Stephen Terry, Director

 

Still Waters Ministry

 

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Light From the Sanctuary

Commentary for the May 25, 2024, Sabbath School Lesson

 

"They serve at a sanctuary that is a copy and shadow of what is in heaven. This is why Moses was warned when he was about to build the tabernacle: "See to it that you make everything according to the pattern shown you on the mountain." Hebrews 8:5

The sacrificial system is almost as old as Eden and humanity. Some have said that when created, Adam and Eve were enshrouded in garments of light.[i] Once they chose to break the bond of trust that existed between them and their Creator, that light dissipated, leaving them exposed. They understood their nakedness to be evidence of wrongdoing, and they attempted to create replacement garments from the leaves of the garden. But when God found them in the garden in their makeshift clothing, he knew it was inadequate and the first sacrifice occurred. God took animal skins and made clothing for the hapless pair.[ii] Those animals were the first to die to expiate wrongdoing. The Bible does not say whether the pair witnessed the slaying of the animals. They may have been loving companions who frolicked about them as Adam and Eve worked in the garden. It must have been hard to see the price of their sin, not only what it cost them, but its impact on the rest of Creation.

We are not told much about the institution of the sacrificial system during those early ages. The next sacrifice is Abel's offering of a lamb. When his brother, Cain, offered produce instead of a lamb, his offering was rejected while Abel's was accepted. In this can be found the origin of the idea that without the shedding of blood, there can be no forgiveness.[iii] Throughout the patriarchal period, animals are sacrificed occasionally, commemorating something special. They seemed to be spontaneous and no consistent rule for offering sacrifices is mentioned until after the exodus from Egypt.

Egypt had a highly regulated religious system with the pharaoh occupying a demi-godlike position at its apex. The patriarch Abraham was told that his descendants would be captives in Egypt for four hundred years.[iv] This began when Abraham's grandson, Jacob, and his family were driven into Egypt by a seven-year famine. They went willingly and were treated with honor, but over four centuries, an anti-immigrant faction gained power in Egypt, and Abraham's descendants were reduced to slavery. They no longer offered sacrifices, nor did they remember the Sabbath established at Creation. For those centuries, they lived under the Egyptian religious system. They learned how it functioned and made accommodations to enjoy "the fleshpots of Egypt."[v] Even Moses, their eventual deliverer, was raised in Pharaoh's household and instructed in the religion, politics, economy, and military strategies of the Egyptians. He saw that the Egyptians had a separate priestly caste. He saw that mandatory offerings and grants of land supported that priesthood. He saw Pharaoh worshipped as a god, and while on military campaigns, Pharaoh's tent was separated into a most holy place where Pharaoh resided and a holy place where he held court with his officials. He saw the courtyard before Pharaoh's tent where the priesthood addressed the people and received their petitions and offerings on Pharaoh's behalf. All these things would later be incorporated into the Jewish worship system. Moses who, in the past, has been credited with writing the Pentateuch, would have found much to inspire the development of the Jewish system of worship.

Like Pharaoh's military campaign tent,[vi] Moses directed the Jews to build a wilderness tabernacle, a euphemism for a two-chambered tent surrounded by a drape-walled courtyard. As Pharaoh was attended by his court, including high ranking members of the priesthood, so the tabernacle was to be attended by Moses, Aaron, his brother, and Aaron's descendants for perpetuity, assisted by the tribe of Levi. This tabernacle endured for around two centuries when it was replaced by a permanent structure as in our illustration accompanying this commentary. This was despite rebellions that arose because of those who saw this system as favoring the power of one family over the rest. Some wanted to return to slavery in Egypt. Others wanted to seize power in the wilderness. In his writings, Moses credits divine intervention with overcoming every crisis. This raised the status of slaves fleeing their Egyptian masters to that of a Jewish Hajj to Jerusalem a millennium and a half before the Prophet Muhammed introduced the idea for Muslims and Mecca. While Muslims trace their ancestry back to Abraham's son, Ishmael, they were not made slaves in Egypt and did not experience the Jewish Wilderness Tabernacle, and its sacrificial system. their system of worship evolved differently, even though they also are sons of Abraham.

