Rabbi Schneider - Enter Into God's Holy Place
Welcome beloved ones to today's broadcast. We're inside the land of Israel. In just a moment I'm gonna take you to a life size replica of the Tabernacle and teach on it, but before we go there I want to tell you how difficult it was to get to this Tabernacle. We were in the middle of the desert in Israel and my production crews car broke down. It must have been a hundred and ten degrees outside, with the sun blazing as they were sweating and schvitzing in the middle of the desert, trying to get that spare tire on. We couldn't get a new tire, because it was Shabbat, so they had to drive an hour after they changed that tire, on a spare tire, but by the grace of God they eventually made it to the Tabernacle.
I want you to know going to Israel is always an adventure and even though God is everywhere on the planet present to us all, some how and some way there's an extra anointing on the land of Israel. It really is elevated above the earth in a special and supernatural way. So today, thank you for joining me on this edition of Discovering the Jewish Jesus. I'm gonna take you now inside the Tabernacle and I believe that as I do God is gonna impart things into your spirit that are gonna transform you, energize you and cause your faith to increase and cause you to fall deeper in love with Him.
Shalom beloved, I'm excited. I'm in southern Israel and behind me here we have a life size replica, built to Biblical specifications of the ancient Mishkan or Tabernacle. This was the structure that the Lord told His people to build exactly, accordingly to the instructions that He gave Moses, so that He could dwell with Israel. You see what we find is that Father God desires to be close to His people. And He said, "Moses I want you to build Me this Mishkan. I want you to build Me this Tabernacle, that I might dwell with My people".
We learn once again that Father's desire is to dwell with us. He wants to have communion with us. He wants to have a relationship with us. But what we also learn is that there needs to be a pattern, a Biblical, spiritual pattern in order for Him to be able to come close. The teaching of the Tabernacle is a prophetic shadow of the things that need to be in place in our own souls, so that the Lord Jesus can dwell within us. Walk with me as I take you on a journey through the Mishkan, through the Biblical Tabernacle. You'll see the walls. The walls that surround it are a hundred and fifty feet long by fifty feet wide.
Once again, a hundred and fifty feet long by fifty feet wide and about seven and a half feet tall. They were tall enough so that people that were on the outside couldn't see what was going on in the inside. And the wall, the dimension that separate the actual outside from the Tabernacle was designed to cause people to understand that their sin had separated them from God. In other words, these walls, the hundred and fifty feet long and the fifty feet wide, that, that barrier, that fence is meant to teach us that there's a separation, that sin has separated man from God. But listen to this, in God's mercy, even though man's sin has separated him from God, which is evidence by the walls, God in His mercy however, made a way in.
And so you'll see over here, this is the entrance. We don't have clear direction in the Bible as to whether this entrance, you can see the multi colored fabrics just as the Bible specifies here, blue, purple, scarlet. We don't know exactly if it was right next to the, to the, to the outer, outer wall, to the outer fence, or whether it was a few feet away as they have here. The Bible just isn't clear about it. What we're gonna do now is we're gonna go in to the Tabernacle through beloved, the one entrance. Now hear me, remember I said that there was a structure, a fence all the way around it, a hundred and fifty feet long, seventy feet wide. You couldn't go in that way, this is the only entrance in and the entrance, notice once again, is symbolized with this beautiful fabric, as opposed to the fence which is just one color.
This right here, the fact that it's one way in, represented by this door with beautiful colors, it represents Jesus. Who said, "I am the way. No one comes to the Father, but through me". Jesus also described Himself as the door and the gate and the only way into the Father. And the fact that the Tabernacle only has one entrance in represents this beloved ones. So what we're gonna do now, is I'm just gonna come around here and now we're gonna enter the outer court of the Tabernacle.
In the outer court of the Tabernacle there were two pieces. There was the altar and then there was the brass laver, where you would wash yourself. We actually get the word lavatory from the brass laver. It goes all the way back to ancient Israel. But this was the altar. This was the first piece of furniture that the worshiper would have come to. And what the worshiper would do is he would bring his sacrifice with him and depending on how much money he had, that would determine whether it was a goat or a lamb, but if he didn't have as much money he might bring a bird. But let's say for example that the worshiper had brought with him a lamb or a goat as a sacrifice.
What the worshiper would do, is he would place his hands on the head of the animal sacrifice and the Hebrew actually tells us in the book of Leviticus that he actually pressed his weight on to the head of the animal. Symbolically what he was doing as he was putting his hands on to the head of the animal, leaning in to it, symbolically he was transferring his sin as he pressed on to that animal. He was transferring his sin beloved, into that animal. Then the priests would take the animal and they would bind it on the altar by the four horns and they would put it to death and smear the blood around. Once again, showing us that there is no forgiveness of sin without the shedding of blood.
