In Exodus 25, God gives Moses instructions on how to build the Tabernacle as well as the articles therein. We all know that there is a lot of gold in there; I have certainly taken that for granted. But reading it again, I was taken aback at how much gold was involved. Here are some excerpts from that chapter: They are to make an ark of acacia wood . . . Overlay it with pure gold; overlay it both inside and out. Also make a gold molding all around it. . . . Make poles of acacia wood and overlay them with gold. . . . Make a mercy seat of pure gold, 45 inches long and 27 inches wide. Make two cherubim of gold; make them of hammered work at the two ends of the mercy seat. . . . You are to construct a table of acacia wood . . . Overlay it with pure gold and make a gold molding all around it. Make a three-inch frame all around it and make a gold molding for it all around its frame. Make four gold rings for it, and attach the rings to the four corners at its four legs. . . . Make the poles of acacia wood and overlay them with gold, and the table can be carried by them. You are also to make its plates and cups, as well as its pitchers and bowls for pouring drink offerings. Make them out of pure gold. . . . You are to make a lampstand out of pure, hammered gold. It is to be made of one piece: its base and shaft, its ornamental cups, and its calyxes and petals. . . . All of it is to be a single hammered piece of pure gold. . . . Its snuffers and firepans must be of pure gold. The lampstand with all these utensils is to be made from 75 pounds of pure gold. Be careful to make them according to the pattern you have been shown on the mountain. That's a lot of pure gold! Why would God insist on so much gold? The cynics generally offer one of two reasons:
Not being wealthy, an investor, or a geologist, I haven't spent much time studying precious metals, so this is rather new to me. Here's a review of gold's properties:
Furthermore, gold seems to exist all over the world. There are currently very large gold mines in South Africa, Nevada and California, Indonesia, Australia, Peru, New Guinea, Japan, Western Africa, Dominican Republic, Mongolia, Russia, and Uzbekistan. Gold artifacts dating back thousands of years have been found across Europe and South America, and that's not getting to the famous golden treasures of ancient Egypt. Clearly, gold existed in accessible form somewhere near Egypt and the Ancient Near East. And the fact that other cultures were using gold in ways God commanded of the Jews does not mean that God did not indeed create it for that purpose in the first place! It means that they discovered what God had intended for its use in the first place. I would go so far to say that God used these other cultures to teach the Jews (who were emerging from 400 years of slavery) goldworking and smithing techniques necessary to accomplish what God asked of them. Now, let's wrap this discussion up. Why did God insist on so much gold in the Tabernacle and Temple? Yes, to make sure the Jews had a personal investment in their relationship with Him, and yes, to make sure their place of worship was worthy of the Living God, but there actually seems to be much more to it. And, as God does, it makes more sense than any other choice:
So why don't we use gold today in our worship? Great question that's surprisingly easily answered. Some churches do, only they don't use gold. They install million-dollar chandeliers or worship in multi-million dollar facilities. They have substituted gold for other implements in our culture that accomplish the same effect. At their best, the proponents of these facilities will say that they are giving their utmost to God's worship. I can respect that. However, it might not be necessary. The New Testament presents a very different picture of worship than the Old. It's actually not centered around a building at all. Indeed, Old Testament worship is Temple-centric, meaning it will necessarily be ceremony-heavy. But the book of Hebrews makes it clear that Jesus fulfilled everything God intended in that Old Covenant and thus made the Temple obsolete. We no longer worship in a temple made by human hands, but rather we are the new temple. Our very lives are the new offering that pleases God; we can build our lives out of gold/silver/precious stones or wood/hay/stubble. The choice is ours. And the imagery is the same. One of my favorite old Baptist pastors said it far better than I can: 'Tis most evident that the Worship of the Old Testament for the beauty and ornament of outward Ceremonies, and the splendor of their observation, far exceeds and excels that Worship which God Commands now.
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