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Redeemer Bible Church

Unreserved Accountability to Christ. Undeserved Acceptance from Christ.

The Partitions of the Tabernacle

Exodus 25:1-31:18

Introduction
I can remember very vividly what it felt like to be a non-Christian in college. I
especially remember feeling lonely, aimless, and depressed.

I remember walking one night toward the dining hall, just after the sun had set
and the sky had not yet turned midnight blue. As I walked I felt in my heart a longing for
something, I wanted to do something, anything—I wanted to do something significant.
But I didn’t know what. I felt like I was on my hands and knees looking for something—
like a contact lens or the back of an earring—while at the same time not knowing what I
was looking for so intently.

Well, after I became a Christian I realized what (rather, who) it was I was looking
for. I was longing for an intimate relationship, for fellowship with God, but didn’t even
know it.

Now I know that you could say that it wasn’t really that I was longing for God
without knowing it, but that I was open to anything that would seem to fill the void in me
and the Christian religion was a prospect from my culture that fit. In other words, you
could say that I wasn’t longing for the Christian God, per se, just anything that would
take my loneliness, aimlessness, and depression away. I was looking for a crutch.

Well, before you dismiss what I’ve said, let me say that these ideas aren’t
mutually exclusive; they can both be true at the same time. I mean, why can’t it be true
that the Christian God, the true God made us as humans to need a crutch in order to
make a difficult life work, in order to give it meaning and purpose? Why can’t it be true
that the need for a crutch was put there by the one true God in order that we might
reach out and find him waiting to be our crutch? Well, the answer is that there is no
logical reason. My need for meaning was simultaneously a need for the one true God.

In a lecture he gave in Athens, the Apostle Paul put it like this:

[The one true God] made from one man every nation of mankind to live
on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the
boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, in the hope that
they might feel their way toward him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from
each one of us, for, “In him we live and move and have our being”; as even some
of your own poets have said, “For we are indeed his offspring” (Acts 17:26-28).

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What I didn’t know in my pre-Christian experience (and what you didn’t know in
yours if you’re a Christian this morning) is that I was feeling my way towards God. I
didn’t realize that I was totally dependent upon him for my life—for my existence and its
meaning. And I didn’t realize that God made me to seek him that I might find him.

Having said this, I don’t want to leave you with the wrong impression. Having
that need for an intimate relationship with my maker did not in a sort of magical, presto-
chango way eliminate my feelings of loneliness, aimlessness, or even depression. Oh, I
felt like I had come home, that I was finally at peace, but I came to realize that that
peace, those feelings of rest, communion, purpose, and joy did not continue in me
without effort on my part. They have to be cultivated.

And this should make sense. After all, if the question of the meaning of life is
resolved in a relationship with God, then our feelings of meaninglessness cannot be
conquered in a moment. Relationships just don’t work that way. By nature they are
continuous. And more than that, without cultivation, what begins well doesn’t
necessarily end well.

Think of the marriage relationship. In every wedding ceremony I officiate, I

exhort the bride and groom with this:

Your love for each other, now so tender and precious must be
carefully cultivated. Unless it receives the same thoughtful attention as it
has until today, it will dissipate, falling away into indifference, or even
hatred. It is possible for you to be satisfied with each other always, and to
attain the highest happiness if, in the self-denying tenderness and strength
that only God can provide, you ceaselessly cultivate each other’s love.

The same is true for our relationship with God. God has made us for a
relationship with him, which means that coming to him initially is only the beginning.
Feelings of loneliness, aimlessness, and despair do not instantly evaporate in the heat
of God’s love. Rather, they are progressively eliminated throughout the relationship
until we finally enjoy perfect intimacy with him either at our death or at the end of the
world when Christ returns to make all things new, whichever comes first.

In the meantime, we need to fight for intimacy with God; we need to fight for
communion with God; we need to fight for fellowship with God. We need to fight for it
because it doesn’t happen (in a sense) automatically. The cultivation of our relationship
with God is like climbing up a slide. Unless you hold on, your tendency is to slide right
back down.

But the reason for this tendency is not owing to any defect in God—not at all.
The tendency is due to the defect in us. The reason why sometimes the fellowship we
crave is elusive is that our sin keeps us from him.

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This truth is taught in the tabernacle instructions of Exodus 25-31.

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Access Denied
If you’ve been here for a while, you know that we have been studying the
instructions for the tabernacle, a tent for God in the desert. According to Exodus 25:8,
it is in this tent that God intends to meet with his people. Turn with me to that verse,
Exodus 25:8.
8
"Let them construct a sanctuary for Me, that I may dwell among them.

