Make Me a sacred space among you, and that space will form you in such a way that you will feel My continual Presence.
As a visual help for us in taking in the final deliverance provided by the two comings of Messiah, the Father gave specific instructions for the construction of a visible symbol that would reveal the dual significance and necessity of these two events. A symbol is defined as "a visible sign of something invisible." We will be looking into some of the details of this visible sign, and the specific "something invisible" which it revealed.
When God took the descendants of Abraham out of their slavery in Egypt, He said to them, "I will take you to Me for a people, and I will be to you a God." He then requested of Moses, "Let them make Me a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them." Ex. 6:7; 25:8 Amplified. God yearned to come as close to them as He could come, and His great heart desire was to bring them to Him as close as they could. God had said to them, "I will take you to Me," and now, by His request to dwell among them, He was asking, in effect, "Take Me to you."
The Tent of Meeting before the Lord, where I will meet with you to speak there to you...shall be sanctified by My glory, [the Shekinah, God's visible presence]...and I will dwell among the Israelites and be their God. And they will know by personal experience that I am the Lord their God Who brought them forth out of the land of Egypt that I might dwell among them. Ex. 29:42-46 Amplified.
Moses' instructions from God for the construction and assembling of each part of this Tent of Meeting were very detailed, for this little sanctuary was divinely designed for a specific purpose. God had a plan, a long range plan which would span the ages. He had an unfolding of light for each age, giving time for the light to accumulate and be taken in and assimilated. Through this little wilderness replica, God was preparing the way for brighter light to come. The people needed preparation of heart and mind to receive the increase of light and the intimacy with Him that He yearned for them to have with Him, and He with them. This wilderness unfolding of light would be pointing to and preparing the way for the next unfolding of light.
God said, "You shall set up the tabernacle of the Tent of Meeting of God with you." Ex. 40:1 Amplified. Encrypted in this wilderness Tent of Meeting was the foreshadowing of the true Tent of Meeting to come, of Whom it was written, "Behold, a virgin shall become pregnant, and give birth to a Son, and they shall call His name, Emmanuel, which, when translated, means, God with us." Matt. 1:23 Amplified. This wilderness symbol, this Tent of Meeting built by human hands, was pointing to the reality of God's true sanctuary, a living Tent of Meeting made without human hands. The wilderness Tent of Meeting was going to be of a mobile nature, because it was a visible replica of Messiah, a living and moving dwelling place of God. The way was being prepared for God's people to receive the conception of the One Who would demonstrate in real life the true function of "the Tent of Meeting of God with you." Therefore, everything in this movable Tent of Meeting in the wilderness was encrypted to reveal the next stage in the unfolding of light, unfolding the true meaning for which it had been designed.
Our purpose here is not to cover the depths of all the aspects of the wilderness Tent of Meeting, but to touch on enough details to show the living Tent of Meeting, into which the Son of God came to dwell at His first appearing, and to reveal the exact manner of His second appearing.
When one begins to take a look at the physical details of the wilderness Tent of Meeting, the encrypted picture contained in those details begins to emerge. Looking at the outside of the wilderness structure itself, and progressing inward, we see four coverings that enclosed the actual Tent of Meeting itself. Their order and their specific material and color, immediately begin to reveal the living Tent of Meeting (Messiah) Who was to come, and the pattern after which this mobile, wilderness sanctuary for God was designed.
Of the four coverings, the fourth was the outermost covering, and the one most visible from outside of the Tent of Meeting. It was made from badger's skins. "And thou shalt make a covering for the tent...of badgers' skins. Ex. 26:14. Lying underneath this outermost hairy covering was the third covering, which was red in color. "You shall make a third covering for the tent of ram's skins tanned red." Ex. 26:14 Amplified. Under this third, red covering was a second, whitish covering. "And make curtains of goats' hair to be a second covering over the tabernacle." Verse 7. The innermost covering, the one most visible from within the Tent of Meeting was multicolored. "You shall make the tabernacle with ten curtains of fine twined linen, and blue and purple and scarlet, with cherubim skillfully embroidered shall you make them...and fasten the curtains together with the clasps; then the tabernacle shall be one whole." Verse 1.
