice, once as is, and once in construct form in verses 1 and 2, where we read, “The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, ² “Tell the sons of Israel to raise a contribution for Me; from every man whose heart moves him you shall raise My contribution.” The phrase “my contribution” stands out, doesn’t it? 

 

The contribution is for God, and then the contribution is his! Things done for God are significant; things that belong to God are even more significant, aren’t they?

 

What is included in the donation box? Gold and silver, of course. Remember, the children of Israel secured much of that from the Egyptian women (Ex. 3.22) as well as articles of clothing and fabric. All will be useful in the Tabernacle yet to be built. People brought everything to the elders, with gladness. The text says, “every man whose heart moves him.” That’s a powerful statement of willingness. The Jewish people had spoiled the Egyptians and any one of them could have kept all those goods for himself, but in gladness, the people knew that all they had belonged to God, and they willingly donated. That’s what donations and offerings should say of the donors.

 

Housing (part 2)

Verse eight tells us that God wanted a house, and he told the people that they should build a ‘mishkan’ (translate Tabernacle) where he could dwell (shochan).

The Mishkan is the place of dwelling. It’s not simply a religious centre or a shrine. It’s not a museum of historic significance. It’s not designed as a gallery of creative expression. It’s God’s house, and he wants it decorated according to a specific pattern. (.9, .40)

 

Furniture

The mishkan contained an ark (a box) with specifications for its length and width, some rings and poles by which it is to be carried. On the ark some artistic renderings of angels and even details about their wings. Of note is the phrase in verse 22, “There I will meet with you; and from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim which are upon the ark of the testimony, I will speak to you about all that I will give you in commandment for the sons of Israel.”

 

Here we read that God wants three things: 1) to meet with the people, 2) to speak with the people, and 3) to give the people instructions. All at his house, and above the item rendered in many Bible translations as “the mercy seat.”

 

Compare your home

What happens at your home? You eat and sleep and visit others via zoom meetings. You decorate it with your own furniture and put down roots in veggie and flower gardens. You make it home. And there you meet with those closest to you. That’s what God wants with us, his people. 

 

In our days, we don’t have a single physical space where God wants to meet with us. Yeshua told us “when you pray, ^ago into your inner room or closet, close your door and pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.”

 

Fantastic, isn’t it? We don’t need a singular tabernacle thousands of kilometres away where only the elect officers and priests can be with the Almighty. And where only Jewish people could surround. Here in Australia, and now our own room, our beach, our garden, our church can be a place where God ‘shochans’ with us. Where he dwells with us. The point of the story is not the where, but the who… It’s a place for him and a place for us. It’s about a relationship. 

 

God’s final house hunting

God is still looking for a home, since if I read the first Christian martyr Stephen’s testimony correctly, “The Most High does not dwell in houses made by human hands; as the prophet says: ‘HEAVEN IS MY THRONE, AND EARTH IS THE FOOTSTOOL OF MY FEET; WHAT KIND OF HOUSE WILL YOU BUILD FOR ME?’ says the Lord,” (Acts 7.48-49). 

 

Where is God’s house hunting leading him today? Through our missionaries and our entire staff, God is using our workers to find open hearts where Yeshua will live. He told his disciples on that Passover evening, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make Our abode with him” (John 14.23) You will be his mishkan!

 

Please pray for us to find those open hearts and willing students who are going to be God’s house, who will in turn make disciples themselves as we preach the love of God in Yeshua. Thank you and Shalom!