Now if you are going to construct a portable palace for the king (which is what
tabernacles like this were in the ANCIENT NEAR EAST), then naturally, it needs walls. It
needs partitions to mark off the space. And this is exactly what it has. The twenty-sixth
chapter in its entirety is devoted to the partitions of the tabernacle.

The only problem with the chapter is that it’s confusing—not to the original
audience, but to us. I think it’s hard to read. In fact, anything’s hard to read if your
reading is without understanding. So let me try to make it readable for you so that you
can see what God’s communicating to us. Turn to Exodus 26:1-6.
1
"Moreover you shall make the tabernacle with ten curtains of fine twisted linen
and blue and purple and scarlet material; you shall make them with cherubim, the work
of a skillful workman. 2 "The length of each curtain shall be twenty-eight cubits, and the
width of each curtain four cubits; all the curtains shall have the same measurements. 3
"Five curtains shall be joined to one another, and the other five curtains shall be joined to
one another. 4 "You shall make loops of blue on the edge of the outermost curtain in the
first set, and likewise you shall make them on the edge of the curtain that is outermost in
the second set. 5 "You shall make fifty loops in the one curtain, and you shall make fifty
loops on the edge of the curtain that is in the second set; the loops shall be opposite
each other. 6 "You shall make fifty clasps of gold, and join the curtains to one another
with the clasps so that the tabernacle will be a unit.

42’ X 6’ for each curtain, times ten—that’s 2,700 square feet of curtain. This is
not exactly the size of the tent you use on a fishing trip, now, is it? Well, that’s the first
covering for the tabernacle, for the interior…

Think of it like the interior of your house— typically you cover the walls with
colors different from the exterior. Well, the interior of the tabernacle according to verse
1 is made of blue and purple and scarlet material.

Between that interior curtain and the air outside in the desert is another covering
described in verses 7-13.
7
"Then you shall make curtains of goats' hair for a tent over the tabernacle; you
shall make eleven curtains in all. 8 "The length of each curtain shall be thirty cubits, and
the width of each curtain four cubits; the eleven curtains shall have the same
measurements. 9 "You shall join five curtains by themselves and the other six curtains
by themselves, and you shall double over the sixth curtain at the front of the tent. 10
"You shall make fifty loops on the edge of the curtain that is outermost in the first set,

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and fifty loops on the edge of the curtain that is outermost in the second set. 11 "You
shall make fifty clasps of bronze, and you shall put the clasps into the loops and join the
tent together so that it will be a unit. 12 "The overlapping part that is left over in the
curtains of the tent, the half curtain that is left over, shall lap over the back of the
tabernacle. 13 "The cubit on one side and the cubit on the other, of what is left over in
the length of the curtains of the tent, shall lap over the sides of the tabernacle on one
side and on the other, to cover it.

As you can see, the exterior of this tent house is not vinyl or cedar shakes or red
brick. It’s made of goats’ hair—an interesting choice that we’ll get to in a moment. For
now I want you to take note of its size.

First of all, it’s made up of eleven curtains—one more than the interior set. And
second of all, each curtain is two cubits longer than the interior curtains. In other words,
the exterior curtains are bigger than the interior ones.

Now think about this for a moment. If the exterior curtains are bigger than the
interior curtains, what’s going to happen when the exterior curtains are put on top of the
interior ones? Well, it’s pretty obvious—they are going to cover them completely.
That’s what verses 12-13 are all about. Read them again.
12
"The overlapping part that is left over in the curtains of the tent, the half curtain
that is left over, shall lap over the back of the tabernacle. 13 "The cubit on one side and
the cubit on the other, of what is left over in the length of the curtains of the tent, shall lap
over the sides of the tabernacle on one side and on the other, to cover it.

All these verses are saying is that the extra goat hair curtains completely cover
the interior blue.

There are two more coverings that go on top of the goat hair, both of which are
described in verse 14. Read it with me: You shall make a covering for the tent of
rams’ skins dyed red and a covering of porpoise skins above.

Rams’ skins died red go on top of the goat hair. And on top of the red rams’
skins is a covering of porpoise skins.

So the tabernacle has four layers. And the instructions begin from the inside out.
From the beautiful blue interior to the goat hair to the rams’ skins to the porpoise skins,
what we can say is the interior of the tabernacle is hard to get to.

