Sovereign Grace Baptist Church

Free Grace Media

Of Princeton, New Jersey

 

AuthorClay Curtis
TitleChrist The Pattern
Bible TextExodus 25:1-9
Synopsis Everything about the tabernacle—how the materials were gathered, the materials themselves, the structure, its furnishings, the priesthood and the sacrifices—all typify the Lord Jesus Christ and the redemption he accomplished for his people! Listen
Date28-Jul-2019
Series Exodus 2016
Article Type Sermon Notes
PDF Format pdf
Word Format doc
Audio HI-FI Listen: Christ The Pattern (32 kbps)
Audio CD Quality Listen: Christ The Pattern (128 kbps)
Length 38 min.
 
Series: Exodus 
Title: Christ the Pattern 
Text: Ex 25: 1- 9 
Date: July 28, 2019 
Place: SGBC, NJ 
  
Exodus 25: 1: And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, 2: Speak unto the children of Israel, that they bring me an offering: of every man that giveth it willingly with his heart ye shall take my offering. 3: And this is the offering which ye shall take of them; gold, and silver, and brass, 4: And blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine linen, and goats’ hair, 5: And rams’ skins dyed red, and badgers’ skins, and shittim wood, 6: Oil for the light, spices for anointing oil, and for sweet incense, 7: Onyx stones, and stones to be set in the ephod, and in the breastplate. 8: And let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them. 9: According to all that I shew thee, after the pattern of the tabernacle, and the pattern of all the instruments thereof, even so shall ye make it.
  
Title: Christ the Pattern 
  
Beginning here until the end of chapter 40 (with the exception of three chapters), Moses is in the mount receiving from God a detailed pattern of how he is to make the tabernacle, its furniture and the priesthood.  
  
Proposition: Everything about the tabernacle—how the materials were gathered, the materials themselves, the structure, its furnishings, the priesthood and the sacrifices—all typify the Lord Jesus Christ and the redemption he accomplished for his people! 
  
Divisions: 1) Christ in the offering 2) Christ in the materials 3) Christ in the tabernacle 
  
Title: Christ the Pattern 
  
CHRIST IN THE OFFERING
  
Exodus 25: 1: And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, 2: Speak unto the children of Israel, that they bring me an offering: of every man that giveth it willingly with his heart ye shall take my offering. 
  
God gives his people the privilege of offering a gift to God.  This was not an offering for atonement for sin—this was a heave offering—a thank offering.  Brethren, giving in the name of God is a gift of God to us.  How so?  It is because everything involved, God first, gave to us—the heart, the substance, the opportunity, even God’s willingness to receive it—all is a gift to us through the blood and righteousness of Christ. 
  
Romans 11: 35: Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again? 36: For him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen. 
  
When a child of God gives for Christ’s cause he is giving to God himself.  Therefore, a true child of God will never go broke meeting the needs of God’s house and God’s people—God will not allow it. 
  
Proverbs 19:17: He that hath pity upon the poor lendeth unto the LORD; and that which he hath given will he pay him again. 
  
But in his child, God the Father requires a willing heartGod regards only that which is done from a willing heart—"…of every man that giveth it willingly with his heart ye shall take my offering.”   This is the heart Christ gives in the day of his power—a willing heart.  We can fool one another because we only look on the outward appearance because we cannot see the attitude of the heart.  But God can see the attitude and spirit and hidden motives within us.  So God loves that which no man has by nature—a willing heart. 
  
2 Corinthians 9: 7: Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver. 
  
That is the definition of a willing heart—someone who purposes in his heart.  A willing heart does nothing grudgingly.  The willing heart gives cheerfully.  A willing heart comes from Christ Jesus our Lord—“thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power.”
  
But the main reason this offering had to be from a willing heart is because it typifies the willing heart in the Lord Jesus.  Our Savior’s entire life, even unto death, was a thank offering unto God his Father. 
  
Hebrews 10: 7: Then said I, Lo, I come (in the volume of the book it is written of me,) to do thy will, O God…10; By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all
 
Everything Christ did for God and his people, he did willingly.  And it is by his will that we are saved.  We are not saved by our will but by his will. 
 
CHRIST IN THE MATERIALS
 
Exodus 25: 3: And this is the offering which ye shall take of them; gold, and silver, and brass, 4: And blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine linen, and goats’ hair, 5: And rams’ skins dyed red, and badgers’ skins, and shittim wood, 6: Oil for the light, spices for anointing oil, and for sweet incense, 7: Onyx stones, and stones to be set in the ephod, and in the breastplate. 
  
