The symbolism of the tabernacle

Werner A. Solórzano Lemus

It never fails that the question “why are we here?” will be asked every year at the feast.
We’ve all heard it, either from the mouth of Mr. Armstrong himself or from someone
quoting him. And we all know the answer, that it is a commanded assembly and as a
testimony to our faith, we all across God’s church gather to keep it in spite of all our
differences.

But what is the deeper reason for this feast? Why are we commanded to keep it? Every
feast has symbolisms from which we glean a deeper meaning of God’s plan for our lives.
Passover: The bread and the wine; footwashing
Unleavened bread: Leaven and unleavened bread
Pentecost: the two loaves that were offered, the wave offering
Trumpets: The sound of the trumpets
Atonement: Fasting; the two goats

The symbolism behind the Feast of Tabernacles is the tabernacle, that is a temporary
dwelling. The meaning we most often hear for the feast is the millennium aspect of
God’s plan. Today I would like to discuss a meaning of this Feast of Tabernacles that we
don’t hear as often that draws from this symbolism of a temporary dwelling.

What exactly does this symbolism mean for us? Why would God command us to stay in
temporary dwellings during this feast, let alone name the feast after them? Does the
Bible reveal the reason behind this command?

“You shall dwell in booths for seven days. All who are native Israelites shall dwell in
booths, that your generations may know that I made the children of Israel dwell in
booths when I brought them out of the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.’”
Lev 23:42-43

According to this verse, the Israelites were to made to dwell in booths as a yearly
reminder of when they did so after God brought them out of Egypt.

In Biblical typology Egypt symbolizes sin and this system in which we live. The
shorthand expression is: This world. The journey through the wilderness of the
Israelites represents our journey through this world until we reach the promised land.
Paul makes this very clear in the book of Hebrews and admonishes us to have the faith
so as to enter that rest. There is a huge corpus of music that was inspired by these
symbolisms. “On Jordan's stormy banks I stand, and cast a wishful eye to Canaan's fair
and happy land, where my possessions lie. I am bound for the promised land,
I am bound for the promised land; oh, who will come and go with me? I am bound for
the promised land”

Take for example what Paul told the Philippians:

“For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the
Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His
glorious body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to
Himself.”

Peter talks about his body as a tabernacle, a tent, a temporary dwelling.

“Yes, I think it is right, as long as I am in this tent, to stir you up by reminding you,
knowing that shortly I must put off my tent, just as our Lord Jesus Christ showed me.
Moreover, I will be careful to ensure that you always have a reminder of these things
after my decease”

As our sojourn during the Feast will end, so will the sojourn of our physical lives. That
understanding gives us a sense of impermanence, of a limited amount time which in turn
gives us a sense of urgency to use that time wisely to prepare ourselves for God's
Kingdom.

Being in temporary dwellings for too long makes us long to go home, just like
sojourning in this world in physical bodies makes us long for God's kingdom (2
Corinthians 5:1-2)

We groan against our ailing bodies, we groan against our “fleshly lusts, which war
against the soul”

By celebrating the FOT we are making a confession of faith, that we are strangers and
pilgrims, that we sojourn in this world looking for that city that has foundations whose
builder and maker is God. We follow on the footsteps of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,
who sojourned in the land of promise, dying in faith without having received it, and all
the other heroes of the faith as we like to call them.

But you know what? We are also following in the footsteps of someone greater than all
of them because it was at this time of year that our Savior was born.

There is a large consensus regarding an autumn birth. We obviously do not have time to
devote ourselves to such a study during this message but the time of the announcement
of the birth of John the Baptist during the priestly course of Abijah, the meteorological
conditions at his birth (but especially the latter evidence) point us toward an autumn
baby.

When Israel was in the wilderness, God did not sit on his ivory throne in heaven and
look down on poor Israel and send an angel every once in a while saying: Where are
they now? God’s tent was right in the middle of the camp every night and God
tabernacled with Israel. He camped out with them.

In the latter days, as John tells us, God decided once again that He wanted to be close to
man. God left Israel as the prophets say and He no longer camped out with them, and
God and Israel drifted apart. But He wanted to be closer than He had ever been before.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him
nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And
the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it”

“And the Word became flesh and TABERNACLED among us, and we beheld His glory,
the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth”

The choice of words is that Jesus came into the world to camp out, to Tabernacle among
us once again. Not as a cloud, not as a pillar of fire, not as one who could not be
approached, but with a physical body, you could touch him, lean on his shoulder, you
could hear his voice fall on your ears and the proximity of God and of the touch of Jesus
Christ was there.

He was with men as He had never been before.

The FOT is also symbolically connected to the birth of Jesus. John’s choice of words is
very significant. Jesus went through the human experience as we are doing. He was
tempted in all points as we are and therefore is a compassionate High Priest.

Therefore, we come to this FOT to worship God, to make a confession of faith that we
are sojourners and pilgrims and to celebrate Christ as the prophet spoke of Him: Behold
the man, whose name is the Branch.