On the first day of the first month shalt thou set up the tabernacle of the tent of the congregation.
It appoints the first day of the first month in the second year after Israel left Egypt as the time to set up the tabernacle. On that day Moses raised the structure, arranged its furnishings, placed the testimony in the ark beneath the mercy-seat, offered as commanded, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. It was built as God commanded so He might dwell among His people as the center of their worship. The wilderness sanctuary and its services were types of the heavenly sanctuary where Christ ministers and of the true tabernacle which the Lord pitched and not man. In its most holy place the ark held the moral law, with the mercy-seat above where atoning blood was sprinkled to obtain pardon for breaking the law beneath it.
Setting and Erection
The appointed time for setting up the tabernacle was the first day of the first month in the second year after Israel left Egypt. That date is given as the day the tabernacle was to be reared up, and Exodus 35-40 records how Israel carried out the work to that end. It was nearly a year after Israel left Egypt on the fifteenth day of the first month, for they reached Sinai two months after leaving and spent the rest of that year building the tabernacle. The testimony was not put into the ark until that setting up, more than nine months after the tables of stone were given, so the pot of manna could only be laid up before the testimony afterward.
On that day Moses raised the tabernacle and spread the tent over it. He put the testimony of the Ten Commandments into the ark, set the mercy-seat upon it, brought it in and set up the vail. He placed the table of shewbread and the golden candlestick with its seven lamps in the first apartment and lighted the lamps before the Lord, put the golden altar of incense before the vail and burned sweet incense thereon, and offered the burnt offering and the meat offering at the door of the tabernacle as commanded. Its erection and anointing prepared it for priestly service and established the setting where the Levitical priests ministered, with everything put in order as directed. Then the cloud covered the tent of the congregation and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle with blessing upon the congregation and the building.
The structure was upright boards set in silver sockets and braced by bars forming its sides and one end, with curtains over it and hangings closing the east entrance. A curtain divided the interior into two apartments, with the outer twice the size of the inner. Its dimensions, material, furnishings and all were exactly according to what was shown on the mount, its inner walls overlaid with gold and angels worked into the ceiling curtains. Exodus 35-40 records the carrying out of the building instructions given on the mountain in Exodus 25-31. The verse belongs to the third part of Exodus, chapters 25 onward, concerning worship as the established form given after deliverance from bitter bondage in Egypt into organized nationhood under Moses with a complete code of laws. Its position in the written record is not strict chronology, since read that way Moses would enter the tabernacle before it was erected.
The wording uses one in the sense of first after a Hebrew idiom where one functions as an ordinal, rendered in the Septuagint as on day one for the first day of the month. The same pattern where mia joined to a day, week, or month means first proves that mia ton sabbaton must be rendered the first day of the week.
Dwelling and Heavenly Pattern
The tabernacle ordered to be set up on the first day of the first month in the second year after the departure from Egypt was erected as God's dwelling-place among His people, built at His command so that He might dwell among them and reveal more fully His great love. There His presence was manifested, and it became the center of Israel's worship under the typical system, remaining God's dwelling-place through the wilderness and through the time of the judges, Samuel, Saul, and David. It was the earthly center of worship until Solomon's temple took its place. Its services were object lessons of spiritual truths, and God's purpose was also to dwell in the hearts of His people, though Israel had not welcomed Him fully into their hearts.
It was set up as a movable, worldly sanctuary in the heart of the wilderness far from enemies, after God brought Israel out from Pharaoh across the Red Sea to Sinai, built by His people as a dwelling-place so their Divine Deliverer might ever be with them, so that the temple of God was with men. Its construction followed in detail the pattern shown to Moses on the mountain, with dimensions, material, furnishings and all exactly according to the directions given there. In that form it was built as a many-part object lesson of God's plan of salvation and His desire to dwell among Israel.
The wilderness tabernacle and its services were types of the heavenly sanctuary where Christ ministers and of the true tabernacle which the Lord pitched and not man, its service representing His ministry there. Its priests served unto the shadow of heavenly things, ministering before the ark for the duration of that sanctuary service, and its rites pointed to the Lamb of God and His power to forgive sin. The seven lamps and the golden altar placed in its first apartment serve as a pattern of the first apartment of the heavenly sanctuary, and the tabernacle with its ministry as a whole serves as a pattern of Christ's ministry in heaven.
That movable sanctuary in the wilderness was afterward succeeded by the magnificent temple of Solomon in Jerusalem, built after the same pattern, which from its dedication when the glory of the Lord filled the house became God's dwelling-place among Israel. There true worship centered until Christ's sacrifice. Though the earthly sanctuary answered every purpose for which it was constructed, with Christ's death the veil was rent and it passed away entirely and forever.
