1 Kings 7:23

The Sea was a large pool made of cast copper, ten cubits (15 feet) in diameter. It took the place of the basin in the tabernacle, Israel's earlier tent of worship (Ex. 30:17-21). It stood 5 cubits high, and it rested on 12 oxen, also of copper it seems, three facing each direction, with their backs turned inwards. So, if the oxen were 4 or 5 feet in height, the top of the sea would be 11 or 12 feet high. It stood outside the temple, between the large copper altar and the temple door. It held 3000 baths (about 8000 gallons) of water, and the priests washed in it (2 Chron. 4:5-6). There must have been steps up to the Sea, but Scripture says nothing about them.

Solomon's cast sea was brass. Brass is the fitting symbol of divine righteousness. That righteousness demands judgment on sin, as at the brass altar, or judgment on uncleanness, as at the brass sea. Revelation 1 describes the Lord Jesus: "His feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace." That is how He walks among the lampstands. He cannot tolerate evil. He must judge it and trample it under His feet. This is why brass served for both the altar, where sin was atoned for, and the sea, where defilement was washed away.

Under the law, a priest whose hands and feet had become defiled did not need to go back to the brass altar. He needed to go forward to the brass sea. He did not need the blood applied again to make him a priest. He needed only to wash with water, so that he could carry on his service. So now, if a believer fails, if he sins, if he picks up defilement, he does not need washing in the blood again as at the first. He needs the cleansing action of the Word, by which the Holy Spirit brings home to the soul the remembrance of what Christ has done. This removes the defilement, restores communion, and fits the spiritual priest again for his service. Did a sea holding 3000 baths of water make little of a priest's defilement? Did it not prove instead how much God made of it?

The basin in the tabernacle came from the women's mirrors (Ex. 38:8); the sea came from the spoils of David's conquests. The mirrors suggest that those who gave them gave something up; the spoils speak of victory, which fits the glories of the kingdom that Solomon's reign displays. Scripture does not give the size and capacity of that basin. For the sea it records these details.

The brass sea served for the daily cleansing of the priests. There they washed their hands and their feet. This made them fit to carry out their service and to live where the Lord lived. In the same way, the disciples could have no part with Christ in the Father's house unless He washed their feet (John 13:8). The Word of God does this washing, on the ground of Christ's intercession as our Advocate. Under the law this washing applied to hands and feet, that is to say, to works and walk. Under grace it applies only to the walk. We have been purified from dead works to serve the Living God, and that happened once for all.

The huge amount of water in the cast sea points to the unlimited provision grace has made. Revelation 4:6 says that "before the throne there was as it were a sea of glass, like crystal." That sea of glass points back to the cast sea in Solomon's temple. But it is not a sea of water. It is glass like crystal, because the redeemed in glory no longer need cleansing. They have entered a perfect and settled state of holiness.