The Sanctuary

At Mount Sinai, God gave Moses the pattern for a sanctuary: a tent Israel could carry through the wilderness. The twelve tribes camped around it on every side, and the cloud of God’s presence rested above it.

Every part of it was a picture of the plan of salvation. Walk it from the gate to the mercy seat, and you walk the way God brings a sinner home.

The court had one way in: a gate twenty cubits wide on the east side, facing the rising sun. Its hanging was woven of blue, purple and scarlet on fine white linen, the colours that run through the whole sanctuary.

It was wide enough for anyone to come in. But there was only one.

A wall of white linen five cubits high enclosed a court one hundred cubits long and fifty wide. It hung from sixty pillars set in sockets of bronze, capped and banded with silver.

From outside, all you could see was the white wall. Inside, everything led toward the tent at the western end, and toward the altar that stood first in the way.

The first thing a worshipper met inside the gate was the altar. It was made of acacia wood overlaid with bronze, with a horn at each corner, and here the lamb was offered every morning and every evening.

No one reached the tent without passing the altar first. Forgiveness came through a substitute: an innocent life given in place of the guilty.

Between the altar and the tent stood a bronze basin of water. The priests washed their hands and feet here before they served, and no one entered the tent unwashed (Exodus 30:18–21).

It was made from the bronze mirrors of the women who served at the door of the tabernacle (Exodus 38:8). Whoever looked into it saw themselves, and then was washed.

The tent was thirty cubits long and ten wide, built from forty-eight boards overlaid with gold, each standing in sockets of silver. Four coverings lay over it: fine linen woven with cherubim, then goats’ hair, then rams’ skins dyed red, and finally a tough outer covering of skins.

From outside it looked plain and weathered. All of its glory was on the inside.

Inside the door, the daylight is gone. The walls are gold on every side, and overhead the inner curtains are woven with cherubim in blue, purple and scarlet. The only light comes from the lampstand.

Only the priests came in here, every day, to trim the lamps, burn the incense and tend the bread. Three pieces of furniture stood in this room, and each one speaks of life with God.

The lampstand was hammered from a single talent of pure gold. Six branches rose from a central shaft, each decorated with cups shaped like almond blossoms, and its seven lamps burned pure olive oil. They were never allowed to go out (Exodus 27:20).

It stood on the south side, giving light across the room to the table opposite.

On the north side stood a table of acacia wood covered with gold, with a crown of gold around its edge. On it lay twelve loaves in two rows, one loaf for each tribe, with pure frankincense on each row (Leviticus 24:5–7).

The bread was set out fresh every Sabbath. It was called the bread of the presence, because it lay always before the Lord.

A small golden altar stood directly before the veil. Every morning and evening the priest burned sweet incense on it, and its fragrance filled the tent before the Lord (Exodus 30:1–8).

Once a year, on the Day of Atonement, its horns were touched with blood (Exodus 30:10). Nothing in the Holy Place stood closer to the presence of God.

A heavy curtain of blue, purple and scarlet, woven with cherubim, divided the Holy Place from the Most Holy. It hung on four pillars of gold set in sockets of silver. Only the high priest went beyond it, and only on one day of the year.

When Jesus died, the veil of the temple was torn in two, from the top to the bottom (Matthew 27:51). Go on, and walk through.

A cube of ten cubits, lit only by the glory of God. Here stood the ark, a chest of acacia wood overlaid inside and out with pure gold.

Inside it lay the two tables of stone on which God wrote the Ten Commandments with His own finger (Exodus 31:18), with the golden pot of manna and Aaron’s rod that budded (Hebrews 9:4). The law of God sat at the very heart of the sanctuary.

Over the law lay the mercy seat, a slab of pure gold with a cherub at each end. Their wings stretched over it and their faces turned toward it, and between them shone the glory of God.

On the Day of Atonement the high priest sprinkled blood here, and the sanctuary was cleansed (Leviticus 16). Adventists see in this the final phase of Christ’s ministry in the heavenly sanctuary, which began in 1844 at the end of the 2,300 days (Daniel 8:14).

The earthly sanctuary was “the example and shadow of heavenly things” (Hebrews 8:5), built after the pattern Moses was shown on the mountain. Its services ended at the cross, but what they pointed to goes on.

Today Christ ministers for us in the sanctuary in heaven, and He invites us to come to Him with confidence.