Hebrews 9:1-2a

"Then verily the first covenant (again going back to the Mosaic) had also ordinances of divine service, (in other words, they had to go through the ritual prescribed) and a worldly (or an earthly) sanctuary. 2. For there was a tabernacle..." (a tent)


Now I trust you all know that the word tabernacle is better translated in our English, as a tent. It was a temporary place that could be taken down, folded up and moved. It was not stone and brick and mortar like the temple which came later. But it was a temporary tent situation and so, consequently, it was called a tabernacle.


Hebrews 9:2-3

"For there was a tabernacle made; the first, wherein was the candlestick, and the table, and the shewbread; which is called the sanctuary. 3. And after the second veil, the tabernacle which is called the Holiest of all;" In other words, all part of this same little tent. Now while we were waiting for the cameras to get ready, I just quickly drew a little makeshift illustration of what we're talking about. This isn't according to scale, but in the outer fence there was only a gate on the East. I'm using the typical directions of North, and East and South and West. This is the way the tabernacle was always set as was the temple on the Mount in Jerusalem. Alright, so as you came in from the East through the outer gate the very first thing that was in the furnishings was the brazen altar; the sacrifices. Then you came to the laver of cleansing, which was filled with water. And then you came to the first door of the tent, or the veil if you want to call it that, and this was called the sanctuary. This was the only place that the priests ministered every day of the year.


And in this, we had the table of showbread with the twelve flat loaves of bread. Down here was the candlestick, the light for the sanctuary. And then right over here next to the veil was the altar of incense, which was still in here but close enough that the aroma of the incense covered the Ark of the Covenant, which was just behind the veil. And we're going to look in a minute how, specifically, God told Moses to place these. And then here was the veil that most Bible readers are acquainted with, the veil that rent when Christ died on that Cross. But it was the veil behind which only once a year the high priest could go and sprinkle the blood on the Mercy Seat, which was above the Ark of the Covenant. So this is basically the floor plan.


Now the Temple was established years later on the same kind of a floor plan, only instead of being a temporary tent, it was made of all the materials that are part and parcel of a building. In other words, the mortar and the stone and the gold and the silver and all the rest of it. But, out in the wilderness, which Paul is dealing with here, it was just the little tent. Now verse 3.


Hebrews 9:3-4

"And after the second veil, (the back room of this little tent or of) the tabernacle which is called the Holiest of all; (or what we really refer to so often as the Holy of Holies.) 4. Which had the golden censer, and the ark of the covenant overlaid round about with gold, wherein (that is in the Ark - this little box made of wood and covered with pure gold) was the golden pot that had (a sample of the) manna (the food in the wilderness) and Aaron's rod that budded, and the tables of the covenant;" (or the Ten Commandments.)


Let's go back to Exodus chapter 40. And the children of Israel are now ready to set up the tabernacle. The last year has been spent getting everything ready. Craftsmen of every sort were commissioned to do the work and they must have been brilliant - to take pure gold and overlay these articles of wood, out of which everything was tremendously beautiful. Verse 19.