While Moses claimed to be constructing the wilderness tabernacle based on what was shown him by God, as the writer of Hebrews points out in our opening verse, The fact that there is no record of any such structure throughout the Patriarchal Period and that similar two-chambered religious structures were not unknown, it could be argued that Moses was simply building things as he was taught during his forty years in Egypt. This would not deny divine involvement. The narrative of Exodus makes clear that there is divine purpose behind Moses eventual rise to power over Israel. Who among us has not seen a plan come together well in our own lives and said afterwards, "This is the Lord's doing." This is a biblical principle echoed by James, who wrote, "Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows." (James 1:17) He recognized that the goodness of a thing is enough to commend it as provided by God. Certainly, the survival of the Wilderness Tabernacle for over two centuries is a testimony to its value.

By the time of Solomon, the sacrificial system had become so institutionalized, a tent of skins was no longer adequate for dealing with the tens of thousands of animals being sacrificed month by month. Therefore, he built the grand temple in our picture. That temple endured for almost half a millennium when it was destroyed by a Babylonian army under Nebuchadnezzar. Many Israelites were taken away to Babylon and captivity. But less than a century later, Babylon fell, and a portion of those Jews and their descendants returned. Under Zerubbabel, they rebuilt the temple, but wept at its poor representation compared to what Solomon had built.[vii] Zerubbabel's temple was in turn desecrated by Antiochus Epiphanes and subsequently cleansed and rededicated by the Maccabees during their revolt against Syrian rule. Later, Herod enlarged and improved the temple, but it was barely completed when it was destroyed during the Jewish Revolt in 70 CE. As can be noted from this brief recounting of temple history, the daily sacrifices were stopped more than once by events the Jews were unable to prevent. Nonetheless, once Jewish control was re-established, sacrifices were resumed. The shedding of blood was foundational to the Jewish religious system. When the final destruction of the temple occurred in 70 CE, blood sacrifices ended, and Judaism had to find another means to achieve expiation.

Christians have seen this long and bloody sacrificial history as pointing toward the sacrifice of Jesus, the Messiah. Since Jews do not recognize Jesus as a Messiah and a fulfillment of the sacrificial system, they are left at a loss as to how to find forgiveness through that system. Whereas Christians feel the blood shed by Jesus has eternal significance and is more than adequate to provide salvation for all who would come and accept that sacrifice on their behalf. The fact that that sacrifice took place outside the temple and the curtain of the temple was torn at the moment of sacrifice on Golgotha, negates all that went before. This fact was originally lost on the Apostles. Even Paul continued to offer sacrifice at the temple.[viii] But when the temple was destroyed, Christians realized that Jesus fulfilled the blood sacrifice with his own blood.

Some believe that Jesus is our Melchizedekian High Priest and is continually offering up his blood in heaven in the original sanctuary that was the pattern for what Moses built. But this does not seem biblical as the writer of Hebrews tells us that Christ was offered once for all.[ix] Stephen the martyr saw Jesus alfeady at the right hand of God when he was judged and stoned to death for his Christian faith. This is problematic for Seventh-day Adventists with their propensity for date setting based on Bible timelines. We are taught that Jesus entered God's presence in 1844 to begin the judgment in the most holy place. We base this on the claim of a vision given to Hiram Edson, a Baptist faith healer and charismatic. That vision has been much embellished over time and Hiram Edson himself never published anything about it. It was claimed that the idea that the Wilderness Tabernacle was based on a patten shown by God was proof that the same tabernacle exists in heaven. But if Jesus was to enter God's presence in 1844, where was he between Stephen's stoning and 1844? Why did he leave God's presence? Sometimes when we try to save face when we make mistakes, it only makes things worse. Rather than admit that there was no significance to the year 1844, we double down and grasp at an idea tossed out by someone as though it was a life saver that will deliver us from the tempestuous seas of doubt and shame. It is human nature to grasp at such straws rather than admit we were ever wrong, but there can be no repentance without confession of sin.[x] Admitting an error, even after two centuries, can be the road home.



[i] White, Ellen G, "Christ's Object Lessons," pp 310-311s, Review and Herald Publishing, 1941..

[ii] Genesis 3:21

[iii] Hebrews 9:22

[iv] Genesis 15:12-14

[v] Exodus 16:3

[vi] Shahar, Yael, "Parashat Terumah: The Tent of the King", February 6, 2019

[vii] Ezra 3:12-13

[viii] Acts 21:26

[ix] Hebrews 7:27, Cf. Hebrews 9:12

[x] 1 John 1:9

 

 

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