God's Detailed Design: The Table of Presence

You're listening to The Bible Guys, a podcast where a couple of friends talk about the Bible in fun in practical ways. Hey, everybody, welcome to another episode of The Bible Guys. Here we are, we are here, and we are going to jump right into Desiree's game. It's a lot like taboo. And for those who are listening, you can just believe us. For those who are watching, we are going to hopefully put the words up on the screen of the words that I cannot say. But my goal is to get you to say words. Okay, So I have to guess what you're trying to get me to say without you saying the thing. The clues. Okay, And by the way, this is according to desire She assigned points. Listen, listen to this. You're going to give Jeff clues to see if you can guess the bold word without the keywords. You are not allowed to say the italicized words, or else you will lose one thousand points. Oh okay, And so she just tossed that points. I didn't even know I had a bucket of I don't know do I have. Points are going to go negative starting at zero. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're going to go negative and you're going to points in the future. Points. I didn't know there was a running talient points. All right, here we go. Ready, Before you attack a city, you have to come up with a plan plan. Wow, okay. I was not allowed to say scheme, strategy, plot, idea or architect very good. Nailed it, all right, me, buddy. When you have supper, you have to sit at a table, table. I wasn't allowed to say chair, desk, dinner. I said supper, tennis or claw. Yeah. Hey, that's right, all right, I'm semantics, but hey, it's I mean, I mean I didn't say anything. You're right, okay, okay, Ready, the Ark of the Covenant was made out of gold. Gold, that's it. So I wasn't allowed to say silver, treasure, We are killing this. I just want you to know or mine. Well, that's all about me. Yeah right, it's all about the clues. Yeah yeah, all right, So here we go. Ready. You always say we don't take, but we receive the we don't take it, we receive it offering, the offering. Oh yes, yes, so I wasn't along the mafia takes offerings. Yeah, that's right, that's right. And by the way. That's Jeff's big thing. So when I got to Heritage, I think one of the first times I get up, I said, hey, it's time to take our offering. And then he saw me afterwards and said, you know, it's really bad language to say take an offering, you know, so say receive. But that's it's not a suggestion, that's a commandment, all right. I learned that. So I wasn't allowed to say sacrifice, peace, burnt, offer, or off. Okay, so offerings, yeah, I don't understand the offer or off. I don't know. Oh offer and offering, offer a burnt okay, yeah, yeah, but the off thing anyway, all right. And so she was this last one's pretty hard. Okay. Today we're talking about the table of bread. Bread bread, yeah, bread bread, Oh that was it? Yeah, Oh wow, Okay. I wasn't allowed to say loaf, butter, dough, wheat, or toast. Okay. Wow, that was a tough one. Yeah, but I got them pretty pretty good. Pretty good, good job, Chris. We should go on if the ministry doesn't work out for us, we should just be like professional game show people. Just go on all the game shows and win them all. I'm not sure that we would do that. We would would we? Oh yeah, man, you're you're amazing Chris. Look look how well you just did right there. It's all about me. Uh huh. I do like games. I like game shows. We need like ten thousand dollars every week. What is the game show that if you're flipping the channels and it's on, you'll usually pause and watch a segment of it? Oh? Man, usually pause. I know what it is. I'm not many. I used to. We got really caught up and who wants to be a millionaire? Back in the day? Oh yeah, back in the day. Yeah, but but the original one, not the not the girl one right right, she was terrible. But I don't watch game show as much. For me, I already know what it is. So I have a game show network. I used to have a game show network, but always no, no, no, although that's pretty good, but not fortunate. Nope, it is family feud, family feud, Okay, okay, family feuds. One I'll watch Yeah it's one. Steve Harvey's funny, Yeah Steve. And two that's it's a clever show. Yeah it's really good. And and uh and and you know you could immediately try it you're right, whereas like, you know, well, fortune is like so slow sometimes you know, and you're like the ell and you're like, okay whatever. But but but immediately when there's a question asked, you go, I have an answer right. And it's different than Jeopardy yelling at the TV. Jeopardy is one answer right, and you have to you have to sort of play Jeopardy the whole thing. But you could, you could. You could pause and watch it for five minutes and then leave it and play. What I'm saying, that's true, you're right. So I don't watch a ton of the game shows, but with my kids, it seemed like I remember thinking, the last time I watched Family Feud was at the emergency room. Then the next time I watched Family Feud was at the emergency room, and then so I don't know, if they just have Family Feud on the emergency