FOLLOWING THE PATTERN IN THE NEW YEAR

By Joe Slater

What do you suppose God’s people were doing on New Year’s
Day roughly 3500 years ago? Would you believe they were
putting up the tabernacle? “On the first day of the first month,
you shall set up the tabernacle of the tent of meeting” (Exodus
40:1). “And it came to pass in the first month of the second year,
on the first day of the month, that the tabernacle was raised up”
(40:17).

Earlier in Exodus (chapters 25-31) God had given Moses
explicit and detailed instructions about the tabernacle and all of
its furnishings, beginning with this exhortation: “According to
all that I show you, that is, the pattern of the tabernacle and the
pattern of all its furnishings, just so shall you make it” (25:9).

The Lord repeated this command several times as He specified
the dimensions, materials, design, etc., of the tabernacle and its
furnishings. “And see to it that you make them according to the
pattern which was shown you on the mountain” (25:40). “And
you shall raise up the tabernacle according to its pattern which
you were shown on the mountain” (26:30). “As it was shown
you on the mountain, shall they make it” (27:8). SO Moses and the Israelites took 

God seriously!”Thus Moses did: according to all that the Lord had 

commanded him, so he did”
(Exodus 40:16).

The tabernacle and things associated with it were a shadow of
the better things Jesus Christ established in the New Covenant.
The Hebrews writer taught that we ought to be even more
diligent to be faithful in the New Covenant than Moses and the
Israelites were in the Old Covenant (Hebrews 2:1-4; 10:28-31).
In this new year, let us renew our determination to follow God’s
pattern set forth in the New Testament!