Some of these materials are expensive, beautiful materials—gold, silver, brass, blue purple, scarlet, fine linen.  Others are plain, nothing to look upon—goats’ hair, rams skins dyed red, badger skins.  If you saw the outside of the tabernacle—it was covered in badger skins—it was nothing to look upon.  But inside it was full of gold, silver, brass, blue, purple, scarlet, fine linen.  Like the tabernacle, outwardly, there was nothing about Christ to impress men—he took flesh like unto his brethren. 
  
Isaiah 53: 2: For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him. 3: He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. 
  
But like the tabernacle, within Christ is God. 
  
Hebrews 7:26  For such an high priest became us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens; 
  
Shittim wood was extensively used in building the tabernacle, the ark, the table of shewbread, and the altars—it is called the “imperishable” wood.  Christ is the imperishable Savior.  Shittim—the city—was on the bank of the Jordan where God stopped the flow of water so the people could go across.  Rather than the fire of God’s wrath making Christ perish, Christ made the fire of God’s wrath perish from his people forever.  He stopped the flow of God’s wrath toward his people.  Now, Christ ever lives to make intercession for us—Christ is the imperishable Savior! 
  
Oil for light, spices for anointing oil,—both picture the Holy Spirit—sweet incense—the smoke going up a picture of Christ’s intercession for his people 
 
Onyx stones, and stones to be set in the ephod, and in the breastplate”—these represent God’s elect.  Each time the high priest went into the holiest of holies to make atonement for the children of Israel, he had these precious stones near his heart. When Christ redeemed his people and entered the true holy of holies in God’s presence he had each of his elect in his heart—“having loved his own he loved them till the end.”
 
CHRIST IN THE TABERNACLE
 
Exodus 25: 8: And let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them. 9: According to all that I shew thee, after the pattern of the tabernacle, and the pattern of all the instruments thereof, even so shall ye make it.
 
It is probable that God showed Moses how he would save his people in and by Christ his Son and how this tabernacle pictured Christo—so God told Moses to make everything after the exact pattern he was shown. 
  
Hebrews 8: 1: Now of the things which we have spoken this is the sum: We have such an high priest, who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens; 2: A minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man. 3: For every high priest is ordained to offer gifts and sacrifices: wherefore it is of necessity that this man have somewhat also to offer. 4: For if he were on earth, he should not be a priest, seeing that there are priests that offer gifts according to the law: 5: Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things, as Moses was admonished of God when he was about to make the tabernacle: for, See, saith he, that thou make all things according to the pattern shewed to thee in the mount. 6: But now hath [Christ] obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises. 
  
Hebrews 9: 1: Then verily the first covenant had also ordinances of divine service, and a worldly sanctuary. 2  For there was a tabernacle made; the first [tabernacle or room], wherein was the candlestick, and the table, and the shewbread; which is called the sanctuary. 3: And after [that room or tabernacle] the second veil, the tabernacle which is called the Holiest of all; 4  Which had the golden censer, and the ark of the covenant overlaid round about with gold, wherein was the golden pot that had manna, and Aaron’s rod that budded, and the tables of the covenant; 5: And over it the cherubims of glory shadowing the mercyseat; of which we cannot now speak particularly.  6: Now when these things were thus ordained, the priests went always into the first tabernacle [the first room], accomplishing the service of God. 7: But into the second [the holiest of holies] went the high priest alone once every year, not without blood, which he offered for himself, and for the errors of the people: 8: The Holy Ghost this signifying, that the way into the [true] holiest of all [God’s presence] was not yet made manifest, while as the first tabernacle was yet standing: 9: Which was a figure for the time then present, in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices, that could not make him that did the service perfect, as pertaining to the conscience; 10: Which stood only in meats and drinks, and divers washings, and carnal ordinances, imposed on them until the time of reformation. 11: But Christ being come an high priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building; 12: Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us
  
God said “let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them”—when Christ dwelt here among us in the flesh, God dwelled among us.
  
Mathew 1: 1:…they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.
 
Even now with Christ in us, God the Father is in Christ so that he still dwells among us. 
  
John 17: 22: And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one: 23: I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me. 
  
So for the next 12-13 chapters we will see Christ typified in detail in the tabernacle and its furnishings and offerings.  This whole book is concerning Christ and the great salvation God has wrought in him for his elect. 
  
John 5:46  For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me: for he wrote of me. 
  
Luke 24: 27: And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. 
  
Luke 24:44  And he said unto them, These are the words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms, concerning me. 
  
It is Christ’s person and works that we are to preach.  He is the message of the book.  Believe on him and you shall be saved! 
  
Amen!