And he set up the court round about the tabernacle and the altar, and hung up the curtain of the gate of the court. And so Moses finished the work.
With the court wall up and its gate screened, the long work of building the tabernacle is over. Two things stand out here: the meaning of that wall with its gate, and the weight of a work finished exactly as God commanded.
The court wall stood between God's tent and the tents of Israel. Its gate was a screen of the same material as that wall.
The white linen barrier stood between God's Tent and all other tents. Its position meant separation. But God also set a gate in that barrier, made of the same material, and that gate meant invitation. It showed His gracious desire that men should draw near to Him, and His gracious intention to provide a Way for them to draw near without compromising His holiness. So in that Gate we have a picture of the Lord Jesus, who said, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me" (John 14:6).
Why does it matter that Moses left nothing out?
Verse 33 ends with the words, "So Moses finished the work." This carries our minds on to Hebrews 3:5, which tells us that "Moses was faithful in all God's house as a servant, to testify to the things that were to be spoken later." The whole tabernacle system was a testimony. In type and picture it pointed to the realities now established in Christ and in His sacrificial work. So the faithfulness of Moses mattered greatly. He carried out everything according to God's word while the work went on, and then finished it without leaving anything out.
One phrase keeps returning through the whole account of the setting up. God's commendation of Moses rests on it.
The praise He gives is this: everything was done in obedience — "as the LORD commanded Moses." Eight times the account repeats that Moses did everything according to the instructions he had received. So again we learn the value of obedience in the eyes of the Lord. As Samuel said to Saul, "to obey is better than sacrifice, and to listen than the fat of rams." Our blessed Lord Himself said, "If you love me, you will keep my commandments" (John 14). Obedience may be missing while real devotion and zeal are present. Even then, no service offered can be acceptable to God… There never was a time of greater energy and activity, or when larger crowds gather together claiming to worship. But measure these things by the test in the words "as the LORD commanded Moses," and you find that man's will, and not the Lord's, is often the main spring of it all… The church is now the house of God — the dwelling place for God by the Spirit (Eph. 2:22).
Scripture opens with God preparing a place for man. It closes this book with man preparing a place for God.
As of old the heavens and the earth had been created, the garden of Eden planted, and man set in it as his dwelling place, crowned and married and satisfied in full measure of blessedness, and all this from God for him — so now the tabernacle is made and furnished and raised up by man for God, and the Glory enters it and the Cloud rests on it, and the Lord God delights in His new dwelling place, as Adam had in his.
As soon as the work was finished, God answered.
At last the Lord takes possession of the sanctuary. It was made so that He might dwell among them. The connection is most significant. "So Moses finished the work. Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle. And Moses was not able to enter the tent of meeting because the cloud settled on it, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle." This was not only the LORD's public endorsement of the finished work. It was also His taking possession of His house in the sight of all Israel.
The finished tent was flawless, yet it was not the final thing.
Moses was indeed faithful; he did everything "as the LORD commanded Moses," down to the smallest detail… This was the tabernacle which man had pitched. It was beautiful and glorious, yet it was not the true tabernacle. It was only the shadow of that. And now the shadow is past, as it is said: it is "a shadow of the good things to come," but "the substance belongs to Christ." But still, do not our minds linger around the shadows on earth? Do we not become occupied with the things made with hands, instead of those made without hands?
- Finished — "So Moses finished the work." Moses left nothing out, because every part pictured Christ and His sacrificial work.
- Fenced — the white linen wall meant separation. The gate in that same wall meant invitation — God's desire that people draw near without compromising His holiness.
- Followed — eight times we read "as the LORD commanded Moses." God commends obedience in His house, not energy or crowd size.
- Filled — when the work was complete, the cloud settled and the glory filled the tent. God endorsed the work and took possession of His house before all Israel.
- Forward — this beautiful tent was only a shadow. The reality is Christ, so our minds should not linger on things made with hands.