When the tabernacle was raised on that appointed day and its furnishings and offerings were arranged as commanded, the Lord's glory filled it, marking God's taking up residence among His people. When the work was completed as directed, blessing and glory came upon the congregation and the building. That manifested glory showed that He accepted the people's repentance.
Law, Sabbath, and Worship
Exodus 40:2 belongs to the body of laws given through Moses, which includes moral, civil, health, ceremonial, and sacrificial laws as well as the Ten Commandments. The laws about offerings and sacrifices reveal types that serve as shadows of the substance of the new dispensation. It is part of a separate set of laws God gave to regulate the worship of Israel, distinct from the set of laws He gave for the civil government of the people in Exodus 21-23. True Gospel religion is designed to bring men back to God by persuasion, while civil government is a temporary arrangement of force to control men and regulate their relations to each other during probation, so religion and civil government have essentially different purposes and entirely separate lines of operation, and any commingling of them produces discordant clashing detrimental to both.
The verse commands the setting up of the earthly sanctuary whose second apartment, the most holy place, received the ark of the covenant containing the moral law spoken by God at Sinai and written on two tables. The top of that ark is the mercy-seat, where the blood of atonement is sprinkled to obtain pardon for breaking the law shut up beneath it, so the sanctuary houses the broken law below and the ceremonial provision for approaching it again above. The ceremonial system of priesthood and sacrifices taught how atonement could be made, typifying pardon and restitution through atonement and foreshadowing the restoration of the pardoned and the destruction of the impenitent, while the law in the ark remained the law that required atonement. The ark was placed in the Most Holy Place, where the Levitical priests ministered before it, and the tabernacle and its ministry served as a pattern of Christ’s ministry in heaven.
The sanctuary was sanctified and set apart for God’s service for the appointed priestly service, and its erection and anointing prepared it for that service. The priests could not use it as they would their own houses. The time appointed to erect the tabernacle was the first day of the first month.
That setting up on the first day of the first month, including setting the table and showbread in place that day, does not prove that the day was a weekly Sabbath. The command to set out the showbread every Sabbath was given later, so it cannot establish the Sabbath status of the earlier event.
It appoints the first day of the first month in the second year after Israel left Egypt as the time to set up the tabernacle. On that day Moses raised the structure, arranged its furnishings, placed the testimony in the ark beneath the mercy-seat, offered as commanded, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. It was built as God commanded so He might dwell among His people as the center of their worship. The wilderness sanctuary and its services were types of the heavenly sanctuary where Christ ministers and of the true tabernacle which the Lord pitched and not man. In its most holy place the ark held the moral law, with the mercy-seat above where atoning blood was sprinkled to obtain pardon for breaking the law beneath it.
Setting and Erection
The appointed time for setting up the tabernacle was the first day of the first month in the second year after Israel left Egypt. That date is given as the day the tabernacle was to be reared up, and Exodus 35-40 records how Israel carried out the work to that end. It was nearly a year after Israel left Egypt on the fifteenth day of the first month, for they reached Sinai two months after leaving and spent the rest of that year building the tabernacle. The testimony was not put into the ark until that setting up, more than nine months after the tables of stone were given, so the pot of manna could only be laid up before the testimony afterward.
On that day Moses raised the tabernacle and spread the tent over it. He put the testimony of the Ten Commandments into the ark, set the mercy-seat upon it, brought it in and set up the vail. He placed the table of shewbread and the golden candlestick with its seven lamps in the first apartment and lighted the lamps before the Lord, put the golden altar of incense before the vail and burned sweet incense thereon, and offered the burnt offering and the meat offering at the door of the tabernacle as commanded. Its erection and anointing prepared it for priestly service and established the setting where the Levitical priests ministered, with everything put in order as directed. Then the cloud covered the tent of the congregation and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle with blessing upon the congregation and the building.
The structure was upright boards set in silver sockets and braced by bars forming its sides and one end, with curtains over it and hangings closing the east entrance. A curtain divided the interior into two apartments, with the outer twice the size of the inner. Its dimensions, material, furnishings and all were exactly according to what was shown on the mount, its inner walls overlaid with gold and angels worked into the ceiling curtains. Exodus 35-40 records the carrying out of the building instructions given on the mountain in Exodus 25-31. The verse belongs to the third part of Exodus, chapters 25 onward, concerning worship as the established form given after deliverance from bitter bondage in Egypt into organized nationhood under Moses with a complete code of laws. Its position in the written record is not strict chronology, since read that way Moses would enter the tabernacle before it was erected.
