Seth Postell has argued effectively that failure frames the Pentateuch.54 That is, the Pentateuch begins with a portrayal of Adam’s inability—even in the best of all possible circumstances—to obey God (Gen 3), and the Pentateuch ends with Moses expressing his complete confidence that Israel will end up (1) violating God’s covenant (Deut 31:28-29) and (2) descending into exile (Deut 30:1-6).55 According to Postell, this sobering
presentation of failure frames the Pentateuch—at least in part—to lay the “groundwork . . . for the expectation of another ‘Adam’ (another priest-king) to arise from among the people of Israel who will ultimately fulfill the creation mandate in the ‘last days.’”56 Despite Israel’s optimistic promise in Exodus 19:8, that its people would obey the entirety of God’s covenant, her national history would prove otherwise. In fact, the people redeemed for mission amongst the nations would become a disgrace among the nations because of their transgressions, a situation that surfaces as early as Exodus 32:25 and is subsequently described in passages such as Psalm 44:13-14; Ezekiel 22:4; and Ezekiel 36:20-23.57 Despite laudable intentions (Exod 19:8), Israel was destined for thorough failure in the area of keeping the covenant, and the spread of God’s glory and praise among the nations was
53John H. Sailhamer, The Pentateuch as Narrative: A Biblical-Theological Commentary (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1992), 282.
54See Seth D. Postell, Adam as Israel: Genesis 1-3 as the Introduction to the Torah and Tanakh (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2011).
55Ibid., 3-4; 141-42.
56Ibid., 4.
57See Enns, Exodus, 396-97.
thereby jeopardized. Requisite was a new “son” (Exod 4:22-23) who would keep the covenant perfectly and be the light to the nations (Isa 42:6; 49:6) that Israel had not been.
Enter Jesus Christ, the Son of God (Mark 1:1; cf. Exod 4:22-23); “a light for revelation to the Gentiles” (Luke 2:32; cf. Isa 42:6; 49:6); the wholly obedient priest-king (Heb 3:1; 1 Tim 6:15) and last Adam (1 Cor 15:45) who by his crucifixion “draws all people to himself” (John 12:32).58 Jesus descends from Abraham (Matt 1:1) and, in his atoning death and justifying resurrection, is the supremely resplendent blessing to all families of the earth (Gen 12:3). Jesus fulfills Exodus 19:5-6, for in the astute words of Peter Enns, Jesus is “God’s ‘treasured possession,’ his ‘kingdom of priests,’ and his ‘holy nation’ in the sense that through him the universal call to the nations is finally and fully put into effect.”59 Far from profaning God’s name amongst the nations (as Israel had done by transgressing God’s law [Ezek 36:20-23]), the concern of Jesus was ever to hallow God’s name (Matt 6:9), and always to say and do whatever the Father commanded him (John 12:49-50; 14:31).
The blood of Jesus has brought believing Jews and Gentiles together into nothing less than a new, unified humanity (Eph 2:13-15). This new “Man” is called the church, a people who have been redeemed from slavery to sin, death, and the devil, in order to be brought into intimate fellowship with God (1 Pet 3:18) and married to him (2 Cor 11:2; Rev 19:7; 21:9). The church has received the blessing promised through Abraham (Gen 12:3; cf. Gal 3:8-9), and the church is itself God’s new vehicle to bring blessing to the nations (Mark 13:10; Matt 28:19; Luke 24:47). God has redeemed the church to be “a people for his own possession” (Titus 2:14; 1 Pet 2:9) and a “chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation” (1 Pet 2:9), doing God’s missionary bidding in the midst
58See Enns, Exodus, 397. See also Schreiner, King in His Beauty, 37.
59Enns, Exodus, 397.
of the nations. As the new Israel, the church has taken over the role of “kingdom and priests” in God’s world (Rev 1:6; 5:10; 20:6).60 Like Israel who had been brought out of Egypt in grace, only to receive marching orders (Exod 19:5-8), the people of the church are those redeemed under the New Covenant and commanded to “walk in a manner worthy of God’s call” (Eph 4:1; 2 Thess 1:11)—a call of grace which has liberated believers efficaciously from the tyranny of darkness.
Indeed, as God’s Bride, the church has been redeemed mightily and assigned a lofty calling. The church is God’s missionary strategy in the world, birthed in order to bless the nations with the gospel and fame of Jesus. May the people of God, the church, embrace their calling and walk humbly before God, pursuing vigorously their mission.
