Exodus 38:13 belongs to the worship part of Exodus, which begins at chapter 25 and shows how Israel received an established form of worship. Exodus means going out, referring to Israel's departure from Egypt after the family of Israel had grown more and mightier than the Egyptians, had been brought into bitter bondage and oppression, had been greatly delivered, and had been made into a nation with thorough organization, efficient leadership, a complete code of laws, and an established worship. It belongs to the minute description in Exodus 25 to 40 of the worldly sanctuary built in the days of Moses exactly according to the pattern shown to Moses in the mount.
It belongs to the record in Exodus 35-40 of how God's directions for building the sanctuary in Exodus 25-30 were carried out. The sanctuary was not left to man's fancy in how it should be built or how large, but God gave explicit instructions even to the pattern, received free-will offerings of all that would be used in building, and endowed special workmen with wisdom to carry them out under penalty of death. It gives one detail of the divinely given directions and description for the marvelously beautiful, movable wilderness sanctuary fashioned in the wilderness far from enemies after Israel was brought out of Egypt across the Red Sea, which God instructed Israel to build and let them make so He might dwell among them. It was a great, multiple object-lesson by various forms and rites that God provided because Israel's hundreds of years of slavery had unfitted them to comprehend His great salvation and the character He required.
The sanctuary building itself was thirty cubits long, ten cubits wide, and ten cubits high, made of upright boards of acacia wood overlaid with gold set in sockets of silver, with a ceiling of fine-twined linen wrought with needle-work and figures of angels, and over it a tent roof of goat's hair, red ram-skins, and seal skins. It was divided into the holy place occupying two-thirds and the most holy place, a perfect cube of ten cubits occupying one-third. The entrance to the first apartment was toward the east, differing from ancient sun-worship and forms derived from it, and the priest ministered in the sanctuary with his back to the entrance and his face to the west.
The verse gives the east side of the sanctuary court as fifty cubits long, which is the breadth and width of the east end and matches the court's width. The court as a whole was an oblong one hundred cubits long and fifty cubits wide. The tabernacle's east end was its entrance, enclosed by an embroidered curtain suspended from pillars, with a twenty-cubit entrance centered in its east end. The fine-twined linen of the court represents the righteousness of the saints, a righteousness they receive only through Christ, who is their righteousness.
As part of that worldly sanctuary first pitched in the wilderness and afterward succeeded by Solomon's temple, the measurement belonged to what was always typical of and foreshadowed the better, more perfect true tabernacle which the Lord pitched and not man. It served unto the shadow of heavenly things as an object lesson pointing to Christ and His power to forgive sin, transform character, and deliver from burdens, until the typical earthly service passed away entirely and forever at Christ's death when the temple veil was rent. The completed sanctuary and its furnishings followed God's directions, and God's glory and blessing came upon the congregation and the building when the work was finished.
Exodus 38:13 belongs to the worship part of Exodus, which begins at chapter 25 and shows how Israel received an established form of worship. Exodus means going out, referring to Israel's departure from Egypt after the family of Israel had grown more and mightier than the Egyptians, had been brought into bitter bondage and oppression, had been greatly delivered, and had been made into a nation with thorough organization, efficient leadership, a complete code of laws, and an established worship. It belongs to the minute description in Exodus 25 to 40 of the worldly sanctuary built in the days of Moses exactly according to the pattern shown to Moses in the mount.
It belongs to the record in Exodus 35-40 of how God's directions for building the sanctuary in Exodus 25-30 were carried out. The sanctuary was not left to man's fancy in how it should be built or how large, but God gave explicit instructions even to the pattern, received free-will offerings of all that would be used in building, and endowed special workmen with wisdom to carry them out under penalty of death. It gives one detail of the divinely given directions and description for the marvelously beautiful, movable wilderness sanctuary fashioned in the wilderness far from enemies after Israel was brought out of Egypt across the Red Sea, which God instructed Israel to build and let them make so He might dwell among them. It was a great, multiple object-lesson by various forms and rites that God provided because Israel's hundreds of years of slavery had unfitted them to comprehend His great salvation and the character He required.
The sanctuary building itself was thirty cubits long, ten cubits wide, and ten cubits high, made of upright boards of acacia wood overlaid with gold set in sockets of silver, with a ceiling of fine-twined linen wrought with needle-work and figures of angels, and over it a tent roof of goat's hair, red ram-skins, and seal skins. It was divided into the holy place occupying two-thirds and the most holy place, a perfect cube of ten cubits occupying one-third. The entrance to the first apartment was toward the east, differing from ancient sun-worship and forms derived from it, and the priest ministered in the sanctuary with his back to the entrance and his face to the west.
The verse gives the east side of the sanctuary court as fifty cubits long, which is the breadth and width of the east end and matches the court's width. The court as a whole was an oblong one hundred cubits long and fifty cubits wide. The tabernacle's east end was its entrance, enclosed by an embroidered curtain suspended from pillars, with a twenty-cubit entrance centered in its east end. The fine-twined linen of the court represents the righteousness of the saints, a righteousness they receive only through Christ, who is their righteousness.
As part of that worldly sanctuary first pitched in the wilderness and afterward succeeded by Solomon's temple, the measurement belonged to what was always typical of and foreshadowed the better, more perfect true tabernacle which the Lord pitched and not man. It served unto the shadow of heavenly things as an object lesson pointing to Christ and His power to forgive sin, transform character, and deliver from burdens, until the typical earthly service passed away entirely and forever at Christ's death when the temple veil was rent. The completed sanctuary and its furnishings followed God's directions, and God's glory and blessing came upon the congregation and the building when the work was finished.