Exodus 40:20-38
Down to the smallest detail, the sanctuary and the objects necessary for worship have been prepared and each then set up in its place. "Moses finished the work" (v. 33). It reminds us of the One who was able to say to the Father: "I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do" (John 17:4). But the faithfulness of Moses over all the house of God, mentioned in Hebrews 3:2 . . . is only a faint shadow of that of the Son, "faithful to him that appointed him". He has revealed the Father, sanctified His "brethren", built the true tabernacle, of which He has become the High Priest, established a new order of things (no longer visible and material), in which God can be known, approached and served. With the last chapter of Exodus we come to the end of the study of this wonderful tabernacle. It has illustrated many aspects of the work of Christ with its consequences. The first of these consequences is that God comes down in glory to dwell in the midst of this people (vv. 34, 35). So it was that at Pentecost, on the ground of the finished work of Christ, God the Holy Spirit came down to form the Church, according to Ephesians 2:22, to be "an habitation of God through the Spirit". Since then, despite the ruin, He is there, the divine Guide, leading and directing the people of God, as the cloud over the tabernacle did for Israel.