Of course, unless a tent has some structure to put the tent curtains on, all you’ve
got is a big pile of fabric. Well, instructions for the structure of God’s tent, the
tabernacle, are found in verses 15-30. Let’s read them together.
15
"Then you shall make the boards for the tabernacle of acacia wood, standing
upright. 16 "Ten cubits shall be the length of each board and one and a half cubits the
width of each board. 17 "There shall be two tenons for each board, fitted to one another;
thus you shall do for all the boards of the tabernacle. 18 "you shall make the boards for

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the tabernacle: twenty boards for the south side. 19 "You shall make forty sockets of
silver under the twenty boards, two sockets under one board for its two tenons and two
sockets under another board for its two tenons; 20 and for the second side of the
tabernacle, on the north side, twenty boards, 21 and their forty sockets of silver; two
sockets under one board and two sockets under another board. 22 "For the rear of the
tabernacle, to the west, you shall make six boards. 23 "You shall make two boards for the
corners of the tabernacle at the rear. 24 "They shall be double beneath, and together they
shall be complete to its top to the first ring; thus it shall be with both of them: they shall
form the two corners. 25 "There shall be eight boards with their sockets of silver, sixteen
sockets; two sockets under one board and two sockets under another board. 26 "Then
you shall make bars of acacia wood, five for the boards of one side of the tabernacle, 27
and five bars for the boards of the other side of the tabernacle, and five bars for the
boards of the side of the tabernacle for the rear side to the west. 28 "The middle bar in
the center of the boards shall pass through from end to end. 29 "You shall overlay the
boards with gold and make their rings of gold as holders for the bars; and you shall
overlay the bars with gold. 30 "Then you shall erect the tabernacle according to its plan
which you have been shown in the mountain.

Don’t let the details of this overwhelm you. Try to take in the structure as a
whole. Three passages within verse 15-30 provide the overall shape of the tabernacle:

1. Verse 18: You shall make the boards for the tabernacle: twenty boards for
the south side. So to the south the measurement is twenty.

2. Verse 20: And for the second side of the tabernacle, on the north side,
twenty boards. As you can see, the north side has the same measurement as
the south—twenty boards.

3. Verses 22-25: For the rear of the tabernacle, to the west, you shall make six
boards. You shall make two boards for the corners of the tabernacle at the
rear. They shall be double beneath, and together they shall be complete to
its top to the first ring; thus it shall be with both of them: they shall form
the two corners. There shall be eight boards with their sockets of silver,
sixteen sockets; two sockets under one board and two sockets under
another board. So the rear of the tabernacle has a measurement of eight.

So if the north and south measure twenty, and if the west measures eight, what
is roughly the shape of the tabernacle? Well, roughly it’s the shape of a rectangle.

“Not a triangle?” you ask. “It only has three sides.” Well, in a sense that’s true,
but what we read in verses 31-37 tells us that the east side (the front) has a doorway—
it’s just not made of wood; it’s made of fabric like the tent itself.

Actually, there are two doorways, one behind the other as you move to the back
of the tent. In other words, there is an outer doorway that can be accessed directly from
the outside and there is an inner doorway that you have to pass through the outer
doorway before you can get to it. The instructions for the inner doorway are given first
and instructions for the outer doorway are given second.

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Let’s look at the instructions for the doorways in the order that we would
encounter them. Check out verses 36-37.
36
"You shall make a screen for the doorway of the tent of blue and purple and
scarlet material and fine twisted linen, the work of a weaver. 37 "You shall make five
pillars of acacia for the screen and overlay them with gold, their hooks also being of
gold; and you shall cast five sockets of bronze for them.

Here is doorway #1, hung on with hooks on wooden pillars—a fabric

entranceway. Like the interior of the tent, it is made of blue and purple and scarlet
material.

Doorway #2 is described in verse 31-33.

31
"You shall make a veil of blue and purple and scarlet material and fine twisted
linen; it shall be made with cherubim, the work of a skillful workman. 32 "You shall hang
it on four pillars of acacia overlaid with gold, their hooks also being of gold, on four
sockets of silver. 33 "You shall hang up the veil under the clasps, and shall bring in the
ark of the testimony there within the veil; and the veil shall serve for you as a partition
between the holy place and the holy of holies.

Like the outer doorway, the inner curtain, or veil is hung on pillars.

So there you have it, God’s tent—a structure that is closed to the north, south,
and west with a two-door fabric entranceway to the east, one behind the other.