Have the details of the living sanctuary encrypted in these four coverings begun to unfold to you yet? God told Moses, "You shall erect the tabernacle after the plan of it shown you on the mountain...See to it that you copy exactly their pattern." Ex. 26:30;25:40 Amplified. A look at the human head will reveal the living pattern of this wilderness structure. The outermost covering on the head, of course, is hair, which is the counterpart in the living human Tent of Meeting, for the hairy covering of badger's skins on the wilderness temple. If one were to fold back the hair layer on the scalp, and open the underlying layer with its rich abundance of capillary beds, red would be the color seen next, lots of red. This is why God gave the specific instruction that the third covering of ram's skin be tanned red. The next protective covering on the head is the skull bone itself, which was typified in color by the goat's hair covering. The final and innermost covering, which pointed forward to the living human sanctuary to come, contained three specific colors. This was the curtain of "fine twined linen, blue and purple and scarlet, with cherubim skillfully embroidered." As was stated earlier, this was the covering that was visible inside the wilderness Tent of Meeting. The following picture of the brain of the living Tent of Meeting, with its red arteries, blue blood vessels, and purple ventricles, reveals the origin of the three colors specified for the inner covering of the wilderness Tent of Meeting.
Exodus chapter 25 deals very specifically with Moses' instructions from God, describing precisely how to construct each item of the sanctuary, and chapter 40 is the assembling of the structure itself, after everything was in readiness. The four coverings of the wilderness Tent of Meeting enclosed two separate rooms. They were spoken of by God as the Holy Place and the Most Holy Place, or the Holy of Holies, the innermost room of the moveable tent in the wilderness.
The very first instructions to Moses after God requested, "Let them make Me a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them," was for the furnishing of the Most Holy Place. "You shall make it according to all that I show you, the pattern of the tabernacle or dwelling, and the pattern of all the furniture of it." Ex. 25:8,9 Amplified.
They shall make an ark of acacia wood. You shall overlay the ark with pure gold, inside and out, and make a gold crown around its top...You shall put inside the ark the Testimony which I will give you. And you shall make a mercy seat, a covering of pure gold...and you shall make two cherubim, winged angelic figures of solid hammered gold on the two ends of the mercy seat...And the cherubim shall spread out their wings above, covering the mercy seat with their wings, facing each other and looking down toward the mercy seat. You shall put the mercy seat on the top of the ark and in the ark you shall put the Testimony that I will give you. There I will meet with you and...I will speak intimately with you. Ex. 25:10-22 Amplified.
And the Lord said to Moses, On the first day of the first month you shall set up the tabernacle of the Tent of Meeting of God with you, and you shall put in it the ark of the Testimony, and screen the ark of God's Presence with a veil...In the Holy of Holies within the veil before the mercy seat upon the ark...I will appear." Ex. 401-3; Lev. 16:2 Amplified.
The Most Holy Place was the place in the wilderness Tent of Meeting where God's personal presence appeared. He said, " In the Holy of Holies within the veil...I will appear...There I will meet with you and...I will speak intimately with you." In this innermost room, the personal presence of God was seen when the high priest came in to Him, once a year on the Day of Atonement. He appeared in the form of light, above the mercy seat, between the cherubim wings.
In the furnishings of the wilderness Most Holy Place, the very patterns and shapes found within the skull of the living Tent of Meeting, to which this symbol pointed, are revealed in a striking way. The picture below is an inner view of the bones in the human skull, looking down on them from above. You can see the forms of the greater and lesser wings in the Sphenoid bone, while between and above them, the crest of the crista galli of ethmoid bone appears as a flame of light.
The crista galli is situated directly between the frontal lobes of the brain, the part of the brain where thought, and the highest function of the mind, resides; the place of conscious knowing and voluntary consent. This place was being revealed as the Most Holy Place of the living Tent of Meeting to come. This part of the brain, the frontal lobes in the forehead, is the repository of the conscience, through which comes the voice of God. This is the place where intimate, reciprocal communion with God occurs. This is the place where God would appear.
In the wilderness Tent of Meeting, the Most Holy Place contained the ark of the Testimony. "In the ark you shall put the Testimony that I will give you." Ex. 25:21 Amplified. The word ark is defined as "a place that contains something, where something is deposited, especially for safekeeping; a small close vessel, such as that which was the repository of the covenant."