This is one of the most primary teachings and fundamental principles of the entire Word of God. Going all the way back to the Passover, where the Israelites took the blood of the lamb and put it over their doorpost and because they were in a home that was covered with the blood, judgment passed them over. Same proof we see on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. The High Priest brought the blood of the bull and the goat into the Holy of Holies, which I'm gonna show you in a second. So through the entire Torah, in Hebrew Bible, we see that God grants forgiveness when an innocent life has been given in the place of the guilty and it was shadowed in the Torah with the innocent animal dying. And then Jesus fulfilled it once and for all and said, "I'm the one to which all these animal sacrifices pointed to".
And now that Jesus has Himself been crucified and His blood shed, no more animal sacrifices are ever necessary again. So let's continue on. This again is where sin was taken care. The worshiper brought in his animal. The animal was put to death in the worshipers place. The blood was shed, signifying that a life had been given, because the Bible says, "That the life of the flesh is in the blood and I've given it to you on the altar", sayeth the Lord, "to make an atonement for your soul", Leviticus 17:11.
Now every day, notice once again, we're not inside the actual Tabernacle yet. We're in the outer court. So we haven't actually gone into the Tabernacle. We're just in the outer court. The two pieces of furniture, once again, the altar that I just mentioned, where we have forgiveness of sin and then we have the brass laver, which speaks about cleansing. And every day the priests had to come to this brass laver and it was actually made from the mirrors of the women that ministered outside the Tabernacle, Exodus thirty eight and verse eight.
So think about this, here they are in the hot desert sun. You can see there's not a cloud in the sky. The sun is beaming down. It's made of brass. It was filled with water and every day the priests would come and wash here. What do you think they saw when they looked over the brass laver that was filled with water? They saw a reflection of themselves. That's why it was made, once again, from the mirrors of the women that ministered outside the Tabernacle.
Now this is a very important spiritual principle. The point is, that the Lord was cleansing the priests and the way that He cleansed them, was of course in the natural, was with the water that was in the basin. Bu the principle, the mystery of this, is that when they looked over the basin when it was filled with water, they saw a reflection of themselves. That's why the Lord was so specific when He said that this brass laver had to be made from the brass of the mirrors that the women outside the Tabernacle used as they ministered.
You see, a mirror is used to show us a reflection of our self and what the Lord is teaching here at a deeper level is, that if we want to be cleansed of sin, if we want to be cleansed of sin, we need to be able to look at ourselves and as we look at ourselves through the light of His Word and through the light of the Holy Spirit, what happens is as we agree with what God shows us about ourselves, as we accept the conviction of the Holy Spirit, what happens is we're cleansed of sin. Because if we confess our sin He's faithful and just to forgive us our sin and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
So cleansing comes when the Lord shows us Himself by the Spirit, we agree with Him and then what happens is, we're washed of the sin. So at a deeper level that's what this brass laver symbolizes. Again, surface level, they washed with the water, got the sand off and etc. A deeper level, it was used as a prophetic shadow to show us that in order to be cleansed of our sin we need to be able to look at ourselves and agree with what God's Word says, because He's faithful and just to forgive us and cleanse us from all unrighteousness when we agree with what He shows us about ourselves and come in to agreement with His Word.
Well beloved, I'm gonna take you now, inside the actual Tabernacle. We're inside the Tabernacle now, we're inside the holy place. Notice that it's all, all the walls are covered with pure gold. And notice the beautiful fabric above me here and the beautiful symbolism of the divine. Now inside the holy place we have the golden menorah, we have the table of show bread and we have the altar of incense. In back you'll see a curtain and behind that curtain is the Holy of Holies, where the Ark of the Covenant is. I'm gonna begin now by going over to the golden lamp stand, or the golden menorah. This is one of the main official symbols of Judaism. You'll see on much of Jewish displays, you'll see the picture of this menorah here.
Now this menorah is different then what some may see with a nine tiered menorah, because the nine tiered menorah is a Hanukkah menorah. But the menorah in the Tabernacle, Mishkan, notice it was seven branches as opposed to the nine tiered menorah for Hanukkah. Now I want you to hear me, this is very important. This golden menorah was made from one piece of hammered gold. In other words, these different sticks that are part of this lamp stand here were not attached to it. They were never separate, but rather this was all formed and molded out of one piece of gold. This was one big lump of gold that had been formed in this direction. Again, not separate pieces that were connected, but it was all one continuous lump that was hammered out to form the seven different lamp stands.