room, that might be the only thing they do is just reruns the Family Feud. But it was probably two or three times in a row, taking the kids, you know, to the for dislocated arm or broken the arm or something. You know, we wind up going, and it seemed like Family Feud was always on the yeah, yeah, Well I distract. I don't know why. I don't know what to do with that. That was a little nugget they had nothing information. Well, I'm just suggesting that perhaps they have it on a maybe there's some medical reason for having it on replay on joy. I don't know. Yeah, put something that causes people joy. Yep. Maybe most people like it like me. So we were talking yesterday about the idea that, oh, we wish we had the ability to just go through all of the different features of the tabernacle without looking ahead and realizing actually, what we're going to do is go through all the different features of the tabernacle. Desiree already had a setup for that and we just didn't realize it. That's so fun. So we already talked about how God said, build it right, and then he's he and collect the offerings, and you're going to need all these special things. And then the first thing you wanted design and built was this arc of the Covenant where the cover of atonement was going to be right, the mercy seat. And then the next thing that he wants. He says this in Exodus chapter twenty five, verse twenty three. He says, then make a table of acacia wood thirty six inches long, eighteen inches wide and twenty seven inches high. Overlay it with pure gold and run a gold molding around the edge. Decorate it with a three inch border all around and run a gold molding around the border. Make four gold rings for the table and attach them at the four corners next to the four legs. Attach the rings near the border to hold the poles that are used to carry the table. Make these poles from acasha wood and overlay them with gold. Make special containers of pure gold for the table, bowls, pans, pictures, and jars to be used in pouring out liquid offerings. Place the bread of the presents on the table to remain before me at all times. Yeah, so this is the table of presents, or sometimes it'd be called the table of showbread. Yeah, show bread. Yep. And so there's really not a ton here about this piece that we know about other than this symbolism. Right. So the symbolism is pretty cool. But I'll read some of it and then you could chime in. I'let me read the opening paragraph on this, so you know, for me, I'm looking these things up right before the podcast, right, Although I do know a lot about the tabernacle and its contents inside, but I would say this one here is the one. I was like cheese, we're going to talk about it says the primary purpose of the table was to hold the bread of the presence, and it says literally translated as the bread of the face. That's interesting, which was set before the presence or the face of Yahweh. Each Sabbath, the priests would replace the loaves from the previous week with a fresh batch of bread. Exactly twelve loaves were arranged into two rows of six, and these loaves represented the twelve tribes of Israel. Now they're probably describing it in the Solomon's Temple, or wouldn't you think, No, No, it was the twelve tribes of Israeli now, but yeah, with Joseph, right, that was before the slavery. These loaves were a food offering to God that was perpetually carried out as a covenant forever. As mentioned in Leviticus chapter twenty four. It also represented so it represented God's work or the work of the priests. Right, there's all that. That's why he's he's really specific about the size and where the rings are and how poles or you know, be able to carry all these things, and so he's highlighting the work of the priests of the people. And then it also the bread represents God's provision for the people. So the people are sacrificing bread to God, which was their main food staple. So they're bringing sacrifice to God, saying, hey, what keeps us alive? We're surrendering to you first. And then it also represents the fact that God always provides, so as they bring to God, God always provides enough for them, right, and so that was a big part of it. He's giving so many specific instructions, it's really amazing. Not twenty six inches and not twenty eight inches, twenty seven inches, twenty seven and now only that. I want the molding around the edges. I want the gold like this, I want this part covered, I want this open wood. I want rings over here. I want it to be cornered like this. God's really, really, really, really precise on his designs, and it shows that God is intentional on everything, that He's actively engaged in everything with your guard to his connections with you, because worship is just connecting with God. And so he's having them build these these articles for worship. But really it's about the fact that God is intimately involved with every aspect of human connection with him. Yeah, and in the extravagance of you know, things being pure gold. So you know, you mentioned earlier that you know, they left Egypt and one of the miracles you know, that wasn't listed actually as a miracle, but it was the