In the fullness of time, it would be from the ark containing the covenant with God, the place in the living Tent of Meeting of conscious union and knowing of Him, that the Testimony put within Jesus would proceed. Jesus' words were this testimony, proceeding out from the ark of His covenant with the Father:
He Who sent Me is true, reliable, and I tell the world only the things that I have heard from Him...When you have lifted up the Son of Man, you will realize, know, and understand that I am He for Whom you look and that I do nothing of Myself, of My own accord or on My own authority, but I say exactly what My Father has taught Me. And He Who sent Me is ever with Me: My Father has not left Me alone, for I always do what pleases Him. John 8:26-29 Amplified.
In the wilderness Tent of Meeting, between the innermost room, or Most Holy Place, and the outer entrance into the courtyard, was the room called the Holy Place. This room was like the front room of the dwelling place of God, like a vestibule of preparation for entering into the Most Holy Place, or the intimate place of God. A veil separated these two places of experiencing God.
In the Holy Place were three emblems, or symbolic objects, which were given as special helps in preparation for entering into the immediate Presence of God, just on the other side of the veil.
You shall bring in the showbread table, and you shall set the showbread, the bread of the Presence, on the table before Me always. You shall bring in the lampstand and set up the seven lamps of it so they may give light in front of it. You shall set the golden altar for the incense before the ark of the Testimony, in front and outside of the veil that screens (separates) the ark of the Testimony, before the mercy seat that is over the Testimony, where I will meet with you. Condensed from Ex. 25 & 40 Amplified.
"Set the bread of the Presence on the table before Me always." Thus God expressed where He regarded the emblems in the Holy Place to be - right before Him. Though His direct appearing was veiled until the Most Holy Place was entered, it was experienced in the Holy Place through the light, the bread, and the sweet-smelling incense. These emblems were symbols of God's special tending, and of the preparation of heart, to go through the veil that kept one from seeing the appearance of God and experiencing the most intimate communion with Him in the Holy of Holies. They represented the felt drawing out of heart in yearning desire which ascended to the divine Presence on the other side of the veil, His illumination lighting the way into the Most Holy Place, and His supply of nourishment for entry into that special place of covenant intimacy with God.
In the living Tent of Meeting, the three colors that were observed in the Most Holy Place of the mind - the red arteries, the blue blood vessels and purple ventricles of the brain - are observed in the Holy Place as well. We observed that the brain was made to contain the center of the conscious knowing of the mind of the intimate thoughts of God, which takes place in the head, and was revealed beforehand and reflected in the wilderness Most Holy Place. Now we observe the center of the body, the center of the knowing of the spiritual instincts, or feelings, of God, which are sensed in the body. The innermost curtain that is shared with the Most Holy Place, is seen in the red arteries, blue blood vessels, and purple ventricles of the living Holy Place of the heart, as well.
The heart and the mind were the two places of experiencing God in the living Tent of Messiah, to which the wilderness symbol pointed. In the fullness of time, when the shadow met its Substance, Emmanuel would be conceived, and grow up, and perfectly demonstrate how "God with us" is experienced in the Holy Place of His heart, and the Most Holy Place of the mind of Christ.
While dwelling in His living Tent of Meeting, the only begotten Son would demonstrate the function of the Holy Place - the knowing of the Father in the sensings of His heart - through the illuminating unctions which He felt, the divine instincts that the Father guided His heart in the way He would have His Son to go, through the sustenance and nourishment of His Father's personal word, and the perpetually ascending desire and drawn out yearning of the heart of the Son, to the One from Whom He came forth.
Messiah would also demonstrate the Most Holy, naked, conscious knowing of His Father's present reality, beyond the veil of human appearance and sensation, rending that veil with His conscious knowing.
Surrounding the wilderness Tent of Meeting was the courtyard, enclosed with a white linen fence. This was the only part of the Tent of Meeting that could be seen by the congregation. The white linen which clothed this wilderness symbol, was the same white linen which clothed the priests who ministered there. "He shall put on the holy linen coat, and he shall have the linen breeches upon his flesh, and shall be girded with a linen girdle, and with the linen mitre shall he be attired: these are holy garments; therefore shall he wash his flesh in water, and so put them on." Lev. 16:4. By this dual reflection, the purity of life which would clothe the living Tent of Meeting to come, was revealed, and in the work of the white-garbed priests was foreseen the work of the Anointed Christ Who would be ministering within the living Tent of Meeting in Jesus of Nazareth.
