The Tabernacle Tour #2
Anchor scripture:
Hebrews 9:1-10
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Hebrews%209%3A1-10&version=ESV
Lesson 2: The laver (wash basin)
“Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.” (Ps. 51:10)
Now we are inside the tabernacle (The Kingdom of God - John 3:3)…
Now we have received the message of the Cross…the Sacrifice of Messiah…and allowed ourselves to be crucified with Him (Gal 2:20-21)…
Now through Christ, we are born again into a new life (1Peter1:23)…
Now God will begin to write His Law on our hearts so we will WANT to obey Him (Jer. 31:33)…
It is here in this place that we must now begin to form a comparison between Justification (The previous Lesson) and Sanctification (This Lesson)
Justification
“Enter his gates with thanksgiving…” Psalm 100:4
At the Altar of sacrifice, we were justified: Through receiving Christ’s one sacrifice on the cross, our position before the Lord instantly changed from guilty to innocent.
“For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.
And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.” Romans 8:29-30
Sanctification
“and (enter) his courts with praise!” Psalm 100:4
Now begins the process of sanctification, where we are transformed from the inside out. Unlike Justification, sanctification is not instantaneous, but rather, it is a process of pure grace and unconditional love and forgiveness…that will continue for the rest of our lives, until the return of Christ…when, in an instant, He will finish what He began in us (1John3:2)…
And we will see Him as He is. HalleluYah!
Read Exodus 30:17-21
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Exodus%2030%3A17-21&version=ESV
This large bronze wash basin is our next, and final stop of the outer courtyard, before entering in to God’s Holy Presence. What is it pointing to?
See John 13:10 Jesus said to him, “The one who has bathed does not need to wash, except for his feet, but is completely clean. And you are clean…”
Here, when giving this final discourse to his disciples, Jesus uses the bathing of the body as a metaphor for the inward cleansing of the soul:
John 15:3 “Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you.”
It is through the words of Jesus - the word of Truth - that the disciples have believed by faith and have been cleansed - Justified, by that same faith.
It will be these words of Jesus that will keep the disciples from the death grip of Satan, when Jesus Christ faces Death on their behalf. It will be his words of Life that will, following his resurrection, bring them to their knees in humble repentance and acceptance of his Sacrifice on the Cross: Thanking back to Lesson 1 - here is where the disciples, by the Way of the Cross, have entered in and been saved. As we also have entered in the same Way.
Here is the bitter-sweet Truth of the Cross (represented by the Altar of Sacrifice) - that convicts and then forgives…from the inside out.
Here is justification.
Sanctification:
Ephesians 5:25-26 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word,
Here we see a simple picture of continual cleansing …through the continuous washing of waters from the Word…
Read John 13:3-10…https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John%2013%3A3-10&version=ESV
because although Jesus cleanses our hearts/souls, Satan - through Jesus Christ - is under our feet; and still can and will bruise our heels…and cause us to stumble.
This is why at the laver, the priests (symbolic of a follower of Jesus) wash only their hands and feet:
This is why Jesus instructs us, the Body of Christ, to wash each other’s feet:
How is this done?
Through bathing them in the Truth of the Word of God; our bread from Heaven which nourishes us and causes growth; the fruit of which, will be Love: for God and each another. (James 5:14-16)
And ultimately, through the Work of Jesus Christ Himself! (Titus 3:4-7)
“…so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.
Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ,
from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.” Ephesians 4:14-16
Because we all have come in by the same narrow Way (the altar…the Cross) and we all must now travel together on the journey of sanctification…
The Process of Sanctification
***Remember: God is extremely gracious and merciful…slow to anger and rich in love toward those who have been justified: ie, who have put their trust in the sacrifice of His Son for their salvation…he who honors the Son, honors the Father who sent Him:
See:
Psalm 103:8-14…https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm%20103%3A8-14&version=ESV
John5:23-24…Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.
Therefore if our faith should sometimes fail…if we, having received the Sacrifice of the Cross, should somehow grow weak, stumble and fall…
The Father’s forgiveness is swift when we cry out…because of our Justification;
Because of the blood of His Son: 1John2:1…“My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.”
But…according to 1John1:9, He will not leave us in that state. So next stop is the laver (Sanctification).
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness
Here is the process of continual sanctification; it is an incredible journey to embark upon, and is available only to those who have come through the Way of the Sacrifice (Remember Lesson 1;
also see John Ch.10:9-16 & Ch.14:6)
And here, we must continually come before God unveiled and trusting totally in Him for Salvation and forgiveness - no hiding!
His blood has opened that Way for us to come, and just as a Bride makes herself ready for her Bridegroom, we must allow the Truth of the Word to cleanse our consciences from the dead works of sin, so we can enter in to the Presence of our Father…who is life.
Hebrews 9:13-14; “For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.
(Also Rev. 19:7-9…https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2019%3A7-9&version=ESV)
Look again at Exodus 38:8 He made the basin of bronze and its stand of bronze, from the mirrors of the ministering women who ministered in the entrance of the tent of meeting.
And although we know now that the cleansing of the body is merely symbolic - because only the Lord can do the real cleansing…that of the soul; it does demonstrate: 1. The obedience of the priests. 2. Their understanding that they are (as all humanity) unclean - and therefore, in order to come before the Lord, they MUST cleanse themselves…be in some way SEPARATE from the corruption of the camp (representative of this world) See also Exodus 33:7. Now Moses used to take the tent and pitch it outside the camp, far off from the camp, and he called it the tent of meeting. And everyone who sought the Lord would go out to the tent of meeting, which was outside the camp.
This would be the final stop for the priests, before entering the Holy Place…
And every time they bathed, it is likely they would have seen a reflection of themselves in the laver…(see James 1:22-27)
Sobering…but also encouraging:
Because it is the truth of the Word of God that washes away all our masks and helps us see ourselves for who we really are…weak and sinful, but Justified: saved, cleansed and purchased back, by a holy God, who loves us deeply enough not to leave us where we are! (John3:16).
It is here, through this process of sanctification, that we remember: We have already embraced the cross (the Altar of Sacrifice); we are now safe and secure inside His Kingdom (the Tabernacle); we are already made right in the sight of God: We are Justified.
“…and those whom he justified he also glorified.”
We can cleanse our bodies…But only the Lord can cleanse/Sanctify our hearts.
See
James 1:23-25
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=James%201%3A23-25&version=ESV
2Corinthians 3:12-18
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Corinthians%203%3A12-18&version=ESV
If we have truly embraced the Cross we should be able to come before God with confidence, knowing that he has…and will continually, forgive and cleanse us (as 1John 1:9 says). We must let Him wash our feet - and also wash each other’s.
***A final note:
To stumble as a Christian is NOT the same as to willfully reject the Cross - to ignore the bronze altar (think back to the tabernacle);
…because if you reject the altar of sacrifice, you cannot enter in to the Kingdom of Heaven. (Heb 6:4-6).
But for we who have entered in, let us continue in this journey of sanctification, trusting totally in the sacrifice of Christ, and encouraging one another in this…
That when Christ returns, we will be found looking to Him and for Him…not perfect…but looking upward:
Believing by faith that when we see Him, we will become like Him - in the twinkling of an eye!***
Romans 6:12-14
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans%206%3A12-14&version=ESV
Ephesians 4:22-32
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ephesians%204%3A22-32&version=ESV
Philippians 1:4-6
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Philippians%201%3A4-6&version=ESV
Image: Grace and Truth
See Lesson 3 @
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