fact that their pockets were filled with silver and gold. That that that they went to the Egyptians and the Egyptians gave them all this money, so they had all the resources. Well imagine this, where would they have gotten the gold to build all this? So so in other words, you're a slave, Okay, the forester household is generations and generations of being slaves. And then all of a sudden Moses tells you go collect gold. So you go around to all the Egyptians that know you, and they willingly give you all this gold. And so now you're rich. Right, you have, you have resources, You take it back, you carry it with you and all of that, but you carry it a very very very long way for a long time, for a long time. If only get to a place where you establish a city, right, it's probably at the base of Mount Sinai, you know, and this is where you're going to be. And then and so you build a temporary dwelling. I'm sure like it's some sort of a tent or something like that. Yeah, but then you have your your gold and it's like, this is my family's gold. And then all of a sudden, Moses comes down and says, okay, we need build and we need a bunch of gold, right right, we need a bunch of gold. Where's he gonna get it? The people have to give it, don't they. They have to. God's not going to just it doesn't say anyway that that He's going to provide gold out of a mountain, right, so the people are going to give. So my point is, even though it doesn't say that, we have to, you know, piece it together and understand that he's asking Moses to do this, but it's for the people, which means the people are going to have to give to the church. So this would be probably I think the first example of people giving their resources to a place of worship, wouldn't it. Yeah, well this is their first place of worship as a people, as Israelites. Yeah, yes, so this would be there. So I mean it had happened in other cultures and things, but for the Israelites, this will be the first because you know, if you go before the you know, if you go with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and Joseph, there wasn't a central place of worship for those people, so this would be it. So I think you do have the one time Abraham is giving an offering, a financial offering to Melchizedec a priest, right, yeah, so you have that piece, so it's in their history, but it wasn't for a place. And that was also one person to a single a priest. But this is a communal idea of the church, where everybody gives. If everybody, it's not the church, it's a temple. I know, I know, but I'm saying they called out people is where I was trying to refer to. But but the the idea of a church anyway, if everybody gives a gold ring, we'll have enough to cover one of the poles, right right, you know that kind of thing. Well, and God wasn't asking for anything that he hadn't already provided, that's right, right, So if he'd hauled them all out of Egypt and hadn't given them the plunder of Egypt. It would have been kind of rude to say, hey, I need you guys to give me what you don't have, or dig right, start digging, guys. But he wasn't asking for what they didn't have. He was only asking for some He didn't even ask for all. He was only asking for some of what he'd already provided. And it was plunder. And then the other thing is, hey, when you're out in the middle of the desert, what good does gold do you? Right, It's just heavy. It just burdens you down. Yeah, there's no good unless you're going to travel in trade. Yeah, but it's it's useless to them out in the middle of the desert. There's no there's no But how funny is that that we you know, we'd be like, oh man, they'd be really hard. I'd want to keep all my gold. I'm going to haul that heavy brick around all the desert. You know, it doesn't do me any good, but I don't want to let go of it. And you know, I think a lot of times we get bogged down by the stuff in our life because we think it's so important, when in reality we are literally wanderers on this planet because this isn't home. We haven't made to the Promised Land yet, and we get bogged down by the extra weight of all this stuff in our lives, and we just and then have a hard time imagining why God ask for some of it. He didn't ask for all of it. He asked for some of it. So then this table, you know, the bread represents the fact that God provides, But then that God continually provides. It's every week He'll be provided now, he'll provide again next week, He'll provide again next week, provide again next week, and that God is always paying close attention to his people. And then you'll notice all these things have the ability to pick them up and move them because it's a temporary thing. And the people of Israel are not in the Promised Land yet. They're kind of wandering in the wilderness. And you know, you and I have not made it to the Promised Land yet either, And so we should make all of our things temporary. They should all be portable. We shouldn't be putting down two deep roots, this isn't home, right, preparing for what God has for us. And then the extreme value of these things, even though they're temporary, the respect that it takes, and the value of