So, God makes his presence inaccessible by the multiple layers of material—
linen, goats’ hair, rams’ skins, and porpoise skins. In addition, the place where God will
be is shielded from view from the outside by having a two-doorway entrance. In this
way, God’s people are kept from the holy of holies, the interior-most room of the
sanctuary, the place where God will make his presence known.

Not Prescriptive, but Descriptive of Our Relationship with God

So you might think that with all of these layers (call them hindrances) of access
to God, that God was trying to tell his people that he wanted to be left alone. But
nothing could be further from the truth. While there are very clearly degrees of
inaccessibility symbolized by the tabernacle structure, the inaccessibility is not a
reflection of God’s desire—they are a reflection of the way things are between God and
humanity. In other words, the partitions of the tabernacle do not represent God
separating himself from us, but of the fact that we have separated ourselves from him.

So the reason why there are so many hurdles to overcome in order to enter
God’s presence is because of us. It is because of our sin, our rebellion against God—
this is what keeps us from his presence. The partitions of the tabernacle remind us not
of a problem with God, but of a problem with us.

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This, incidentally, explains the choice of material used to cover the interior
curtains of the tabernacle. Goats’ hair, rams’ skins, and porpoise skins—all from
animals indicates that animals had to die in order for these curtains to be made. The
goats and rams are especially significant in that they are animals that would be killed in
sacrifice—deaths that functioned as substitutes for the people whose sin separated
them from God and would have resulted in their own deaths without a substitute.

Sometimes this is a hard concept to grasp, but the bottom line is that sin (our
rebellion against God) has created a rift between God and us. And because this rift was
created by our rebellion against God, God’s justice must be satisfied. We are guilty of
the crime of cosmic treason against the true and living God. Death is our consequence.

Well, what God did through the sacrificial system of the Old Testament was to
provide for the people a way of repairing the rift between them and him: the death of
animals would be a symbolic substitute of their own death for their sins. God would
allow them to enter his presence because a substitute sacrifice had been made.

All of this is to say (by way of reminder) that what keeps us from God is not God,
but us. God made us to fellowship with him; he made us for intimacy with him, but
because of our sin, access to him is denied.

Turn with me in your Bibles to Genesis 3.

As you do that, let me orient you to the context.

God has created humanity to be in charge of the care of the world he has made.
And he has created humanity to do this under his divine authority, in harmony with God,
and enjoying unhindered communion or fellowship or intimacy with him.

Genesis 2:8 says that the Lord planted a garden in Eden and put the man in it to
cultivate and keep it. Genesis 2:16-17 says that in the garden, the Lord gave the man a
command. He said, “From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree
of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it
you will surely die.”

Well, what we read in Chapter 3 is of the disobedience of humanity. The man

and then the woman refused to submit to God’s mandate and chose instead to go their
own way. Read verses 1-8.
1
Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the LORD
God had made. And he said to the woman, "Indeed, has God said, 'You shall not eat
from any tree of the garden'?" 2 The woman said to the serpent, "From the fruit of the
trees of the garden we may eat; 3 but from the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of
the garden, God has said, 'You shall not eat from it or touch it, or you will die.'" 4 The
serpent said to the woman, "You surely will not die! 5 "For God knows that in the day
you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and
evil." 6 When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to

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the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and
ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate. 7 Then the eyes of both of
them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves
together and made themselves loin coverings. 8 They heard the sound of the LORD God
walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves
from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden.

Verse 8 is particularly instructive. Let’s read it again: They heard the sound of
the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his
wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the
garden.

We see first that the Lord God was walking in the garden; he was walking in
the garden in the cool of the day. In other words, the Lord is amongst humanity,
fellowshipping with them, in communion with them, present with them.

Second, we see that the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence
of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. They hid themselves from God.
They sinned against God and so they hid from him—he did not hide from them!

This is one of the effects of our fall into sin—alienation from God. In our sin, we
have hidden ourselves from him. Because of our sin, there is a rift between us and
God, a wide gulf separating us from him.

Turn back to Exodus 26.

The way to God is closed. It is closed because we have chosen to go our own
way.

Our sin has limited our access to intimacy with God.

Almost Closed, but Always Open in Christ

But as we have seen, the way to God is not closed entirely—it is almost closed.1
I say that it is “almost closed” because there is still a way in—through the screen first
(the outer door) and then through the veil (the inner door). The way the people could
enter was through the priesthood (which we read about in Chs 28-29), the people’s
representatives. And the way the representative entered was by a sacrifice, hinted at,
as we have seen, in the choice of material to cover the tabernacle.