And the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of Jehovah filled the tabernacle.
The book of Exodus does not end with a law or a battle, but with a house — and with God moving into it. Everything from chapter 25 on has led here, and it raises two questions: why does God now live with a people He had only visited, and why is the man who built the tent left outside?
The cloud comes down on a finished work, and it does more than approve it.
This was not only the Lord's public approval of the finished work. It was also His taking possession of His house in the sight of all Israel. The cloud, the symbol of His presence, covered the tent of meeting outside, and His glory filled the tabernacle inside.
Two different Hebrew words sit behind the English here, and the verse gives each one its own action.
The cloud covers the ohel (tent), and the glory of the Lord filled the mishkan (habitation). Moses could not enter the ohel moed (tent of meeting), because the cloud stayed on it, and the glory of the Lord filled the mishkan. Mishkan is the dwelling-place... Ohel is a tent.
God had spoken with people before. He had never lived with them. Commentators point to one reason for the change.
It is only on the footing of redemption that God dwells with man. He did not dwell with Adam innocent, though He came down to him. He did not dwell with Abraham, though He visited him and ate with him. But when Israel came out of Egypt, God said He brought them to Himself "that I may dwell among them." At once the tabernacle went up, and God was present in the midst of His people.
At creation God prepared a place for man. Here the direction turns around.
In sovereignty, the Lord God had at the beginning built and furnished a place for man. Now, in obedience, man prepares a place for God... Then, keeping it all in His sovereign hand, the Lord commands Moses to put it together and to set it up in its sanctuary form. Moses does so, still in the spirit of obedience. And the Lord, in the symbols of the Cloud and the Glory, takes possession of it as His dwelling.
The next verse says Moses could not enter. The glory came close, but it also drew a line no one could cross. That limit points forward.
God was showing His intention to dwell with men, as His glory dwelt among Israel. But as we see in Moses, man under law could not draw near to God, or enter into the full blessedness of God's presence with them. The time will still come when what was shown that day is fulfilled, for it is written: "Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them... and be their God" (Rev. 21:3).
(The ESV reads "the dwelling place of God is with man." The older wording keeps the link to the word tabernacle.)
John's Gospel picks up this scene with one deliberate word. The two tabernacles are not the same.
"And the Word was made flesh, and tabernacled among us, (and we beheld His glory, glory as of an only begotten with the Father,) full of grace and truth." This wording is more literal than the usual translation, and it keeps the all-important connection with the tabernacle of old. In that tabernacle the glory of God had dwelt in darkness, not in light — shut up, and out of reach for man. Here now was a tabernacle: the flesh of Christ, in which the fullest glory of Godhead dwelt, and it was most accessible. Divine glory could now be approached and looked upon, because it was revealed in grace and truth.
(The ESV reads "the Word became flesh and dwelt among us"; the wording quoted keeps the word "tabernacled".)
Commentators see the same thing happen twice more in Scripture.
It was so — in an even more striking way — when the temple was built. Both are surely pictures of that scene at Pentecost recorded in Acts... There the two things are combined. The house of God was formed and filled by the coming of the Holy Spirit. In both cases it was God taking possession of the house already made for Him.
- Redemption first. God visited Adam and Abraham, but He lived with neither. Only after Israel came out of Egypt does He say "that I may dwell among them" — and the tabernacle follows at once.
- Obedience next. At creation God made a house for man. Here man makes one for God, to the exact pattern — and the glory comes down on a work done as commanded.
- Possession then. The cloud settles on the tent outside. The glory fills the dwelling inside. This is God's public receipt for the work, in the sight of all Israel.
- Distance still. Moses, who built it, could not go in — proof that under law man could not yet draw near to the God who had drawn near to him.
- Access at last. The same glory later tabernacled in the flesh of Christ. It was no longer shut up in darkness, but open to be looked upon. And it ends where Revelation ends: God dwelling with men for good.