bringing the very best of what we have for God, even in these temporary situations. In the tabernacle, they brought the very best of what they had, And there's something to that. You know. Sometimes sometimes we can be a little bit flippant. We just come I struggle, you know, on one side. You know, we're a kind of a blue jeens church, and I see the value of that. The reason why I think that that was so valuable was I can remember I had a conversation with a lady on the phone. She was very concerned that they wouldn't be welcome the church that they had been in with some other people, some of the leaders have pointed out the fact that their children didn't fit in because they were so poor, and that maybe it be better, you know, to find some place where their peers were more like them. And it just devastated her. So she called and she's asking all these questions about would they be welcome. They were extremely poor, And I can remember walking out on stage that next morning because I said, of course, you're welcome. And we had made a conscious decision that we would go casual rather than suit and tie, we would go casual so that people like her and her family would feel comfortable. And unbeknownst to me, I walk out on stage and clearly the poorest family in the whole church was sitting next to what I knew to be the richest family in the church. And I never do this. I've never done it before, never did it since. But for some reason, I just walked out, and before I made eye contact with those people, I said, Hey, it's good to be here. Won't you stand up, give somebody a handshake, a pat back, give them a hug, let them know you're glad to see them. And I'm not a hugger, so I never encourage that, but I did that day. And then I realize the poorest family sitting next to the richest family. The richest guy in the room was where wearing a golf shirt and a pair of khakis, and the guy, the poorest guy in the room, was wearing a red Wings golf shirt and a pair of khakis. And they turned, they shook hands and then just leaned and gave each other a hug. And the poor man didn't know that he was sitting next to the rich man, and the rich man didn't know he's sitting next to the poor man. And I thought, that's why it's supposed to be right. The grounds level at the cross were all equals. And sometimes it had that rich man been wearing a Brooks Brother's suit that cost three thousand dollars and the poor man is wearing that same outfit. It was just nicest clothes. They would have had a sense of who was more important than the other, or richer than the other, right, but they didn't. So I appreciate our decision to be casual. However, sometimes our casual thing can turn into a lack of respect for what's happening and why we're there and who we're there for, and all those kinds of things. And so I think we have to have a conscious effort to make sure that when we're coming gathering together for worship, that we're making a conscious effort to remember that we're we're on holy ground and that what we're doing is a sacred thing. This is an important, you know, sacred element, and this is a lot of what God's doing is bringing the very best. And that's what I want is I want you to it's to set apart. This isn't how you guys decorate your house. This is how you decorate my house, right, is what he's doing there, And there's something to that. So I liked living in the tension of those two but remembering that what we're doing and where we're at and who we're for is holy. Right at the same time, everybody's welcome. And you know, it's so hard about this is that it's all semantics and it's all interpretation, like for instance, like the fact that we don't have stained glass windows and the fact that we don't have like you know, so we've not chosen to have you know, crosses everywhere or crucifix everywhere, and uh and then and there's something about an environment where you walk in And I grew up in the you know, Catholic church and and I remember there was a big, you know, huge cross. He's on the cross, and when you walked into the fourier, he was there in the fourier and he just sort of looked right at you. And then, you know, depending on which set of the doors that you walked in, because this head was tolded one way, and as you've walked in and you looked up and he's looking right at you. It's like, I'm not going in those doors anymore. You know, that to me was just But when you stand in that type of presence, it demands that you sh which is why I didn't feel like there was permission for a lot of clapping or laughter or celebration or you know what I would consider normal things, right, And so there's a reverence there, But then you lack, you know, the humanity side of it, the relational side of it. You left, you know, you lack the whole everything. A lot of stuff that's missing in the New Testament you lack. So it feels like an Old Testament type environment. But then when you go to our church and we don't have many of those things. That's why I appreciate a lot that we do Good Friday service often, and there is a good Friday on Good Friday. And I'm sorry, yes I'm saying, I'm saying almost every all the time, almost almost every Good