Now notice on top, each one is burning the oil. I want you to think about this, in the book of Revelation chapter number one, where John is brought before the throne of the Lord. He hears the voice of God coming to him saying, "From He who was, from He who is and from He who is to come". And He said, listen, "From the seven spirits that are before the throne". Notice how many flames we have. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, you see beloved, the menorah, the light that's coming from the menorah represents the Holy Spirit. You would not be able to see anything in here at all. It would be pitch black, because again, the roof is covered, the sides are covered. The only light that's in here is the light that's coming from the golden lamp stand.
And the point is we're in the holy place. This is the place where we can perceive the things of God. This is the place of revelation and the concept is, is that we can't grasp God's mind by relying on the natural sun. The natural sun is outside. I'm talking about the sun that shines, you know on the animals and plants and on the earth. We can't perceive deep revelation often times through the natural sun. To be able to receive God's thoughts we need to be able to receive it through the light of His Spirit. So inside this holy place we have no natural light. The only light we have is coming from the golden menorah, which represents the light of the Holy Spirit.
You see David said, "In they light there is life". There's different types of light in the world, even the devil disguises himself as an angel of light. But when we have God's light we're able to truly have beloved ones, the thoughts of God and perceive the depths of the spirit. Now the light in the menorah is what gives us the ability to perceive the other objects that are in the holy place here and so I'm gonna take you next to the table of show bread. Notice here that there are six loaves on this side, six loaves on this side, for a total of twelve loaves. These twelve loaves stand for the twelve tribes of Israel. They were also known as the Bread of Presence. And the Torah tells us that God's eyes were continually upon them. And again, they represent the tribes of Israel.
So this speaks to us of several things. Number one, that the Lord is saying, "My eyes are always on My children". And then the priests would actually eat the bread on the Sabbath and then replace it. The truth that we find from this is, is that because this is called the Bread of Presence, meaning God's presence, the truth is, is that we eat God's presence. We live by the presence of God. God alone is our source.
Once again, it's called the Bread of Presence. There's twelve here, representing the twelve tribes of Israel and every Shabbat the priests would eat it and replace it. They would eat the Bread of Presence. So what the Lord is saying is that, "I am your source". Just like Jesus quoted from when He overcame the devil in the wilderness, when He said, "Man shall not live by bread alone". He was quoting from the book of Deuteronomy, "But by every word that procedeeth out of the mouth of God". And so the Bread of Presence here, God is always looking at His people, because He loves them and He is our source of life. He is our presence.
Let's continue on now beloved, to the altar of incense. The altar of incense was the place where they would burn continually a special recipe of incense that was prescribed by the Lord. It wasn't just any incense, it was an exact mixture that was specified in the Torah. The incense was always burning. And the Bible tells us in the book of Revelation chapter five verse eight, that rising incense represents, listen, the prayers of God's children, the prayers of the saints. And because there was no wind in here the smoke of the incense went straight up and this speaks to the fact that our prayers should ascend straight up to God.
Sometimes when people pray it looks like they're praying, it sounds like they're praying, but they're not really praying in the true sense, because sometimes what they're doing is they're praying to impress somebody else or they're praying in a way that they think it will impress other people. And when they do that, their prayers aren't going straight up. They're prayers are going outward. Maybe they're standing up and they're praying and it sounds real sanctimonious, but what's in their heart really is, "I want to sound good in front of these people that are listening to me pray". That isn't prayer that ascends straight up, but the prayers beloved, that truly please God are prayers that arise straight up, just like the smoke of the incense in the Tabernacle here arose straight up beloved ones, to the Lord.
So you seen here that inside the holy place we have the three primary objects of the golden menorah, the Table of Show Bread and the Altar of Incense. On next weeks broadcast I'm gonna continue talking about the garments of the High Priests and then we'll go behind beloved, the curtains, into the Holy of Holies. A lot that we've learned today, but the primary thing I want to communicate to you beloved ones is this, the Lord told Israel to build this Mishkan, this Tabernacle, so that He could dwell with His people. He desires to be close to us. He desires to be close to you. But in order for Him to dwell with us in the intimacy that He desires, our lives have to be in order, our soul has to be in order and that's what these things teach us. It's a pattern for how to walk in intimacy with God.
So I pray today that you've learned that we need to rely on the light of the Holy Spirit. We need to be convinced that God loves us and to eat of His presence and we need beloved, to be bathing our lives and saturating our lives in prayer. Prayer is just reaching out to God, it's just talking to Him and we can develop a continual state beloved, of being conscious of His presence. I love you. This is Rabbi Schneider saying shalom to you from southern Israel, inside this Tabernacle replica. Join me next week for a very important edition of Discovering the Jewish Jesus.