A laver of water, and an altar for continual burnt offering, were within the precincts of the courtyard. These were the instructions given for the emblems within the courtyard.
And the Lord said to Moses, You shall also make a laver or large basin of bronze, and its base of bronze, for washing; and you shall put it outside in the court, between the Tent of Meeting and the altar of burnt offering, and you shall put water in it; There Aaron and his sons shall wash their hands and their feet. When they go into the Tent of Meeting, they shall wash with water, that they die not, or when they come near to the altar to minister, to burn an offering made by fire to the Lord...It shall be for a perpetual statute. Ex. 30:17-21 Amplified.
The Lord said to Moses, Command the Israelites, saying...My food, My offerings made by fire, My sweet and soothing odor you shall be careful to offer to Me at its proper time. And you shall say to the people, This is the offering made by fire which you shall offer to the Lord; two male lambs a year old without spot or blemish, two day by day, for a continual burnt offering. One lamb you shall offer in the morning and the other in the evening...a continual burnt offering which was ordained in Mount Sinai for a sweet and soothing odor, an offering made by fire to the Lord. Num. 28:1-6 Amplified.
By the two lambs which were slowly consumed on the altar of burnt offering, from morning to evening, and from evening to morning again, God typified the two appearings of the Lamb of God, required in order for the living Atonement He had provided to be fully carried out. In Jesus of Nazareth, the living Tent of Meeting, the life of the Atonement was conceived, for the founding of the kingdom of God in the earth. His life was to be offered in the dawning light of "God with us." This was the morning sacrificed Lamb. Yet, in order for the living Atonement to fully accomplish the purposes of the Father, it was necessary for the Lamb to return a second time to earth. This was the evening sacrificed Lamb. This evening sacrifice was made to bring final completion to the kingdom of God in the earth, by the "marriage of the Lamb."
This marriage is the final and complete union of God with man. It is the consummation of the Atonement. This second sacrificed Lamb of God, the return of the Messiah Michael as seen in Daniel 12:1 and Revelation 12:7, is the fulfillment of the evening sacrifice here typified. In Michael, the life of the Atonement is consummated, for all separation from God has been annihilated. In the evening, at the close of light to this world, the founded life of the Atonement would return. The life Who had been conceived in Jesus of Nazareth, to pioneer the way for the founding of the kingdom of God in the earth, was to return. He would now pioneer the way to the consummated life of the Atonement with God, bringing to full maturity the final deliverance prophesied.
In the book of the Revelation, "The Lamb that was slain in sacrifice from the foundation of the world," is seen again. "And there between the throne and the four living beings...I saw a Lamb standing, as though it had been slain, with seven horns and with seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God." Rev. 13:8;Rev. 5:6 Amplified. In the wilderness replica, two lambs were the closest symbol that could be used to represent the two comings of the Lamb of God Who would provide one complete Atonement.
The wilderness tabernacle built by human hands, with the visible glory of God dwelling in it, was pointing to its living Antitype and its divine Lamb, in the tabernacle not built by human hands. Here, the glory of God was to be visible in a new and living way. The Father had would bring the light of the wilderness "Tent of Meeting of God with us" to the next step, to "Immanuel, which being interpreted is God with us." While at His first appearing, Messiah would reveal that God had come to dwell in a living temple, this was not the final light of the revealing; for Messiah's first coming would be a type in itself, prefiguring the way of His return the second time as Michael, at the end of the age.
The fire which slowly consumed the lambs provided, was originally ignited by God Himself at the dedication of the Tent of Meeting. "And the glory of the Lord, the Shekinah cloud appeared to all the people as promised. Then there came a fire out from before the Lord and consumed the burnt offering." Lev. 9:23,24 Amplified. A Jewish historian, Josephus, records that "a fire proceeded from the victims themselves, of its own accord, which had the appearance of a flash of lightening, and consumed all that was upon the altar." The New Treasury of Scripture Knowledge. This fire proceeding out of the sacrifice is the very fire of God, which proceeded first from Jesus at Messiah's initial appearing, and now from Michael at the second.
The divine instructions after that dedication were, "This is the law of the burnt offering: The burnt offering shall remain on the altar all night until morning. And the priest shall...take up the ashes of what the fire has consumed with the burnt offering...and the fire upon the altar shall be kept burning on it; it shall not be allowed to go out." Lev. 6:9-12 Amplified.