Friday. We have done this, Yes, since I've been there, and uh since yeah so in my experience there so, and you've done plenty before that. But but there's a reverence to that. And and because we're not as reverent as we could be, I appreciate the reverence, and I think to myself, man, we we we missed this a lot, right, like we're not as reverent as we should be. And and uh but at the same time, like it depends on what you believe, you know. Uh, you know, excellence translates into oh, you got to have your best. That means suit and tie. And I've heard people say that. I'm like, that doesn't always mean suit and tie, Like, since what that doesn't equal that, right, Because if that's the case, then you know you might as well you can translate that into everything. Yeah. Right, Well, my dad's thought. My dad said, Hey, I dressed for God like I would dress for the president. That's that's that's that would be my dad's view. There's a lot of respect and that right. Sure, And that's wrong. No, that that's perfectly legit. If that's what If that's what you feel convicted to do, you should do that. Our choice in our in our building is to level the ground so that there is no rich and poor, right that that that's what we're trying to do in that environment. But so I would say, make sure that it's intentional. But I think that in an environment in ours where we work hard to be casual so that you know, a poor person doesn't stand out. We have to also consciously work hard in our individual hearts to also understand this is a holy moment. That song up there is not just a song. That's a holy moment for you, right, That prayer is not just a one more religious hoop that we jump through because it's a Sunday morning. That is a holy moment where we are collectively going before our God. That's great, and and and so because we're like we like this song, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, which is a casual attitude, right, but it's but it's a but it's a reverence. It's it's you're going before Holy God. There's a there's a there's a worship moment. And even God says, you know, come boldly before my throne, you know. And when we enter into the presence of God, which again I mean semantics, God is everywhere. We're always in the presence of God. Right, But but but to but to go before Him in prayer, it's it's as if God is saying, you're going into the Holy of holies. Yeah, we're gathering together for these purposes, and there's there's something holy in that. So, you know, having a strategy where our intent is on a Sunday morning. We know that most people who aren't Christians in our community, so we live in kind of a post Christian area where most of the people have some kind of religious background, but they're not currently uh you know followers of Christ. My father used to go to some church somewhere. Yeah. Yeah, we we are aware that most of the people if we stop them on the street and ask if you were going to get right with God, what would you do? They would say, I'd go to church on Sunday morning and meet with a priest or pastor. That's what they tell us. So we on purpose make that are gathering on a Sunday morning be for that lost person to introduce them to Jesus. Right, That's what we're doing. And so our intent is different. But we have you know, specific worship nights and we have gatherings. And I think that those moments in the homes, if you look in the New Testament, they weren't you know, they were gathering in the temple. Certainly those were those holy moments, but they're also gathering house to house that you know, for fellowship and for the purpose of leaning into the apostles, teaching and all these things. And it's both sides. There's the holy side and the personal relational side, and we just have to be conscious about both of them, not just embrace the casual without the holy, or not just the holy without the normal people thing. There's a tension there, but God is really setting it apart on purpose because they were only ever slaves and they had no concept of the holy right, because this is generation's right four hundred years and there had never been a tabernacle, so He's setting up going, hey, this is particularly special because they'd never had it before. And so I just have to be aware of the fact that there's kind of a pendulum that swings back and forth where we go too casual too holy. And it convicts me because we do a lot of the planning for the weekends and we should do more very intentional, reverent kind of moments, right, and we do that sometimes. Yeah, we do this sometimes, but we should probably do it more sure. And so that's what I'm taking away from this is that God always provides, and he provides every week just like this. There's always enough He wants to be with his people He's very engaged with the details of how to come to him in this and God's paying attention to every detail in your life. And then he invites us into the Holy and I think we have to just be you know, even today as you pray, you know, that's a holy moment. There's something special about that. That's awesome. All right. Well, hey, that is our time, so we will see you next time on the Bible. Guys,