The wording uses one in the sense of first after a Hebrew idiom where one functions as an ordinal, rendered in the Septuagint as on day one for the first day of the month. The same pattern where mia joined to a day, week, or month means first proves that mia ton sabbaton must be rendered the first day of the week.
Dwelling and Heavenly Pattern
The tabernacle ordered to be set up on the first day of the first month in the second year after the departure from Egypt was erected as God's dwelling-place among His people, built at His command so that He might dwell among them and reveal more fully His great love. There His presence was manifested, and it became the center of Israel's worship under the typical system, remaining God's dwelling-place through the wilderness and through the time of the judges, Samuel, Saul, and David. It was the earthly center of worship until Solomon's temple took its place. Its services were object lessons of spiritual truths, and God's purpose was also to dwell in the hearts of His people, though Israel had not welcomed Him fully into their hearts.
It was set up as a movable, worldly sanctuary in the heart of the wilderness far from enemies, after God brought Israel out from Pharaoh across the Red Sea to Sinai, built by His people as a dwelling-place so their Divine Deliverer might ever be with them, so that the temple of God was with men. Its construction followed in detail the pattern shown to Moses on the mountain, with dimensions, material, furnishings and all exactly according to the directions given there. In that form it was built as a many-part object lesson of God's plan of salvation and His desire to dwell among Israel.
The wilderness tabernacle and its services were types of the heavenly sanctuary where Christ ministers and of the true tabernacle which the Lord pitched and not man, its service representing His ministry there. Its priests served unto the shadow of heavenly things, ministering before the ark for the duration of that sanctuary service, and its rites pointed to the Lamb of God and His power to forgive sin. The seven lamps and the golden altar placed in its first apartment serve as a pattern of the first apartment of the heavenly sanctuary, and the tabernacle with its ministry as a whole serves as a pattern of Christ's ministry in heaven.
That movable sanctuary in the wilderness was afterward succeeded by the magnificent temple of Solomon in Jerusalem, built after the same pattern, which from its dedication when the glory of the Lord filled the house became God's dwelling-place among Israel. There true worship centered until Christ's sacrifice. Though the earthly sanctuary answered every purpose for which it was constructed, with Christ's death the veil was rent and it passed away entirely and forever.
When the tabernacle was raised on that appointed day and its furnishings and offerings were arranged as commanded, the Lord's glory filled it, marking God's taking up residence among His people. When the work was completed as directed, blessing and glory came upon the congregation and the building. That manifested glory showed that He accepted the people's repentance.
Law, Sabbath, and Worship
Exodus 40:2 belongs to the body of laws given through Moses, which includes moral, civil, health, ceremonial, and sacrificial laws as well as the Ten Commandments. The laws about offerings and sacrifices reveal types that serve as shadows of the substance of the new dispensation. It is part of a separate set of laws God gave to regulate the worship of Israel, distinct from the set of laws He gave for the civil government of the people in Exodus 21-23. True Gospel religion is designed to bring men back to God by persuasion, while civil government is a temporary arrangement of force to control men and regulate their relations to each other during probation, so religion and civil government have essentially different purposes and entirely separate lines of operation, and any commingling of them produces discordant clashing detrimental to both.
The verse commands the setting up of the earthly sanctuary whose second apartment, the most holy place, received the ark of the covenant containing the moral law spoken by God at Sinai and written on two tables. The top of that ark is the mercy-seat, where the blood of atonement is sprinkled to obtain pardon for breaking the law shut up beneath it, so the sanctuary houses the broken law below and the ceremonial provision for approaching it again above. The ceremonial system of priesthood and sacrifices taught how atonement could be made, typifying pardon and restitution through atonement and foreshadowing the restoration of the pardoned and the destruction of the impenitent, while the law in the ark remained the law that required atonement. The ark was placed in the Most Holy Place, where the Levitical priests ministered before it, and the tabernacle and its ministry served as a pattern of Christ’s ministry in heaven.
The sanctuary was sanctified and set apart for God’s service for the appointed priestly service, and its erection and anointing prepared it for that service. The priests could not use it as they would their own houses. The time appointed to erect the tabernacle was the first day of the first month.
That setting up on the first day of the first month, including setting the table and showbread in place that day, does not prove that the day was a weekly Sabbath. The command to set out the showbread every Sabbath was given later, so it cannot establish the Sabbath status of the earlier event.