And yet all of this is symbolic—even then. How can the death of an animal ever
be an appropriate substitute for our rebellion? God is everywhere; his presence has
never ultimately been limited to a particular space.

And this is precisely what the tabernacle shows us. It demonstrates for us a
universal truth—that humanity’s access to God is hindered by our sin and that an

1 I owe this language to Philip Graham Ryken, Exodus: Saved for God’s Glory (Crossway, 2005), 851.

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innocent must die in our place if we are to have our access restored. The tabernacle
prepares God’s people for a future sacrifice that will change the almost of the tabernacle
into always.

Turn with me in your Bibles to Hebrews 9:11-12.

11
But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things to come, He
entered through the greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to
say, not of this creation; 12 and not through the blood of goats and calves, but through
His own blood, He entered the holy place once for all, having obtained eternal
redemption.

Jesus Christ is that sacrifice. By Jesus’ death on the cross for us, we no longer
hear “access denied”; instead, we hear “access granted.” And the access is ever and
always open—not almost closed, but always open.

Look ahead to 10:19-20.

19
Therefore, brethren, since we have confidence to enter the holy place by the
blood of Jesus, 20 by a new and living way which He inaugurated for us through the veil,
that is, His flesh,

We have confidence to enter the presence of God, to enjoy fellowship,

communion, intimacy with him by a new and living way that Jesus has inaugurated
through the veil—that is, through his flesh, through his death on the cross for us. Our
veil is Jesus Christ. He is our doorway to intimacy with God that we have been
designed to crave.

So God is not far from us. In fact, he has never been far from us. He made us to
seek him in the hope that we might feel our way toward him and find him (Acts 17:27).
We have made ourselves far from him. But our access to fellowship God may be
regained by faith, by trusting Jesus Christ.

A Continual Remedy
Are you feeling far from God? Are you feeling empty, isolated, alienated, lonely,
depressed? Well, the reason for this is not because God has left you. It is because you
have left him.

What hinders us from enjoying the relationship with God that Christ has
inaugurated by his death on the cross is the same as it’s always been—our sin. It’s not
God, but us.

Psalm 66:18 says, “If I regard wickedness in my heart, The Lord will not hear.”
And the Apostle Peter tells husbands to “live with your wives in an understanding
way…and show her honor as a fellow heir of the grace of life, so that your prayers will
not be hindered” (1 Peter 3:7).

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The reason I may be feeling far from God is that I have cherished sin in my heart;
that is, I am refusing to turn away from attitudes and actions that defy God—I am loving
my sin more than I am loving my God.

Or perhaps I have been living insensitively in relation to other people, especially

my wife. Men, have you ever felt like your prayers hit the ceiling and went no farther?
Well, maybe the reason is that you have dropped the ball on living with your wives in an
understanding way, that you have dropped the ball on showing her honor as a fellow
heir of the grace of life.

Now I would suggest to you that this is true for all relationships, not simply the
marriage relationship. For the way we behave in relation to one another is indicative of
the condition of our relationship to God. As the Apostle John says, “If someone…does
not love his brother whom he has seen, [he] cannot love God whom he has not seen” (1
John 4:20).

I do not say this to you to make you feel more discouraged; to the absolute
contrary, I point this out to you to encourage you greatly.

God hasn’t gone away. Jesus is always near. We are the ones who drift. The
issue is our own sin. And since the issue is our own sin, and not the disposition of God,
we have hope; for God has provided the remedy for our sin that doesn’t affect us only
when we became Christians, at the beginning of our relationship, but he continues to
provide the remedy for our sin throughout the relationship so that we might continue to
enjoy his presence.

Listen to what Jesus says in Revelation 3:19-20: “Those whom I love, I reprove
and discipline; therefore be zealous and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock;
if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with
him, and he with Me.”

Christ is standing at the door and knocking—we are not letting him in. But if we
let him in, by turning from our sin and with zeal returning to him, he will stop knocking
and he will come in. And when he does he will sit down with us once again and dine
with us once again and we will dine with him…once again.

Conclusion
This is what the tabernacle points us to. The partitions of the tabernacle function
as a reminder of our own waywardness and of God’s desire to bring us back into
fellowship with him, to enjoy the relationship he made us all for.

Are you lonely, aimless, discouraged, disheartened, empty?

1. It’s because you’ve drifted from God in your sin.

2. You don’t have to settle for being distant from God!

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Reach out and touch the Lord who is waiting for you. Amen.

Redeemer Bible Church

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Exod 25:1-31:18: The Partitions of the Tabernacle © 2006 by R W Glenn