May God be glorified as the church lives out her vocation in faithful obedience, bringing the blessing of God to the nations in the hours before the Bridegroom returns.
60Interestingly enough, in Rom 15:16, the apostle Paul describes himself as being “in the priestly service of the gospel of God” (emphasis added).
CHAPTER 9 GOD’S MOBILE HOME
The Tabernacle: Narrative Bearings
At the commencement of the book of Exodus, the Hebrew people are involved in the forced construction of cities at the behest of their overlord, Pharaoh (Exod 1:11).1 A noteworthy absence of the divine presence, combined with a perceptible darkness, characterize the initial stages of the Exodus story. Enslaved and unable to extract themselves from their dire situation, the Hebrew people appear helpless and doomed.
However, as the book of Exodus closes, the circumstances have changed in dramatic fashion. Now freed from Egypt by the mighty arm of Yahweh, the people of Israel are once again engaged in a building project, but this time they are a glad and willing party to the wishes of a very different Architect. The tabernacle that Israel produces under the direction of Yahweh signifies Yahweh’s presence in their camp; the tabernacle is the place of Yahweh’s dwelling amongst them.
One may discern the significance of the tabernacle narrative for the book of Exodus by observing the voluminous space allotted to the tabernacle’s design and
1The observations contained in this paragraph and the next, concerning the beginning and end of Exodus, are not original to me. For example, see Everett Fox, The Five Books of Moses, vol. 1 of The Schocken Bible (New York: Schocken, 1995), 395; Victor P. Hamilton, Exodus: An Exegetical
Commentary (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2011), 451; Victor P. Hamilton, Handbook on the Pentateuch, 2nd ed.
(Grand Rapids: Baker, 2005), 214-15; Daniel R. Hyde, God in Our Midst: The Tabernacle and Our Relationship with God (Sanford, FL: Reformation Trust, 2012), 211; Tremper Longman III, How to Read Exodus (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2009), 141; and John N. Oswalt, Exodus: The Way Out (Anderson, IN: Warner, 2013), 253-54.
construction.2 Victor Hamilton has noted that almost one-third of the book of Exodus is devoted to the tabernacle (Exod 25-31 and 35-40), while other aspects of Exodus that are normally understood as holding a high degree of importance (i.e., the exodus from Egypt and the Decalogue) are given considerably shorter treatments.3 This fact being the case, it seems clear that the reader of Exodus is being beckoned to grasp the momentousness of God’s manifest presence, connected with the tabernacle.4
The Exodus tabernacle narrative may be divided into three sections. If the focus of Exodus 25-31 can be described as instructional, wherein God reveals his blueprint for the tabernacle structure, the core of Exodus 35-40 is executional: these latter chapters of Exodus narrate the actual construction of the tabernacle.5 In between the instructional and executional chapters of Exodus is a notable disturbance: Exodus 32-34 are chapters largely concerned with describing Israel’s transgression in engaging an unauthorized building project, that of the Golden Calf. A thorough discussion of every aspect of the tabernacle narrative would require a book-length exploration.6 The focus in what follows is decidedly more modest, highlighting three brief passages found within the tabernacle narrative.
Exodus 25:8-9 is a foundational pericope located near the beginning of the instructional section, while Exodus 39:42-43 and 40:34-35 are passages found in the executional
2So Gordon J. Wenham, A Guide to the Pentateuch, in vol. 1 of Exploring the Old Testament (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2003), 74.
3Hamilton, Exodus, 449, notes that only two chapters of Exodus narrate the exodus from Egypt, while a mere two-thirds of one chapter is devoted to the Decalogue.
4Ibid.
5Fox, The Five Books of Moses, 394, identifies Exod 25-31 as “blueprint” chapters, while he labels Exod 35-40 the “construction chapters.” Hamilton, Exodus, 451, outlines Exod 25-40 in the following terms: “The flow in these last chapters is from instruction (25-31) to interruption (32-34) to implementation (35-40).”
6An excellent, thoroughgoing, recent treatment of the tabernacle can be found in J. Daniel Hays, The Temple and the Tabernacle: A Study of God’s Dwelling Places from Genesis to Revelation (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2016).
chapters. These latter two passages are significant because they describe the completion of the tabernacle (Exod 39:42-43) and the subsequent infilling of the divine presence (Exod 40:34-35). In addition to providing brief inquiries into each of the three passages, attention is given to select aspects of the broader tabernacle story.